1.1 Calendar-based graphics

Visualization is critical for understanding data patterns, and for discovering the unexpected in data. Chapter 2 describes how to make a calendar layout to produce a new type of plot. It is especially focused on human activity data that can be examined to explore the rhythm of a society’s daily behavior, especially the distinctions between working and leisure life. The layout algorithm provides a new method for assembling small multiples into a familiar calendar structure. It is fully integrated into the grammar of graphics (Wilkinson 2005; Wickham 2009), specifying the plots as a functional mapping from data variables to graphical primitives. This new calendar-based display sketches the patterns of daily and sub-daily human behaviors, unlocking vivid and detailed data stories about the way we live. The chapter contains a comprehensive literature review related to calendar-based graphics.