Shiny in Production 2024: Workshops
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Shiny in Production is returning to the Catalyst, Newcastle upon Tyne,
for its third instalment this October. We’ve expanded the itinerary this
year, with four workshops to choose from as well as a day of talks, with
speakers soon to be announced. Full details of the workshop are below,
and you can head over to the conference
website to register.
Join us for an immersive experience tailored for both beginners and
advanced users of Shiny and other web-based R packages.
The first day of the conference (Wednesday 9th October), will consist of
the four parallel workshops, followed by a drinks reception in the
evening, a great opportunity for networking and debriefing from the
day’s learning.
Level up your plots: Tips, tricks and resources for crafting compelling visualisations – Cara Thompson
Data visualisations are a great asset in getting people talking about
your findings. From making the patterns in the data easy to see, to
making a big visual statement and keeping people talking beyond the end
of your presentation, transforming your plots from functional to
aesthetically pleasing and visually compelling is about so much more
than making things pretty.
In this workshop, we’ll explore how we can make the most of colours,
different plot types, text, and interactivity to maximise the impact of
our visualisations. Here’s where we’re looking to boost your dataviz
confidence:
- crafting intuitive dataviz-friendly colour palettes without
compromising on accessibility (or creativity!) - selecting the right type of dataviz for your data and your story
- making the most of typography to optimise text hierarchy and
readability - using annotations wisely to both help interpretation and declutter the
visualisations - turning your ggplot into an interactive plot for additional data
exploration - packaging up your decisions, easy reuse across plots (and projects!)
This is intended as a hands-on workshop, so bring along a laptop, a plot
you’re working on or a research question, and some data. Throughout the
workshop, I will highlight free resources for each of these aspects of
dataviz development. The aim is for you to leave with a plot that you’d
be happy to publish, and with some resources you can continue to build
on.
About the speaker
Cara is a freelance data consultant with an academic background,
specialising in dataviz and in “enhanced” reproducible outputs. She
lives in Edinburgh, Scotland, and is passionate about maximising the
impact of other people’s expertise.
Building Responsive Shiny Applications – Pedro Silva
The diverse range of devices used for modern web browsing presents
challenges when designing an application that works well for all users.
Enter responsive design: the practice of building fluid web pages that
“work” on huge 4k and 5k monitors, tiny smartphones and all things in
between. This course will look at responsive design principles and best
practices for Shiny developers, covering page layout, easy-to-add
widgets and some simple CSS tricks for when built-in solutions don’t
quite cut it.
By the end of the workshop, participants will…
- know what responsive web design is
- know how to use flexible grids to adjust page layout for mobile,
tablet and desktop - be able to use HTML5 elements and Shiny Widgets to use limited space
efficiently and effectively - know how to add CSS and JavaScript snippets to an app for finer
customisations - understand how to test Shiny apps on various screen sizes from desktop
to mobile
About the speaker
Pedro is a full stack developer with over 15 years of experience in the
field, loves front-end and R Shiny development, and is a moonlight
practitioner of JavaScript dark arts.
Asynchronous Shiny – Russ Hyde
Imagine you couldn’t register to attend “Shiny in Production” if someone
else was in the process of registering, and you had to wait until they
had finished before you could click to “Buy tickets on EventBrite”. This
kind of “blocking” shouldn’t happen in modern web applications but is
surprisingly common in Shiny applications. It happens because a single R
process handles all of the server-side processing for multiple users—one
long-running task can prevent any other task from proceeding, hampering
interactivity both between and within user-sessions.
Fortunately, Shiny’s support for asynchronous programming can alleviate
this problem. In the asynchronous approach, you start tasks running
without having to wait for them to complete. But, this requires a change
in mindset for many programmers and there are a few concepts to
understand before you can take advantage of this approach. So, what are
you waiting for? Sign up for this workshop!
By the end of the workshop, participants will…
- understand how within-session and between-session blocking can arise
in a Shiny app - understand the basics of asynchronous computation
- solve between-session blocking with future/promise
- solve blocking the modern way, with ExtendedTask
About the speaker
Russ has previously worked in molecular biology and bioinformatics. He
holds a PhD in Molecular Physiology and MSc in Mathematics. Russ is an
author of several CRAN packages and mentor on the R-for-data-science
community.
Building Apps for Humans – Clarissa Barratt
Frameworks like Shiny and Dash can help those with a scientific or
mathematical background communicate their research in a way that’s
interactive and engaging. But while these tools can make constructing a
graphical user interface quicker and easier, there’s no guarantee that
the end product is going to be optimised for human use.
This workshop is aimed at scientists (and the curious) that are
interested in learning some basics of human-computer interaction and
gaining an understanding for how science itself can assist with the
development of better user interfaces that, in turn, lead to improved
user experiences.
By the end of the workshop, participants will…
- understand the benefits that come from designing applications with the
human mind in mind - know how the layout, colour, size and motion of interface and
graphical components can be used to enhance (or detract from) a user’s
experience - understand the importance of providing users with feedback so they can
tell both whether their actions have been successful and what the
current state of the application is - be able to identify some common problems found in web applications
About the speaker
While working towards her PhD in applied mathematics Clarissa discovered
her love of science communications. Her goal is to make data science
accessible to everyone, and to encourage people to engage with the
goings on at Jumping Rivers.
What’s next?
Early bird tickets for the conference are still available till the end
of July, so don’t miss out! The full line up of speakers will be
announced in the coming weeks. Still not convinced? Head over to our
YouTube channel to take a
look at lineups from previous years to see what we have in store.
For updates and revisions to this article, see the original post
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