Lost on the Frontline data
Timeline: Aug 2020 | Visit link
Description: I was part of a beautiful effort to create an online memorial dedicated to the healthcare workers who died fighting the pandemic. The memorial also serves as a database, as data was collected and presented as part of a larger series. The Guardian worked with newsroom Kaiser Health News and freelance journalists to make this a reality.
Technical summary:
Architectured and coded the full-stack experience
Data collection and privacy
Architectured and coded the full-stack experience
Working with the spreadsheet as our data storage, I fetched the data using the npm package google-spreadsheet-to-json. This json was fed into an s3 bucket that is retrieved on runtime (?).
Because of the nature of the data fetching, the memorial updates are controlled by the newsrooms, and it allowed us to create a more formal process of updating that allowed for more QA.
I was the sole designer and developer for the interactive; I designed the components and experience, and coded the experience in React using D3.
Data collection and privacy
I was merely one of many amazing people who worked on this effort. Journalists from both the Kaiser Health News and Guardian newsrooms collected data, and I worked to coordinate a system of data entry and validation, while also allowing for basic privacy checks for the relatives of the deceased.
The reporters were able to insert information into the database itself, while a separate form stored user-submitted stories into a separate location.
create a way for reports to update the interactive
allow for multiple QA processes, including data privacy and data accuracy
consider technical restraints and process differences of two editorial programs