LIFE IN TECH
Concept Visualization with AIMA(Google Summer Of Code-2018)
Google Summer Of Code, one of the most prestigious scholarship offered.
Are you planning on applying to GSOC? Or are you interested to know how does it adds value to life? Well, everybody’s experience is different and we might not be able to generalize it as well. But here I have penned down my experience which not only helped me get other internship but also helped me crack Job Interview. So grab a cup of coffee and let’s get started.
It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen. I was going through hundreds of projects selected under Google Summer Of Code, one of the most prestigious scholarship offered.
Yes, it was like war. Thousands of people struggling to seize their position. In the mild conscious state, I bumped into an organization with a very unique concept. It was AIMA: Artificial Intelligence: A Modern Approach. It has different projects like aima-javascript, aima-python and aima-java. Aima-javascript aims towards visualization of concepts from Russell And Norvig’s “Artificial Intelligence — A Modern Approach”, for better understanding.
This is where I was introduced to the enigmatic field of visualization.
So why visualization is a big part of our technical world? Well, our brains have the ability to process visuals a lot faster than text. It’s been reported that 70% of all our sensory receptors are in our eyes. Visuals are committed to long-term memory easier than text. By visuals, we can tell stories to deliver complicated information. And the best part is we can actually control the other person’s perspective. They will learn the way we want them to.
There are many tools for the purpose of visualization such as Processing.js, Raphel.js, D3.js, p5.js, two.js, three.js. My personal favorites are D3.js and three.js for better flexibility. But remember coding it not the only requirement here. This is what is the tricky part.
So what makes a visualization good visualization? That is, to vindicate it beyond “it looks beautiful”. It should convey the message behind it in a proper manner so that user with any type of prior knowledge will be able to grasp it. Concept visualization plays a role complementary to books, classes and videos with its interactivity. Good interactive explanations have a deliberate progression and rhythm. The cohesive narration is again a plus point. With the increasing amount of data in the corporate world, there is even more need for visual re-presentation. So more and more developers should be encouraged to acquire the knowledge of visual communication.
So if you are getting started with visuals, then make sure to go through this document once.
During the work process, I also learned a lot of new things like the how to create cohesive narration, the importance of qualitative visualization and the proper code structure to produce the same. I gained valuable insight each day and grew as a developer. As this project is unique in the sense that, the contributor not only needs to understand the solution but also has to explain it to the reader with a varying degree of prior knowledge, so it reinforced my understanding of the concept and improved my problem-solving abilities. Acquiring problem-solving abilities was fascinating and kept me hooked to it.
I am grateful for the invaluable suggestions and guidance from mentors, Samuel Goto and Amit Patel. They have been very kind to provide me with time from their busy schedules to guide me to get started with the development process under aima-javascript. And a special gratitude to Rishav Agarwal for his continuous direction and efforts to make me learn what I know.
There is a tutorial built on the shoulders of giants who have already covered d3 well. I learned this by heart and I recommend you do, too.
