Category Tests
The category pages for vanderwal.net have been in need of improvement for a very long time. One of the things I've long wanted is to have sparklines to get some idea of how recent the temporal patterns of category usage. I've long been a fan of sparklines since running across them in grad school reading Edward Tufte books as additional suggested reading for quant classes.
In initial framing and sketching things I realized I have two pages for category lists: Alphabetical and by count with the most used at the top. But, there is a third sort I'd really like to have and that is by recency. Thinking about adding recency and how I'd add it in I realized for 25 years I've had two pages (alpha and descending use) where I could have had one with a toggle for the filter. I don't think I'm going to move to one page for all things category lists until after I add sparklines.
Having 25 years of posts and categories used and sparklines being relatively short I opted to group categories into two 6 month groups per year for the sparkline rather than going with a more common monthly layout.
I also leaned into using SVG for lighter browser computation than using JavaScript or the other option of building static images with each new post or category update. Going the SVG route meant I needed a little assistance, but quickly got that resolved.
Category Page
This is sort of a first step as I really want to add concurrent categories on the category page and their counts in the sidebar. Say if I'm looking at the "Folksonomy" category the posts that have folksonomy category also have other categories, but what are the dimensions of those other categories with number of concurrent tags and sparkline on those as well. The sidebar has long been an interest to show what else is related and use that as a filter to get a subset of the category shown.
I have also long considered reworking the category page. Not only to have concurrent category lists, but to add a definition (my CMS had definition added to the category's data table that I added in the mid-2000s update, but never used and my 2020 update I removed it). Having a definition of how I use the category would be helpful. Now that I've been looking at sparklines and the length of time I've had the blog a visualization with more space could be helpful and possibly add that to the category page. This reworking would take a little more sketches and iterations.
Post Sparklines Graduation Look at Category Page
[Update: 3 June 2026] Now that I have the category list pages out of the lab and into production I want to focus on the actual category page. I have a static Category page lab that I will be working on. I have a rough sketch of the addition to the top of the Category page:
I have long planned to have the category definition included on the page and there was a column in the database for many years, but in a clean-up in 2020 I took it out. But, now is the time to bring it back.
I really like the sparklines on the category lists and now I want to bring that to the category pages, but as a more full line chart and to add a legend for time. Having a sense of when the category was used I find really helpful.
The likely next step after adding a line chart would be to add filtering for time. Then add a list and count for concurrent category usage on category posts and use that as another filter.
Category Lab
Follow on Steps
I am getting somewhat happy with the sparklines. I am also thinking about doing a quick "recently categorized" page, to try it and possibly add a reverse sort on it as well.
I was able to quickly query and get a Category List by Recency that includes sparklines. This listing with sparklines is one I find really interesting