Book Image

Google Visualization API Essentials

By : Traci Lynn Ruthkoski
Book Image

Google Visualization API Essentials

By: Traci Lynn Ruthkoski

Overview of this book

There's a lot of data in our world, and visual representations are often the best method of making sense of it all. Yet, it should not take an army of programmers and analysts to create visualizations in order to make data useful. The Google Visualization API is accessible to novice and advanced programmers alike, making data useful to more people."Google Visualization API Essentials" will show you how to create interactive data displays with very little code. The API, combined with Google Spreadsheets and Fusion Tables, is a complete system, from data management to analytical displays. Not only is it simple to learn, but the Google Visualization API can also be viewed as a first step to learning additional Google APIs."Google Visualization API Essentials" uses both methodology overviews and hands-on examples with real data to introduce chart and graph creation on the Google platform. Topics are presented from various aspects, including Google Spreadsheets and Fusion Tables, and Graphic User Interfaces. An overview of the various API development environments available to developers is also covered. Basic and advanced charts, data source connectivity, style formatting, and publishing options are also explored in depth."Google Visualization API Essentials" brings the arsenal of Google Visualizations into the web developer toolkit.
Table of Contents (16 chapters)

Knowledge prerequisites


With Google Visualization Tools, a developer with knowledge of HTML5 and some JavaScript can utilize approximately 90 percent of the functionality of the Application Programming Interface (API). Some methods of creating visualizations do not even require writing code at all, but instead rely on the Graphic User Interface (GUI) of common Google Drive (previously known as Google Docs) tools. The remaining 10 percent of the functionality comes from the ability to interface with custom data sources. Google often makes its Java Libraries, in this case the Data Source Libraries, available for developers to use. A developer requiring such a capability can build custom data source connectors to a database on a web server. However, data connectors provided in the Visualization API, including communications through a SQL-like query language and jQuery, are generally adequate for most visualization projects.

Skill summary

To work in depth with the Visualization APIs, the following programming skills are highly recommended:

  • HTML5

  • JavaScript

  • Java (specific uses only)

System requirements

In short, the Visualization API requires very little beyond a text editor and Internet access to create visualizations. However, additional tools make development much easier. Suggested tools or services when working with the Visualization API are as follows:

A Google account is required for the purposes of this book. Without a Google account, many of the tutorials and examples will not work properly.