Trends at a glance: A management dashboard of library statistics

Abstract

Systems librarians at an academic medical library created a management data dashboard. Charts were designed using best practices for data visualization and dashboard layout, and include metrics on gatecount, website visits, instant message reference chats, circulation, and interlibrary loan volume and turnaround time. Several charts draw on EZproxy log data that has been analyzed and linked to other databases to reveal use by different academic departments and user roles (such as faculty or student). Most charts are bar charts and include a linear regression trend line. The implementation uses Perl scripts to retrieve data from eight different sources and add it to a MySQL data warehouse, from which PHP/JavaScript webpages use Google Chart Tools to create the dashboard charts.