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DB Query Becomes Browseable In Virtual World

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the kill-that-query-takes-on-a-whole-new-meaning dept.

Jani Pirkola writes to tell us that Green Phosphor's new project "Glasshouse" allows users to take database queries or spreadsheets and create 3D representations in a virtual world. Man what I wouldn't give to mash my level 80 death knight up with some of the ugly joins I have run across in the past. "Users can see data, and drill into it; re-sort it; explore it interactively - all from within a virtual world. Glasshouse produces graphs which are avatars of the data itself. We've tailored the system for the use of biotech companies, specifically for drug discovery and development. Dr. David Resuehr, a molecular biologist, recently joined Green Phosphor as our Chief Scientist."

19 of 82 comments (clear)

  1. It's a database query, I know this! by PotatoFarmer · · Score: 5, Funny

    But the real question, of course, is whether or not a teenage hacker girl can successfully use this to navigate your data and fix your TPS reports before the velociraptors eat you all.

    1. Re:It's a database query, I know this! by sukotto · · Score: 2, Funny

      Only if it's Unix. She KNOWS that.

      --
      Come play free flash games on Kongregate!
  2. Re:And who's to blame? by Seakip18 · · Score: 4, Funny

    [Outside a Miami office building, a quick shot to a broken window several floors up.]
    [Then a cut to the street where Horatio knells over a bloodied monitor, with the attached tower in parts. Delko pokes at the nearby keyboard various instruments]
    D: It looks like a lot of energy was transferred from the keyboard to this monitor.
    H: You can tell by the missing keys on the keyboard, this was an old fashion capacitor driven board...
    D: Well whoever did this did a select * on destruction with both hands.
    [Horatio stands, removing his sun glasses]H: He didn't just go Select *...he committed the changes without a rollback.
    [Intro to the The Who's "Won't Get Fooled Again"]

    --
    import system.cool.Sig;
  3. DNA got there first by Kupfernigk · · Score: 4, Insightful
    Remember when Zaphod Beeblebrox fixes things in the galactic accounting system by entering a virtual old-style accounting world? How many other big ideas did DNA get to first? - including his request for the universal power brick.

    More seriously, the point about visualisation of data is well made. How many people who think they are information literate produce incomprehensible spreadsheets and graphs that conceal reality? However, the example on the web page (oil production) is a terrible one - very hard to read, unnecessary wodges of solid color, everything that upsets Tufte. To make a project like this really work, I think they are going to have to concentrate on what to leave out, as much as what to leave in. And silly avatars don't cut it. Learn from Clippy, guys. I am sure that there is a right way to use data to virtual reality 3D modelling, but, and I can't say this too strongly, when marketing demands more color, more widgets and exciting background sound tracks, tell them to go fornicate off. Thousands of data analysts will thank you.

    --
    From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
    1. Re:DNA got there first by lennier · · Score: 3, Insightful

      "How many people who think they are information literate produce incomprehensible spreadsheets and graphs that conceal reality? "

      You say that as if revealing reality were what corporate reports were about in the first place.

      --
      You are not a brain: http://books.google.com/books?id=2oV61CeDx-YC
    2. Re:DNA got there first by StormReaver · · Score: 2, Insightful

      > How many people who think they are information literate produce incomprehensible spreadsheets and graphs that conceal reality?

      And that is why this "technology" won't displace any current business methods. Producing business data in 3D won't tell you anything more interesting than it will in 2D (with the exception of a few specialized fields which already represent their data in 3D). Anyone unethical enough to intentionally hide business reality in 2D will still unethically hide business reality in 3D. This is not magic pixie dust that will eliminate white collar deceit and crime. It is just another way to show the same data we've been showing since the invention of business graphics.

      There will be no additional business specialty that doesn't already exist. This is a neat tinker toy, and nothing more. The author is just very easily impressed.

    3. Re:DNA got there first by arkowitz · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Tufte unfortunately did not have an actual 3D world in which to experiment. He was stuck on the page. Screenshots are bullshit no matter what you do; 3D requires motion. Try it someday. Arkowitz

    4. Re:DNA got there first by arkowitz · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The magic pixie dust is the realtime collaboration. That's why it matters that the data is in the virtual world. Also, I have to respectfully disagree with your assumption that using three dimensions to display data gets you no more understanding than using two. Just the ability to see time, grouping, and magnitude all at once exposes relationships that were not obvious in two dimensions. This is why scientists have been using 3+D visualization for a long time. Why not apply the same techniques to business and to government? Arkowitz

  4. Re:Huh. by NotBornYesterday · · Score: 3, Funny

    Looks like a mini-nightmare I had when I nodded off during a late-afternoon DB2 class.

    --
    I prefer rogues to imbeciles because they sometimes take a rest.
  5. New excuse by clarkkent09 · · Score: 5, Funny

    No boss, I'm not playing rpg games at work, I'm working on my quarterly sales report

    --
    Negative moral value of force outweighs the positive value of good intentions.
  6. Cathartic by clarkkent09 · · Score: 2, Funny

    Users can see data, and drill into it; re-sort it; explore it interactively - all from within a virtual world.

    Can you shoot at a stock prices chart until it explodes in a huge fireball? Can you chop it up with an axe? Can you take a dump on it? I can see some value in this after all

    --
    Negative moral value of force outweighs the positive value of good intentions.
  7. I've looked at this... by argent · · Score: 2, Informative

    It works, surprisingly well, but it really needs a richer scripting environment than Second Life provides to really produce good feedback. Also, it would benefit from having the ability to manage and maintain the parameters of the display outside the 3d world, because editing and retyping a database query in "chat" is not pretty.

  8. These tools.. by mewsenews · · Score: 2, Interesting

    .. always seem fun and then never seem to go anywhere. Anyone else remember psDooM? Blast away unwanted processes with a shotgun? Sounds great, right?

    Well.. turns out, when you actually want to terminate a process, Windows Task Manager, or ps & kill are vastly more efficient, effective, and obvious tools to do the job.

  9. Re:You couldn't make this up... by BlackSabbath · · Score: 2, Interesting

    In a slightly more considered tone I will say this:

    This tool (assuming it has some diagnostic benefits), can be just as easily deployed to mislead as to inform. Anybody that's looked at company reports knows they're full of graphs that for the most part tend from lower left to upper right. "That's good isn't it?"

  10. Earlier generation was "Adventure Shell" by billstewart · · Score: 5, Interesting


    You are in a small dusty directory called "$HOME".
    A stairway called ".." leads up and a stairway called "docs" leads down.
    There are files here.
    > throw file "foo" at lineprinter daemon.
    The lineprinter daemon eats your file and belches.
    > Delete file "bar"
    What? With your bare hands?

    Doug Gwyn's Adventure Shell added a layer of Adventure-like syntactic sugar to the regular Bourne Shell. It wasn't terribly useful, but it was fun for 15 minutes, and since it was written in shell, you could hack on it yourself, and everything worked relatively normally.

    If I were using the 3D visual interface, I'd expect my data to be slightly out of focus and to get carried off by pterodactyls if I didn't pay enough attention to everything at once...

    --

    Bill Stewart
    New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
  11. Re:ObDilbert by Linker3000 · · Score: 2, Funny

    This is to prevent rouge programs.

    --
    AT&ROFLMAO
  12. Re:You couldn't make this up... by BlackSabbath · · Score: 2, Insightful

    The above post (AC) belongs to me. For some reason I was logged in to one tab but not in another (FF 3.07). Weird.

  13. Re:Has to be asked... by Tim_UWA · · Score: 2, Funny

    Yes... I mean no

  14. Survival got there first by Ostracus · · Score: 2

    They are if the company's small, private, and doesn't have the concept of a "golden parachute" for anyone.

    --
    Shai Schticks:"You don't make peace with friends, you make peace with enemies"