NetViz - Group 3

[lynnwbl]

DSCI532-peer-review

1. Open an issue with the name of your group and app Use this template:

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To complete by the group

• Name of the app: NetViz
• Link to the repo in milestone2: https://github.com/UBC-MDS/netviz/releases/tag/v0.1.1

• Link to the proposal.md file where it is the description of the persona and scenario:
  https://github.com/UBC-MDS/netviz/blob/main/doc/proposal.md

2. Review the group that is one number ahead of your group's number. For example, if you are group 5, review group 6. If you are group 30, review group 1. Paste your answers in the issue of the group assigned.

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To complete by the group reviewing:

Persona

• Provide 3 pieces of constructive feedback that could help the app to be better suited to the scenario it was designed for
• Provide 3 pieces of constructive feedback that could help the app to be better suited to the user(persona) it was designed for

Frontend / layout

• Is the text (plot labels / titles / subtitles) easy to read?
• Are the plots selected appropiated for the data? Can you think of other alternatives or improvements for the plots regarding interactivity/reactivity or plot selection?
• Was the dashboard organized in a way that was easy to read (columns / rows) or you would suggest a change in this sense?
• Would you prefer including tabs / navbars to improve the navigation or you think it is better to visualize everything in one screen by the nature of the content?
• Are the plots or other images described properly for the persona described?

Backend

• Are the options that you can select in the widgets working fine or have you found some cases where it is not working?
• If there are interactive plots: are the labels clear and easy to understand?

Documentation

• Was the documentation easy to understand from the README.md how to use the app? How could the documentation be improved?
• Was the app intuitive to use without reading the documentation? What information could be good to include?

Indicate something you would like to include in your own app after reviewing this one

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[michelle-wms]

Persona

• Provide 3 pieces of constructive feedback that could help the app to be better suited to the scenario it was designed for

  The Table of Examples at the bottom right can be slightly simpler and improved on ease of navigation rather than scrolling through hundreds of pages of titles. Table of Examples can incorporate other information like film’s year so that stakeholders can get more insight on these films and perhaps be ordered in descending order of year. There could be another bar chart that shows information on top genres of all films so that we can see which genres are more popular

• Provide 3 pieces of constructive feedback that could help the app to be better suited to the user(persona) it was designed for

  There could be a widget for users to select different periods of films and connect that with the trend line and table below to display films that are in that year. This is useful for the stakeholders to zoom in on specific periods of interest for example: 2019-2021. Rating chart and Movies over time chart can be linked interactively for users to select different ratings and have the movies over time reflect those ratings. This is useful for users to see specific trends in certain ratings of interest. The World Map is very cool. There could be a dedicated widget to input the country of interest that users want to target to display just the figure for that country so that the user doesn’t need to hover their mouse to search for the country’s figures.

Frontend / layout

• Is the text (plot labels / titles / subtitles) easy to read?

  The header color for “World Map” appears to be a lighter shade than the other headers and is harder to read with the yellow font. A darker shade might help increase contrast and readability. Styling could be added to the Table of Examples to help increase readability, such as a bolded header, striped rows, and left alignment for text columns.

• Are the plots selected appropriate for the data? Can you think of other alternatives or improvements for the plots regarding interactivity/reactivity or plot selection?

  A feature that would be nice to have is the ability to search or sort the Table of Examples to help users find specific movies from directors or on specific topics in the description. Another interactive feature that could be useful for the persona is filtering the movies in the table of examples by rating, such that clicking on a bar in the “Rating” section would link to the “Table of Examples” section. Similar interactivity could potentially be implemented for the Release Year and Country.

• Was the dashboard organized in a way that was easy to read (columns / rows) or you would suggest a change in this sense?

  Yes it was fairly easy to read

• Would you prefer including tabs / navbars to improve the navigation or you think it is better to visualize everything in one screen by the nature of the content?

  I think it's not necessary, one single page is good.

• Are the plots or other images described properly for the persona described?

  Overall, the dashboard was well organized and plots seem reasonably understandable for the target persona.

Backend

• Are the options that you can select in the widgets working fine or have you found some cases where it is not working?

  The widgets work as expected.

• If there are interactive plots: are the labels clear and easy to understand?

  All the interactivity provided works as expected. The plot of Ratings and Netflix Movies over Time are of different plot sizes which keeps changing based on genre selected. It would be great if you could make both the plots sizes the same. The zoom in and out interactivity in Netflix Movies over Time plot triggers everytime we scroll to see the table plot . This could be my preference but I found it hard to deal with . My opinion would be to either adjust the amount of zoom in and zoom out or provide a selection interval in the plot itself . The world map plot is an interesting plot . It would be great if you could provide interactivity to it . Also the plot looks shrunken , the table plot can be reduced in size to increase the visual representation of the world map .

Documentation

• Was the documentation easy to understand from the README.md how to use the app? How could the documentation be improved?
• Was the app intuitive to use without reading the documentation? What information could be good to include?

The documentation is fairly easy to understand. It’s very nice that the table of content was included in the README.md file so that users can quickly navigate through the documentation. And the link to the data set and app were both included, which is very handy. In the description section, the document clearly narrated how to use the dashboard step by step. Users can have a clear idea of what to expect from each visualization module. However, it would be better if more explanation could be provided about the movie rating. This part is not that intuitive. It’s really nice that the gif of app usage was included in the readme to show the function of the widget. I really like this part. The installation part included very detailed installation instructions to help users install and run the app locally, which is very nice and intuitive. Overall, the documentation was very clear and intuitive for users to use and follow. One thing I would recommend is that the motivation is better placed before the description of usage. As I was a little confused about the target users and the purpose of developing this app at the beginning. The app was intuitive to use without reading the documentation. But it's better to include a short description of each visualization for users to follow the information displayed in each plot. For example, in the plot named “World map”, I found it hard to understand what the app was showing. It could mean how many users in different countries were using Netflix as well without providing sufficient context information.

Overall, great job and very informative dashboard! 👯