New Book:  “The Dictionary of Lost Words” by Pip Williams   Dear Commons Community, I have just finished reading, The Dictionary of Lost Words  by Pip Williams.  It is an historical novel wi […]

‘60 Minutes’ Chief Bill Owens Quits, Citing Interference from Paramount Bill Owens Dear Commons Community, The executive producer of CBS News’ “60 Minutes,” Bill Owens, said he will leave his job, citin […]

Keeping my Cool: A Month‑long View of My Air‑Conditioner Habits I began this project with a deceptively simple question: how often do I press the power button on my window air‑conditioner and what specific yet subjective personal or environmental cues persuade me to do so? Almost thirty spring days of meticulous logging every interaction between myself and my A/C between 28 March and 22 April 2025 provided the raw material for me to explore just how complex this simple question was by making three visualizations. Before interpreting the three following visualizations, readers need to understand the method of collection. I collected the data manually over seven consecutive days (28 March to 3 April 2025). Every single press of the ON/OFF button became a row in a Google Sheet, where I captured the exact date and time, whether the action turned the unit on or off, the fan speed or cooling mode chosen when the unit was activated, the indoor temperature read from a living‑room thermometer, the outdoor temperature taken from a local neighborhood weather app online, and the subjective reason I chose was from an eight‑item list that ranged from “Humidity” to “Too Cold.” I also grouped the timestamps into morning, afternoon, and evening blocks so that patterns by time of day would be simple to spot. var divElement = document.getElementById(‘viz1745380683996’); var vizElement = divElement.getElementsByTagName(‘object’)[0]; vizElement.style.width=’100%’;vizElement.style.height=(divElement.offsetWidth*0.75)+’px’; var scriptElement = document.createElement(‘script’); scriptElement.src = ‘https://public.tableau.com/javascripts/api/viz_v1.js’; vizElement.parentNode.insertBefore(scriptElement, vizElement); This bubble chart is the easiest way to introduce the data while also illustrating how vast the dataset is without overwhelming the reader with too many variables, although they are lurking beneath the visualization. The next visualization is the pie chart, which really flexes how much data we have here – this pie chart is actually animated and has four groupings for users to start to digest – this is the main part of the dataset that we “created” in a sense, the groups were decided and you could always say that it was arbitrarily done. But, “Afternoon” as 12-5pm, “Evening” as 6-9pm, “Late Night” as 10-11pm, and “Morning” as 12am-11pm makes sense because I am usually asleep during most of the “Morning.” I also think we are basically testing bubbles against pie charts here, but I also wanted to add the wrinkle of having four pie charts essentially through the animation. var divElement = document.getElementById(‘viz1745380437845’); var vizElement = divElement.getElementsByTagName(‘object’)[0]; vizElement.style.width=’100%’;vizElement.style.height=(divElement.offsetWidth*0.75)+’px’; var scriptElement = document.createElement(‘script’); scriptElement.src = ‘https://public.tableau.com/javascripts/api/viz_v1.js’; vizElement.parentNode.insertBefore(scriptElement, vizElement); The pie chart also shows you the human element to all of this in a colorful way, which is that the “Sleep” reason goes up during the Late Night grouping, which also tells you what time I go to sleep. The fact that I do not always or even a majority of the time use the sleep reason to turn off the A/C at night shows you that I do in fact sleep with it on, which is not recommended. var divElement = document.getElementById(‘viz1745380450314’); var vizElement = divElement.getElementsByTagName(‘object’)[0]; vizElement.style.width=’100%’;vizElement.style.height=(divElement.offsetWidth*0.75)+’px’; var scriptElement = document.createElement(‘script’); scriptElement.src = ‘https://public.tableau.com/javascripts/api/viz_v1.js’; vizElement.parentNode.insertBefore(scriptElement, vizElement); The bar chart towers at 26 toggles between 10 p.m. and 5 a.m., nearly half of the week’s total. I’m a light sleeper, and even a slight temperature drift or street noise makes me reach for the switch almost as a reflex. I also like the bar chart as the summary here because again, just seeing the grouping as separate pie charts does not allow you to compare the groupings, but then when we have the bar charts, that is the immediate clearest thing. We also did not show this in the bubble chart in the beginning so the user can decide which simple visualization impacted them more, the animated ones, or the simple ones. Even so, for the reader and myself, the exercise has practical value. I now know that a quieter fan mode might curb my noise‑inspired toggling, a small dehumidifier run overnight could reduce how many times I press it in the morning, and a smart plug could be used to automatically shut power between noon and five o’clock, which would eliminate wasted electricity. If I extend the study, I will automate data collection with a connected switch, pair it with continuous temperature and humidity sensors, and look at hourly electricity rates to see what the economics are behind these on/off decisions, since my background is in economics. Other researchers could expand the scope to multiple apartments or seasons, but for me, I think the overall message is pretty simple, which is that by paying attention to the tiny habitual decisions I make each day, I have uncovered real ways to save energy and improve everyday comfort and the evidence is sprinkled thr […] “Keeping my Cool: A Month‑long View of My Air‑Conditioner Habits”

Alpha BarryChile, Obstinate Memory (1997), directed by Patricio Guzmán, is a powerful and emotional film that shows his return to Chile after […]

Nostalgia de la LuzToday in class we watched Patricio Guzmán’s documentary Nostalgia de la Luz from 2010. Like most of his other films, the documentary de […]

4/22 Nostalgia for the LightI found the film Nostalgia for the Light by Patricio Guzman interesting in how it connects science, history, and memory in a powerful […]

Week 10 – Chile, The Obstinate MemoryChile, Obstinate Memory (1997), directed by Patricio Guzmán, follows his emotional homecoming after more than two decades in exile as he […]

XOXO Gossip Bird – Birds on the Upper East SideBirds can be found all over New York City and, like people, contribute to the personality and identity of certain areas and neighborhoods. Walking around my neighborhood of the Upper East Side, I know I am likely to see scandalous pigeons mating on fire escapes and talkative sparrows singing in the trees. For this project, I wanted to learn more and visualize the types of birds that populate my neighborhood and what they get up to.   The data at hand was collected over a course of four bird watching sessions taking place in parks in my neighborhood, including Central Park North and Carl Schurz Park. These bird watching sessions lasted approximately 1.5 hours each. The information collected includes bird name, Latin family name, dominant color, location, and behavior. It is important to note that this data set does not represent an objective record of all birds in these areas. To be collected, the bird had to be noticed by me, the birdwatcher, and accurately identified either by preexisting knowledge or online assistance.   The bar chart above shows the total count of birds by family in both parks across all bird watching sessions. Not surprisingly, the family ‘Columbidae’ which includes doves and pigeons had the most recorded observations. This was followed by ‘Passeridae’, which includes Old World sparrows.   The tree chart above paints a visual picture of the colors of the birds observed on the upper east side. The expanse of greys and browns from pigeons, sparrows and geese are cut by bits of flashing red and yellow from rarer birds such as cardinals and kinglets.   After separating out the birds in Central Park North and Carl Schurz Park, two different demographics are revealed. The most identified bird in Carl Schurz was a Domestic Pigeon, whereas the most identified bird in Central Park North was a Canada Goose. This may be due to the stagnant ponds present in Central Park. While no geese were spotted in Carl Schurz, Gulls make up 2.2% of the sightings due to its placement on the East River.  To understand the personality of the bird populations in my neighborhood, I created the following pie charts of the behavior of four commonly sighted birds. Not surprisingly, Canada Geese were mostly found swimming in bodies of water. Since it is Spring, almost all four birds can be found foraging. House Sparrows were mostly found singing, painting a more aural picture of the neighborhood of birds. Pigeons, though mainly idle or foraging, were found courting or mating 11% of the time. Love is in the air!  This project, including the data collection and visualization processes, proved to be a fun way to interact with the fauna of my neighborhood. However, many improvements could be made. Having more researchers to help collect the data on the bird-watching excursions would be very helpful in gaining more diverse and accurate data. As one birdwatcher, I can only focus on so many bird sightings at one time. Additionally, incorporating a device such as a tally counter may help in accuracy of counting high density birds such as pigeons and sparrows. I would also like to gather data such as time of day and weather to further explore when certain birds are out and about. Gathering more data would allow for more interesting visualizations and conclusions!  Overall, this preliminary project brings me, other avid birdwatchers, and those who live on the Upper East Side, into the complex world of birds. Whether mating, foraging, singing, they are all contributing to the unique personality and natural allure of the neighborhooRead More »XOXO Gossip Bird – Birds on the Upper East Side

Commons 2.5.7I’ve just released version 2.5.7 of the CUNY Academic Commons. This maintenance release is a major-update release for plugins and themes. The […]

Life after Nobel Peace Prize: Talk by Hibakusha (4/30/2025) LaGuardia Community College is hosting a talk by Hibakusha (Atomic-bomb survivors) on Wednesday, April 30, 2025. The two speakers are […]

The Art of Running Half-Marathons and Controlling My Cholesterol Levels (PUBLIC TABLEAU, CAUSALITY ANALYSIS)Using my own medical records, and the actual race records from New York Road Runners (“NYRR”) and New York City Runs (“N […]