D3.js: Cutting-edge Data Visualization

Chapter 1. Data Visualization

Humans began to record things long before writing systems were created. When the number and diversity of things to remember outgrew the capacity of human memory, we began to use external devices to register quantitative information. Clay tokens were used as early as 8000-7500 BC to represent commodities like measures of wheat, livestock, and even units of man labor. These objects were handy to perform operations that would have been difficult to do with the real-life counterparts of the tokens; distribution and allocation of goods became easier to perform. With time, the tokens became increasingly complex, and soon, the limitations of the complex token system were identified and the system began to be replaced with ...