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Why We're Building Observable

observablehq.com

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Re: Why We're Building Observable

#11

Post by carls »

darksaints wrote: post #8

I really like Observable and have used it quite a bit, but I absolutely hate that it is the default documentation form for D3, because D3 is a javascript library, and Observable is not javascript. At the very least it would be nice if there was a way to take an example and press a button to get the same thing in javascript.

A lot of the code you can write does look like JS, though. You can use the libraries that may be common to a JS dev. It's not perfect, but there's enough overlap and the differences are understandable and documented[1].

Also having learned a lot of D3 by reading through Observable tutorials, I'm curious what you've seen that doesn't seem to work when you port it to JS?

One thing I'm aware of is that you have to move a lot of the plotting code into the .then() method of promise when you're loading data.

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[1] Observable's not JavaScript: https://observablehq.com/@observablehq/observables-not-javas...

Re: Why We're Building Observable

#12

Post by RobinL »

billconan wrote: post #5

An issue of visualization on the web I don’t know how to solve is how to load large data.

Very much depends on how large you're talking, but check out Apache Arrow: https://observablehq.com/@theneuralbit/introduction-to-apach... https://observablehq.com/@uwdata/arquero-and-apache-arrow

Re: Why We're Building Observable

#13

Post by breck »

rgovostes wrote: post #3

Coincidentally, I tinkered with my first Observable notebook last night ( https://observablehq.com/@rzg/prosthaphaeresis -- don't judge too harshly). One of the improvements on the computational notebook concept is that it seems to compute a data flow graph so it knows what cells to update when the data changes, without you needing to re-run cells in a particular sequence. The cells can also be out of order. The edit…

Wow, never heard of Prosthaphaeresis before. So cool! Really enjoyed playing with your notebook. So concise and clear. thanks!

Re: Why We're Building Observable

#14

Post by breck »

billconan wrote: post #5

An issue of visualization on the web I don’t know how to solve is how to load large data.

I've found 10MB (gzipped) to be a good rule of them. Anything bigger, query a backend. Storing bigger things in ephemeral tab memory can be painful if you refresh browser a lot.

Re: Why We're Building Observable

#15

Post by breck »

chatmasta wrote: post #10
billconan wrote: post #5

An issue of visualization on the web I don’t know how to solve is how to load large data.

Observable supports direct DB connections [0], but these only work in private notebooks at the moment. At Splitgraph [1] we're building a "data delivery network" (DDN, like a CDN but for databases) that looks like a big Postgres database. It works really well with the Observable Postgres client in private notebooks -- you configure it like you would for any Postgres connection. For public notebooks, you can use our H…

I've been watching splitgraph for a while. Very interesting what you are doing!

Re: Why We're Building Observable

#16

Post by fractionalhare »

petulla wrote: post #7

My gripe with Observable is I can't fit into a Python-based workflow. I.e., a machine learning or gpu-training worfklow. It is a nice place to create explainers, though. I almost think of it as being like a Medium alternative.

This is also the main thing holding me back from using it. The Observable experience feels more polished than Jupyter for me.

Re: Why We're Building Observable

#17

Post by petulla »

fractionalhare wrote: post #16
petulla wrote: post #7

My gripe with Observable is I can't fit into a Python-based workflow. I.e., a machine learning or gpu-training worfklow. It is a nice place to create explainers, though. I almost think of it as being like a Medium alternative.

This is also the main thing holding me back from using it. The Observable experience feels more polished than Jupyter for me.

My hope is eventually to be able to run it locally and integrate it into other language, like Tensorboard.

Re: Why We're Building Observable

#19

Post by catacombs »

petulla wrote: post #7

My gripe with Observable is I can't fit into a Python-based workflow. I.e., a machine learning or gpu-training worfklow. It is a nice place to create explainers, though. I almost think of it as being like a Medium alternative.

> My gripe with Observable is I can't fit into a Python-based workflow.

Observable is for JavaScript ecosystem. I wouldn't count on them implementing anything for Python.

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