Using ADF Data Visualizations

One of the under-utilized killer features of Oracle ADF is the Data Visualization compontents. When you see the application that Oracle build themselves with ADF (Fusion Applications, Enterprise Manager), you'll notice that they use of a lot of visualizations. You application could probably benefit from some, too.
 

• Learning ADF DVT components
• Which visualization components to use
• The new visualizations

Learning ADF DVT Components

When you have defined a data control, you can often simply choose a DVT component when you drop it on a page. Experiment with the various types and settings to see what they look like. 

The ADF Rich Client Demo also shows the visualizations in action. 

If you want a tutorial, Oracle has one that covers Bar charts, Gauges, Gantt charts, Geographical Maps and Pivot table:  http://www.oracle.com/webfolder/technetwork/tutorials/obe/jdev/obe11jdev/ps1/dvt_graph/gant_chart_pivot_table.htm

Which Visualization Components to Use

• Do use Gauges (types Status Meter and LED). They are very compact and work well in tables
• Do use Bar charts for discrete values over time
• Do use Horizontal Bar for discrete values that are not time-based. Horizontal layout gives you space for a longer label that vertical. 
• Do use Line charts for continuous value over time
• Don't use Area charts because one area might overlap another, hiding information from the user
• Don't use Pie charts. The eye is not good at comparing angles, a horizontal bar is easier to read.

The New Visualizations

In JDeveloper 12.1.3.0.0 and 11.1.1.9.0, all of the visualizations have been rewritten to work on the client side. This means that the visualizations offload processing to the browser and can achieve much better responsiveness. If you use ADF visualizations, seriously consider moving to one of these versions to get a snappier user experience and remove load from your WebLogic server.

Right now, four rarely-used visualizations haven't made it to the client side. These are Funnel, Pareto, Radar, and Stock. Oracle currently recommends that you don't use these because they still run on the server side. I don't much misse Funnel, Pareto and Stock, but I'm hoping the Radar diagram will appear on the client in a future release.