Custom website architecture for academic data visualization
The University of Waterloo–based team behind TRANSFORM – a global network of researchers focused on sustainable entrepreneurship – partnered with Hyphen to help enable sustainable entrepreneurship researchers to share data from diverse global sources with the academic community.
- Industry
Education
- DeliverablesBrand ImplementationWebsite DesignWebsite StrategyWordPress DevelopmentData Visualization
Challenge
Our key challenge was to design custom website architecture to present large volumes of non-standardized data without affecting its academic integrity. This required a creative shift away from the categorizing and filtering of data typically seen in web design.
Outcomes
- 100+ data points synthesized into dynamic & editable infographics
- Translation of academic objectives into dynamic web design
- Unique website architecture for impactful data sharing
- A tailored SVG framework for structuring data relationships & nodes
- A custom WordPress website that can grow with evolving needs
- An intuitive back-end for user-friendly data additions & updates
Understanding TRANSFORM's Objectives
TRANSFORM is an international network with researchers around the globe investigating sustainable entrepreneurship from a variety of angles and generating large, disparate datasets.
Creative Approach to User Experience
Given TRANSFORM’s focus on presenting raw data for academic analysis, we were limited in our ability to categorize and standardize their data.
This required us to be more creative in our approach to website architecture.
Elegant Solution
After exploring various options, we developed a custom SVG framework for visualizing TRANSFORM’s database.
This proved to be an elegant solution providing design versatility to accommodate dynamic data.
Furthering Academic Research
The new TRANSFORM website provides a centralized hub for global data on sustainable entrepreneurship, making it an important tool for further academic research in this field.
“Hyphen took the reins in helping our team design and implement a large-scale website, making sure that our global stakeholder input was at the forefront of their vision. They were incredibly patient with us and really understood the ethos of what we were trying to achieve!”
Research Manager, TRANSFORM, University of Waterloo