WebGL 101 and the making of MyTTC.ca

VISUALIZATION: A live-coding session where you will learn how to use WebGL, starting with a "hello world" challenge to colouring the streets and highways of Toronto in a WebGL-based map. This event is for Data Heads who are looking to learn a new and powerful data visualization tool (which can be challenging to learn on your own). Some background in javascript is very helpful.

Kevin Branigan (https://github.com/kbranigan), our WebGL expert, will kickoff this meetup with a story of how he created Toronto's first TTC trip planner, MyTTC.ca (http://myttc.ca/), and other visualizations of Toronto's transit activity.

AGENDA

Pro-Talk [30 min]: Kevin shares his experience of wrangling TTC data, a task equivalent to herding cats . He has a vision for a better quality of publicly available transit information, from the launch of MyTTC.ca in 2008 to his current project of mapping the PATH. You'll love his story.

Live Coding Tutorial [90 min]: As a group, we will modify Kevin's sample WebGL project to:

1. Create a "hello world" WebGL page using simple shapes

2. Manipulate a larger dataset of Toronto map data

REQUIREMENTS

1. Laptop with a modern web browser - you might consider Chrome

2. A text editor for editing javascript and HTML files

WHO SHOULD ATTEND

This session is intended for people who are eager to learn a complex visualization tool (WebGL) form someone who understands the challenges and is ready to share what he's learned.

ABOUT THE DATASET

A git project and dataset will be provided at the meetup.