Toolkits and Programs
Tools for working with data
- Data acquisition tools: DocumentCloud, OpenRefine
- Analysis tools: Excel, Google Spreadsheets, SQL, CSVKit, R
- Presentation tools: Excel, Overview, R, Tableau Public, QGIS
- National Institute of Computer Assisted Reporting (NICAR), a site that provides tools and tutorials useful for getting and analyzing electronic information.
- “Dollars for Doctors,” a series of tools and technical guides related to ProPublica’s Dollars for Docs search tool.
- Journalists’ Toolbox’s “Digital Tools,” an assortment of story-telling tools, data scraping tools, and other handy information from the Society of Professional Journalists.
Tools and databases for visualization
- Vizzuality: Cool maps and graphics on a range of topics
- Flowing Data
- Andy Kirk: Visualizing Data
- Alberto Cairo: The Functional Art
- D3: interactive / web-based
- Inkscape: free version of Illustrator (graphic design software program)
Programming and Computer Science
- Hacks/Hackers: A journalism organization that seeks to bridge information seeking and storytelling. Journalists, developers, and designers around the world can meet in local chapters.
- Open: A New York Times blog about code and development
- Stack Overflow: A question-and-answer site for programmers, from beginning to professional skill levels
- Code Academy: Learn a variety of programming skills and languages, for free
Mapping
- Carto: WebGIS (Graphic Information Systems) with a “free” plan
- Mapbox: Another webGIS
- UC Berkeley Geospatial Innovation Facility: Programs and tutorials for geospatial data
- GeoJournalism: Tools to produce multimedia stories or simple maps and data visualization to help creating context for complex environmental issues
