2016 Charleston Library Conference

This presentation will explore how the University of Wisconsin-Madison is using tools like Tableau to facilitate the manipulation of large data sets and to develop visualizations that assist in the description and analysis of collections. In this presentation we will discuss how UW has used visualizations to easily tell the story of collections usage to library and campus audiences and how UW is developing tools to assist librarians with collection management decisions. We will trace our process beginning with the assumptions library staff and campus stakeholders make about the use of collections through the formulation of concrete questions, identifying and mapping data points for answering those questions and the subsequent exploration of data sets. The presentation will describe our iterative process for developing and refining visualizations and provide an overview of data processing techniques and tools used. We will also discuss the reaction we have received from inside and outside the library as we shared the presentation of library data.