r/Canadiancitizenship

Hi folks! Some news to share.

Some of you may remember that a few months ago, I released a Tableau-based dashboard to make it easier for all of us to understand and visualize the data in our community spreadsheet. While it was generally well-received, a few people understandably had concerns about the dashboard being publicly accessible, even though the data had been anonymized. To respect those concerns, I took the dashboard down.

Today, I’m happy to announce that I’ve rebuilt the entire dashboard in Google Data Studio, and this version is not publicly accessible. Access is restricted to members of the existing Google group for the spreadsheet, so simply sharing the link will not grant someone access. I’ve also been in touch with both Doug and Nano over the past few months, and they’re aware of the project.

ACCESS NOTE: If you click the link and do not have access, please do not click "Request Access". Use the Google account you signed up with to access the spreadsheet, or request access to the spreadsheet.

Dashboard:
Canadian Citizenship by Descent: Application Timelines

The new version isn’t an exact copy of the original Tableau dashboard, as there are some differences in how Data Studio handles certain visualizations, filters, tooltips, etc. (which.. tbh I don't really like, but most of the same functionality is there, along with a few improvements, and it's private).

A few notes about the data and privacy:

• The dashboard is generated from a sanitized subset of the community spreadsheet and refreshes daily. Only the fields needed for the dashboard are included in the reporting data source.
• No personally identifying information (usernames/emails) is displayed in the dashboard.
• Access is limited to members of the existing spreadsheet Google group.
• Downloading, printing, and resharing through the report have been disabled/restricted.
• As with any shared report (including the spreadsheet), authorized viewers could still take screenshots or manually reproduce information they are able to see, so the access controls shouldn’t be considered an absolute guarantee that information can never leave the report.
• If your access to the Google group is removed, you should also lose access to the dashboard.

This project has also been a lot of fun for me personally. I’ve spent much of my career working in data science/data analytics and building dashboards and reporting tools for executives, so getting to apply some of that experience to a community project like this has been really enjoyable.

For anyone interested in helping make this better, please let me know! I’m happy to provide editor access to people who want to contribute or help improve the visualizations.

I’m also very happy to take suggestions, feedback, bug reports, or ideas for additional ways of looking at the data. And, especially given the concerns around the original version, if anyone has a privacy concern about a particular visualization or data field, please feel free to reach out and I’m happy to review it.

Hopefully this gives everyone another useful way to explore the timeline data while keeping access within the existing community. Enjoy!