Technical Research: Google Charts

Google Charts is an API written in JavaScript that creates charts from data within the webpage. [1] It renders these charts through HTML5/SVG according to the HTTP request parameters. This is fundamentally different from D3.js because Google charts is a charting tool at its core whereas D3.js at its core manipulates DOM objects with fed data.

Key Features

JavaScript Charting Library

Has a wide selection of built in charts

Charts rendered through HTML5/SVG

Cross platform compatible

Also supports older browsers such as IE8 as a bonus

Usage

Google charts can be used to create the data visualisation on the front end. It would serve the same purpose as D3.js and could potentially be an alternative.

Advantages

Built in selection of charts and graphs

Dashboard available

Very easy to use

Accessible for non-techies

Ability to easily export charts as PNG

Disadvantages

Does not offer as much variety and customizability of data visualisation as D3.js

Google Charts only offer popular charts and graphs such as pie, line, column etc. [2]

Lacks the ability to add custom interactive functions such as zoom and active manipulation

Alternatives

Below are some popular alternative javascript charting libraries. Some of which will also be explored in our research.

D3.js

ChartJS

N3-charts

References

[1] Google Developers. (2016). Charts | Google Developers. [online] Available at: https://developers.google.com/chart/ [Accessed 22 Nov. 2016].
[2] Elements.polymer-project.org. (2016). Polymer Element Catalog. [online] Available at: https://elements.polymer-project.org/elements/google-chart [Accessed 22 Nov. 2016].