DB Query Becomes Browseable In Virtual World

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."

Comments

It's a database query, I know this!

[PotatoFarmer]

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.

Re:And who's to blame?

[Seakip18]

[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"]

DNA got there first

[Kupfernigk]

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.

Re:DNA got there first

[lennier]

"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.

Re:DNA got there first

[arkowitz]

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

Re:Huh.

[NotBornYesterday]

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

New excuse

[clarkkent09]

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

Earlier generation was "Adventure Shell"

[billstewart]

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...