Visualisation Software - an A-Z of the basics

Analysis: The primary reason engineers, scientists, and researchers employ visualisation technology is to accurately analyze their data. It is the analysis of data through visualisation that results in greater insight, understanding, and knowledge.

Benefits: Users of visualisation software derive many benefits. In addition to facilitating communication and collaboration, it helps users plot, explore, and manipulate their data.

Colour: If a picture is worth 1,000 words, then a colour picture is worth more. Each colour can have a unique meaning associated with distinct properties, allowing the user to gain insight and additional understanding from his data.

Desktop: Not so long ago, desktop visualisation was not possible. Visualisation tasks were typically the domain of powerful supercomputers at large government laboratories. Then, servers and workstations became available with the power to perform visualisation work. Today, visualisation software runs on affordable desktop workstations.

Ease of Use: Clichés aside, a software program must be easy to use if it is to be truly useful. An effective visualisation package is one that can be used out-of-the-box, with little or no prior experience.

Fast: Visualisation software has kept pace with companies’ need for speed. Users of visualisation software expect fast results and today’s advanced data visualisation products do not disappoint. They wade through mountains of data, extract pertinent information, perform numerous calculations, and create graphical displays.

Graphics: A pie chart, bar chart, shaded surface, or x-y plot are just some of the graphics that a visualisation software user can choose to communicate their results. While colour is important, the graphics on which the colour is draped play a critical role in data analysis. Modern visualization software combines thousands of colours with hundreds of graphics to tell the story hidden in the data.

Huge Data: With continuing advances in the processing power and memory capacity of desktop computers, engineers and scientists have become adept at generating huge data sets when conducting engineering simulations. This data glut, coupled with the stringent demand for accuracy, is the main driver behind the evolution and widespread acceptance of visualisation software.

Intuitive: Productivity tools, such as visualisation software, are not helpful if they are a burden to use. For these tools to deliver on their promise, they must be intuitive, designed to automatically perform many routine tasks.

Judgment: Corporate executives are awarded their positions in part because they exercise sound judgment. Because visualisation software is a leading tool for increasing productivity and job satisfaction, its use demonstrates good managerial judgment.

Killer Application: As a relatively young category of software, no visualisation product has yet earned the title of killer application. This means that any visualisation software, when fully deployed and properly utilised by an organization to deliver superior results, can be considered indispensable by that organization, making it their killer application.

License: Software buyers expect comprehensive product documentation and technical support, coupled with timely product upgrades and innovation. Only financially stable software vendors can offer these ancillary services. It is imperative, therefore, that piracy be stopped.

Money: As the lifeblood of businesses, money is the resource that keeps them afloat, workers employed, and customers satisfied. Companies do everything they can, including making investments where necessary, to streamline operations, increase efficiencies, and maximize profits. The purchase and implementation of visualisation software is one such investment.

Numerical Simulation: Whether measuring stress levels of an airplane wing or recording temperature fluctuations of a NASCAR engine, numerical simulation is the engineering technique of choice for many technical professionals. Numerical simulation alone, however, is not enough. The data generated by the simulation must still be analyzed and, often, presented to others. That's the job of visualisation software.

Output: Often overlooked in discussions about visualisation software is the output it generates. Sure, most visualisation software can generate fantastic onscreen images that help users perform detailed analysis of their data, but does it offer versatile output formats that protect resolution and graphics quality? Because sharing results is often as important as getting them in the first place, presentation output is an integral component of visualisation software.

Productivity: Perhaps the main reason companies chose to invest in visualisation software is because it can increase the productivity of its technical professionals. When their productivity increases, they generate quality results in less time, resulting in greater efficiencies that directly impact the bottom line.

Query Tools: One of the greatest strengths of the new breed of visualisation software is its ability to extract pertinent information from huge data sets. Often, the data must be broken down into subsets before the relevant information is found. Advanced visualisation software does this by employing query tools that cut through the chaff to find the wheat. Based on parameters established by the user, these query tools will find essential data points, streamlining the entire analysis process.

Return on Investment: Quantifying the return on investment from the purchase of software is difficult. Nevertheless, Tecplot user Ken Greiner, a senior engineer at Cary, N.C-based Coventor, Inc., recently said, “Tecplot has a wide range of data visualisation and analysis functionality, which reduces the amount of work that we have to do.” In the end, that’s the true measure of ROI freeing engineers’ valuable time so they can focus on engineering rather than visualisation and data analysis.

Stable: Visualisation software that routinely crashes or is infested with bugs does not enhance productivity. Technical users and their managers want a stable product that delivers results consistently, with little or no downtime. History has shown that the only way to achieve this level of stability is through maturity. In other words, buyers of visualisation software should seek a product with some grey hairs. A higher version number will likely result in greater satisfaction with the software.

Test & Measurement: Almost any engineer can benefit from visualisation software, but test and measurement is perhaps the discipline in which the benefits are most evident. By definition, test and measurement is about performing investigations, gathering data, and benchmarking results. Without the proper data analysis, however, those results can be flawed. Because visually inspecting data is the best way to form analytical judgments, visualisation software is highly valued by test and measurement engineers.

User Interface: The onscreen menu for digital cable TV, like the user interface for a visualisation software package, is how users form a first impression about the quality of the product. User interfaces should be clean and streamlined, allowing the user to easily navigate from one feature to the next. All too often product developers underestimate the importance of the user interface, making it cumbersome and counter-intuitive. During the competitive review process for any software, potential buyers should carefully evaluate the user interface.

View: Whether from The Eiffel Tower, The London Eye or The Empire State Building, a stunning view provides tremendous detail of the far-reaching landscape below. The views created with visualisation software are no different. Visualisation tools can turn unruly data into picturesque images that contain a level of detail, and therefore understanding and knowledge, unattainable by other means.

Windows: When it comes to desktop computing, Microsoft Windows has the largest market share in operating systems. This dominance means most visualisation software run under Windows. But Windows is not the only operating system. Hardware platforms that run Linux, Unix, or Mac OS all support modern visualisation software. As with most products, the buyer decides which option is best.

X-Y Plots: If full colour shaded surfaces and 3D contour plots are the sizzle of visualisation software, then old fashioned x-y plots are the steak. No matter how elaborate a user wants to display and communicate his results, there will always be a need to analyze data using simple x-y plots. As such, buyers of visualisation software should seek a versatile product that generates both high-end and low-end graphics equally well.

Years: The benefits of using visualisation software can be measured in weeks or months, not years. While other enterprise-wide, or even department-wide, software requires years to fully benefit an organization, visualisation software bears fruit much sooner. Visualisation software users can be up and running in a matter of days, and generate meaningful results in weeks, depending on the size and complexity of their data.

Zero: After reading this article there should be zero doubt that visualisation software will strengthen the bottom-line of organisations, primarily by increasing the productivity and job satisfaction of the engineers, scientists, and researchers who use it.

Mike Peery
President/CEO of Tecplot Inc.
Taken from R&D Magazine – August 2004

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