Niklas Elmqvist
@nelmqvist.bsky.social
Villum Investigator and Professor in HCI & visualization at Aarhus University in Denmark. Husband, dad, dog dad, runner, Kung Fu artist, gamer. He/him. Mastodon: @elm@vis.social
VIS 2025 wrapped! Our OPC team introduced two experiments: student reviewers (20% uptake, successful mentorship model) and public peer reviews (16 papers, 52 reviews on OSF). Both continue next year. Thanks to our IPC and the incredible Petra Specht. #ieeevis 🎢 ieeevis.org/year/2025/bl...
Road's End - Reflections on the VIS 2025 Review Process
IEEE VIS 2025 in Vienna has come to a close and we—Niklas Elmqvist, Holger Theisel, and Melanie Tory, the 2025 Overall Papers Chairs (OPCs)—have reached the ...
ieeevis.org
November 15, 2025 at 9:00 AM
VIS 2025 wrapped! Our OPC team introduced two experiments: student reviewers (20% uptake, successful mentorship model) and public peer reviews (16 papers, 52 reviews on OSF). Both continue next year. Thanks to our IPC and the incredible Petra Specht. #ieeevis 🎢 ieeevis.org/year/2025/bl...
Ever wondered why your advisor keeps suggesting the same ideas? I'm a deterministic state machine with no memory—and I suspect many professors are too!
I just published a simple suggestion for Ph.D. students to manage their advisor's memory 🧠
niklaselmqvist.medium.com/the-state-ma...
I just published a simple suggestion for Ph.D. students to manage their advisor's memory 🧠
niklaselmqvist.medium.com/the-state-ma...
The State Machine Professor
Memory Management for Your Mentor
niklaselmqvist.medium.com
November 13, 2025 at 12:44 PM
Ever wondered why your advisor keeps suggesting the same ideas? I'm a deterministic state machine with no memory—and I suspect many professors are too!
I just published a simple suggestion for Ph.D. students to manage their advisor's memory 🧠
niklaselmqvist.medium.com/the-state-ma...
I just published a simple suggestion for Ph.D. students to manage their advisor's memory 🧠
niklaselmqvist.medium.com/the-state-ma...
We’re very pleased to present DashSpace, a web-first live and collaborative platform for immersive analytics using WebXR: github.com/Webstrates/D...
Here is @maski89.bsky.social ready to give the talk at #ieeevis 2025 and @pwsbutcher.bsky.social on deck for a demo.
PDF: pure.au.dk/ws/portalfil...
Here is @maski89.bsky.social ready to give the talk at #ieeevis 2025 and @pwsbutcher.bsky.social on deck for a demo.
PDF: pure.au.dk/ws/portalfil...
November 6, 2025 at 3:24 PM
We’re very pleased to present DashSpace, a web-first live and collaborative platform for immersive analytics using WebXR: github.com/Webstrates/D...
Here is @maski89.bsky.social ready to give the talk at #ieeevis 2025 and @pwsbutcher.bsky.social on deck for a demo.
PDF: pure.au.dk/ws/portalfil...
Here is @maski89.bsky.social ready to give the talk at #ieeevis 2025 and @pwsbutcher.bsky.social on deck for a demo.
PDF: pure.au.dk/ws/portalfil...
Here we have Johannes Ellemose giving his #ieeevis 2025 talk on “Eye of the Beholder 🧿: Towards Measuring Visualization Complexity”. Is there something intrinsic about a visualization that can be used to characterize its complexity? Johannes connected several studies to investigate this.
November 6, 2025 at 1:07 PM
Here we have Johannes Ellemose giving his #ieeevis 2025 talk on “Eye of the Beholder 🧿: Towards Measuring Visualization Complexity”. Is there something intrinsic about a visualization that can be used to characterize its complexity? Johannes connected several studies to investigate this.
Sungbok Shin is now presenting Visualizationary (needs some practice to say; think “revolutionary”) as an automated LLM feedback tool for visualization design. The tool gives feedback for novices to improve their visualizations over iterative design processes. #ieeevis PDF: arxiv.org/abs/2409.13109
November 5, 2025 at 3:44 PM
Sungbok Shin is now presenting Visualizationary (needs some practice to say; think “revolutionary”) as an automated LLM feedback tool for visualization design. The tool gives feedback for novices to improve their visualizations over iterative design processes. #ieeevis PDF: arxiv.org/abs/2409.13109
I just enlisted the help of Arnold from Austria 🇦🇹 to bring home my controversial message that immersive analytics has a Unity problem at the “DataVis in XR” panel. Our CG&A paper: pure.bangor.ac.uk/ws/portalfil...
Thx @pwsbutcher.bsky.social, @ritsosp.bsky.social, and @maski89.bsky.social for help!
Thx @pwsbutcher.bsky.social, @ritsosp.bsky.social, and @maski89.bsky.social for help!
November 5, 2025 at 1:05 PM
I just enlisted the help of Arnold from Austria 🇦🇹 to bring home my controversial message that immersive analytics has a Unity problem at the “DataVis in XR” panel. Our CG&A paper: pure.bangor.ac.uk/ws/portalfil...
Thx @pwsbutcher.bsky.social, @ritsosp.bsky.social, and @maski89.bsky.social for help!
Thx @pwsbutcher.bsky.social, @ritsosp.bsky.social, and @maski89.bsky.social for help!
Wow—Sungbok Shin points out that our work on Drillboards was started in 2020 (deepest COVID). Drillboards is a dynamic dashboard with authoring and reader modes where you can create chart hierarchies for varying detail. #ieeevis
ArXiv: arxiv.org/abs/2410.12744
Demo (laptop): drillboards.pages.dev
ArXiv: arxiv.org/abs/2410.12744
Demo (laptop): drillboards.pages.dev
November 5, 2025 at 9:14 AM
Wow—Sungbok Shin points out that our work on Drillboards was started in 2020 (deepest COVID). Drillboards is a dynamic dashboard with authoring and reader modes where you can create chart hierarchies for varying detail. #ieeevis
ArXiv: arxiv.org/abs/2410.12744
Demo (laptop): drillboards.pages.dev
ArXiv: arxiv.org/abs/2410.12744
Demo (laptop): drillboards.pages.dev
Important question in accessible visualization. Our interviews (doi.ieeecomputersociety.org/10.1109/TVCG...) tell us that basing an accessible representation on the visualization is good for (1) working with sighted people, and (2) for people not born BLV. Dylan Cashman and Areen Khalaila #ieeevis
November 4, 2025 at 1:34 PM
Important question in accessible visualization. Our interviews (doi.ieeecomputersociety.org/10.1109/TVCG...) tell us that basing an accessible representation on the visualization is good for (1) working with sighted people, and (2) for people not born BLV. Dylan Cashman and Areen Khalaila #ieeevis
It was our great honor to serve as #ieeevis 2025 overall papers chairs. The conference is now open and we can’t wait for you all to enjoy the program. Thanks to Petra Specht for her tireless work as assistant to the OPCs! (And good luck to Melanie, Alex Endert, and @tisenberg.bsky.social for 2026!)
November 4, 2025 at 1:24 PM
It was our great honor to serve as #ieeevis 2025 overall papers chairs. The conference is now open and we can’t wait for you all to enjoy the program. Thanks to Petra Specht for her tireless work as assistant to the OPCs! (And good luck to Melanie, Alex Endert, and @tisenberg.bsky.social for 2026!)
Here’s @zcliu.bsky.social presenting “contextual dynamic explanations” (CoDEx) at the #VISxGenAI workshop at #ieeevis 2025. Go @hcil-umd.bsky.social and UMD! visxgenai.github.io
November 3, 2025 at 10:38 AM
Here’s @zcliu.bsky.social presenting “contextual dynamic explanations” (CoDEx) at the #VISxGenAI workshop at #ieeevis 2025. Go @hcil-umd.bsky.social and UMD! visxgenai.github.io
Brand new Ph.D. student Anton Wolter from my group at @csaudk.bsky.social presenting his team’s work on multi-agent data visualization and narrative generation at the #VISxGenAI workshop at #ieeevis; a runner-up in the VisAgent min-challenge at the workshop. Congratulations Anton and team!
November 3, 2025 at 9:34 AM
Brand new Ph.D. student Anton Wolter from my group at @csaudk.bsky.social presenting his team’s work on multi-agent data visualization and narrative generation at the #VISxGenAI workshop at #ieeevis; a runner-up in the VisAgent min-challenge at the workshop. Congratulations Anton and team!
@pwsbutcher.bsky.social and @ritsosp.bsky.social tag-teaming immersive data analysis at the DashSpace tutorial during the first day of #ieeevis 2025!
November 2, 2025 at 1:29 PM
@pwsbutcher.bsky.social and @ritsosp.bsky.social tag-teaming immersive data analysis at the DashSpace tutorial during the first day of #ieeevis 2025!
The #ieeevis 2025 OPCs, working under the direction of the VIS Steering Committee, has just released 52 anonymized peer reviews for 16 accepted papers to be published at VIS 2025. We hope each year will add to this repository. OSF link here: osf.io/s9j5b/ (download the spreadsheet directly)
OSF
osf.io
October 30, 2025 at 6:31 PM
The #ieeevis 2025 OPCs, working under the direction of the VIS Steering Committee, has just released 52 anonymized peer reviews for 16 accepted papers to be published at VIS 2025. We hope each year will add to this repository. OSF link here: osf.io/s9j5b/ (download the spreadsheet directly)
New favorite use of LLMs: asking it to explain my own slides from last year back to me because I was too stupid/lazy to write proper speaker notes at the time.
October 27, 2025 at 9:37 AM
New favorite use of LLMs: asking it to explain my own slides from last year back to me because I was too stupid/lazy to write proper speaker notes at the time.
The duality of man (peer review edition):
- System paper: “where is the user study?”
- Evaluation paper: “where is the system description?”
😑
- System paper: “where is the user study?”
- Evaluation paper: “where is the system description?”
😑
October 16, 2025 at 10:16 AM
The duality of man (peer review edition):
- System paper: “where is the user study?”
- Evaluation paper: “where is the system description?”
😑
- System paper: “where is the user study?”
- Evaluation paper: “where is the system description?”
😑
Thinking of your academic paper as less your magnum opus and more as a line of dialogue in a greater conversation can take the pressure off scientific publishing. Here are my most recent thoughts on "Science as a Conversation":
niklaselmqvist.medium.com/science-as-a...
niklaselmqvist.medium.com/science-as-a...
Science as a Conversation
When do you know that your paper has done enough?
niklaselmqvist.medium.com
October 15, 2025 at 11:15 AM
Thinking of your academic paper as less your magnum opus and more as a line of dialogue in a greater conversation can take the pressure off scientific publishing. Here are my most recent thoughts on "Science as a Conversation":
niklaselmqvist.medium.com/science-as-a...
niklaselmqvist.medium.com/science-as-a...
Sorry to say it, but if you're a Ph.D. student, chances are that your code will not live long past your degree. Instead, you should strive for separating your research contribution from their implementation (which counts as validation). Read more:
niklaselmqvist.medium.com/your-code-wi...
niklaselmqvist.medium.com/your-code-wi...
Your Code Will Be Dead in Ten Years
But Your Ideas (Hopefully) Won’t Be
niklaselmqvist.medium.com
October 2, 2025 at 8:24 AM
Sorry to say it, but if you're a Ph.D. student, chances are that your code will not live long past your degree. Instead, you should strive for separating your research contribution from their implementation (which counts as validation). Read more:
niklaselmqvist.medium.com/your-code-wi...
niklaselmqvist.medium.com/your-code-wi...
Only my second UIST paper ever, but please check it out! I can’t go to South Korea (too much travel this fall already), but @clemens.klokmose.net and @maski89.bsky.social will be there to show the flag!
Next week I’ll be at ACM UIST 2025 in Busan, South Korea, where @maski89.bsky.social will be presenting our work on Spatialstrates. In this project, we address the gap between everyday laptop-based computing and immersive experiences with augmented or virtual reality headsets.
September 26, 2025 at 5:10 PM
Only my second UIST paper ever, but please check it out! I can’t go to South Korea (too much travel this fall already), but @clemens.klokmose.net and @maski89.bsky.social will be there to show the flag!
In an act of true courage, @clemens.klokmose.net opens the JavaScript study lecture in our @csaudk.bsky.social HCI class by challenging the students to “ask me anything” about web development, and then proceeds to live code solutions to all contenders. Pictured after white-knuckling drag and drop.
September 25, 2025 at 12:46 PM
In an act of true courage, @clemens.klokmose.net opens the JavaScript study lecture in our @csaudk.bsky.social HCI class by challenging the students to “ask me anything” about web development, and then proceeds to live code solutions to all contenders. Pictured after white-knuckling drag and drop.
Professor Corrie is on deck for the faculty meeting at @csaudk.bsky.social!
September 5, 2025 at 10:51 AM
Professor Corrie is on deck for the faculty meeting at @csaudk.bsky.social!
The way we prompt AI has been bothering me for a long time. Accidentally hitting Enter sends off prompts—but surely they should be carefully crafted, not fired off haphazardly? I wrote about why this frustrates me so much and what we should do instead. niklaselmqvist.medium.com/to-prompt-is...
To Prompt Is Human, To Specify Divine
Rethinking how we should interact with Generative AI
niklaselmqvist.medium.com
August 21, 2025 at 10:03 AM
The way we prompt AI has been bothering me for a long time. Accidentally hitting Enter sends off prompts—but surely they should be carefully crafted, not fired off haphazardly? I wrote about why this frustrates me so much and what we should do instead. niklaselmqvist.medium.com/to-prompt-is...
This bowling alley has just rickrolled its entire clientele. Gotta respect the hustle.
June 21, 2025 at 11:09 AM
This bowling alley has just rickrolled its entire clientele. Gotta respect the hustle.
After seeing one too many #ieeevis papers that were clearly resubmits with little or no revision from the previous iteration, we VIS 2025 OPCs just wrote this blog article (ingeniously named if you ask me): ieeevis.org/year/2025/bl...
Déjà Review - When You Have Seen the Paper Before
As IEEE VIS Overall Papers Chairs, we’ve observed a troubling pattern that undermines the integrity of our peer review process: papers rejected from one venu...
ieeevis.org
June 10, 2025 at 6:17 PM
After seeing one too many #ieeevis papers that were clearly resubmits with little or no revision from the previous iteration, we VIS 2025 OPCs just wrote this blog article (ingeniously named if you ask me): ieeevis.org/year/2025/bl...