I've been doing some work with log file / exception report analysis over the past few days, with a geographic slant. And I've come to the conclusion that a picture paints a thousand words ... or even more!
Do you prefer a listing of log file data - in this first case of trains that are shorter than they should be, not running their (full) route or lack catering ...
Affected trains: 13:05 Falmouth Docks to 13:29 Truro 12:38 Looe to 13:08 Liskeard 12:37 Truro to 13:00 Falmouth Docks 12:08 Liskeard to 12:37 Looe 11:50 Falmouth Docks to 12:14 Truro 11:40 Looe to 12:07 Liskeard (etc - 30 lines or more ---) | |
I know that I personally prefer to see a quick graphic to tell me - at a glance - where there are issues, with a option to provide the full gory detail where it's needed - first down to a list of specific service and then, if one service is of especial relevance, to a pop such as the one to the right of this paragraph.
Let me give you some links.
If you're interested in the data on these diagrams and want to see it regularly, have a look at
the First Great Western Coffee Shop where the diagram appears on the top left of each page, and at our
details page where you can see the text (and get links to popups too!) if you want to look in depth.
If you're interested in using this technology yourself, you can see the source code of the detail page
here and the source code for the dynamic image in PHP
here.
For readers who would like to use the technology, but don't yet have the knowledge / background to do so without serious help, can I point you towards our
PHP Programming course, and / or our
PHP Techniques Workshop where you can pick up that knowledge.
The examples above came about as a result of various work / experimentation we're doing internally to help with out marketing - keeping an eye on where abouts our web site visitors are browsing from. You've seen some sample outputs from that work earlier on these pages - but here are some more:
The use of dots of different colours to differentiate them, and sizes (to give an idea of the numbers of hits) are very informative - and again they are somwthing we can help you with if you want to do something like this.
(written 2008-08-13)
Associated topics are indexed as below, or enter http://melksh.am/nnnn for individual articles
H309 - PHP - Maps, Graphics and Geographics [320] Ordnance Survey - using a 'Get a map' - (2005-05-22)
[563] Merging pictures using PHP and GD - (2006-01-13)
[665] PHP Image viewing application - (2006-04-01)
[937] Display an image from a MySQL database in a web page via PHP - (2006-11-22)
[1104] Drawing dynamic graphs in PHP - (2007-03-09)
[1194] Drawing hands on a clock face - PHP - (2007-05-19)
[1389] Controlling and labelling Google maps via PHP - (2007-10-13)
[1390] Converting from postal address to latitude / longitude - (2007-10-13)
[1391] Ordnance Survey Grid Reference to Latitude / Longitude - (2007-10-14)
[1628] Gant charts - drawing them with a PHP script - (2008-05-03)
[1724] addslashes v mysql_real_escape_string in PHP - (2008-07-27)
[1734] All around the world? - (2008-08-03)
[1756] Ever had One of THOSE mornings? - (2008-08-16)
[1923] Making it all worthwhile - (2008-12-04)
[1956] Images for Christmas - (2008-12-21)
[2343] World Flags in your PHP pages - (2009-08-10)
[2361] Geocoding - converting address to latitude / Longitude with PHP via Google - (2009-08-14)
[2390] Dynamic / changing images on your web page - (2009-09-01)
[2583] Reducing image size on digital photos - PHP - (2010-01-17)
[2675] Redirecting to your main domain for correct security keys - (2010-03-13)
[2729] Uploading a document or image to its own URL via a browser - (2010-04-18)
[2939] Protecting your images from use out of context - (2010-08-29)
[3027] Server logs - drawing a graph of gathered data - (2010-11-03)
[3133] An image from a website that occasionally comes out as hyroglyphics - (2011-01-14)
[3197] Finding and diverting image requests from rogue domains - (2011-03-08)
[3211] Computer Graphics in PHP - World (incoming data) to Pixel (screen) conversion - (2011-03-24)
[3447] Needle in a haystack - finding the web server overload - (2011-09-18)
[3536] UK Mapping Data - and more to come - under government Open Data measures - (2011-12-03)
[3584] QR codes - graphics images that provide quick phone links - (2012-01-18)
[3734] QR codes with marketing logos embedded - (2012-05-16)
[3817] Fpdf - generating .pdf documents easily from your PHP program - (2012-07-24)
[4178] Where are you? How to write a geosensitive application - (2013-09-18)
[4365] The changing face of Christmas - (2014-12-26)
[4437] Adding a PHP build option, rotating an image based on camera data, and a new look at thumbnails in PHP - (2015-02-22)
[4655] Image indexer / thumbnail display scripts in PHP - (2016-02-25)
Some other Articles
IstanbulUpgrade from PHP 4 to PHP 5 - the TRY issuePerl v PHP, choosing the right languageDynamic maps / geographics in PHPPublic Training Course Dates until July 2009Glorious (?) 12th August - what a Pe(a)rl!Using server side and client side programming togetherHotel room prices - Melksham, WiltshireWho is watching you?