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October 9, 2006
ITR 1
Visokio Omniscope is a Java based software developed by Visokio ( formerly Known as Iokio ), a London based company.
All the images of the review are available at http://www.flickr.com/photos/danielegaliffa/sets/72157594319320100/.
The Omniscope version I tested is the 2.2 and its a important improvements from the version 1.0.
Omniscope allows to use and manipulate data in a very natural way: all the filtering and the search facilities are available through a set of GUI controls.
Omniscope is mainly targetted to finance/business analysts because of its background; in the last monthes something has changed and now the tools seems to be really usefull for other areas of interestes.
The first thing about Omniscope is that it gets data from any source ( a database, a spreadsheet, an XML ) and automatically converts data into the appropriate data types, in order to have the corresponding filters, views and GUI controls for each of them.
After the data loading process has completed, the main interface display the header ( that includes the main commands and the result group ), the main views area and the filters area ( on the right ).
The first things that make Omniscope really interesting is that filters are created according to the data types and they are ready to be used.
Dynamic query model is used to display data variations when using filters; this approach offer an easy approach to get information for the user.
Using dynamic filters could disorientate user from his task; for this reason an "Actions History and a "Reset filters functions are always available to help user to go back on his steps.
When a filter is used, data are automatically grouped in the "included collection and the "excluded colletcion; in this way the user could use both selected data that match ( or not ) the filters criteria.
Data are represented through several available views ( treemaps, advanced barcharts, pie charts, istograms, tables, scatter plots, maps, and so on ).
Into the detail view is always possible
One other key-features is the generation of interactive reports.
Its possible to generate interactivepowerpoint-like slides, with graphical representation of data that dont need to be created everytime.
Also, its possibile to define formula and filter rules to display data.
This feature is very usefull when the analysis require a deep understanding of the issues involved and the standard filters are not suitable to generate knowledge.
The weak points
- The user interface and the graphical solutions are often not appropriate with the context and/or the goal of the UI elements.
- Its possible to work only on a single table of data at time.
- The outcomes have limited customization
- Map Views are not integrated with other map services ( yahoo/google )
The strong points
- Several languages are now available
- Its possible to manage a lot of data
- No Limitation in creating views and dynamic filters
- Interactive Reports creation is very fast and customizable
- High level of interactive content customization
- Use all groups of data ( mainly the excluded from filtered research )
- The slideshow features is interesting
- Map View is often usefull
http://www.mentegrafica.it/blog/?p=131
Posted by InfoVis at October 9, 2006 8:23 AM
