This is a user guide for a custom web application I made to compare ACS data among geographies as part of a larger project. This may be useful in providing professional-looking tables and visualizations for questions such as:
It should be noted that this data is only for the 2019 acs surveys!
The toolbar consists of three sections:
The first step needed to be taken by the user is entering an API key (token) acquired from the census.gov website into the text box at the top-right of the toolbar.
After entering a key, the user can now select and retrieve the data of interest.
There are two ways for finding data: i. scrolling through or searching the table at the bottom of the Select Data (default) screen, or ii. using filters to isolate questions you may be interested in
The latter approach may be helpful if the user needs to find a starting point or a general category.
Once clicked on, a menu is expanded with options to filter the table query. Since each Select Data table row is one answer to a question (as opposed to all answers for one question), the data takes a hierarchical format: concept>grouping 1>grouping 2.
Once a filter is chosen at the highest level, the next level will expand with options if available, and so forth.
The Tabs section contains 3 buttons that navigate between different panels.
The Data Selection panel is the default screen that appears when the application is loaded.
This screen exclusively consists of an interactive table of census responses. Valid interactions with the table include:
Once a row is selected - and a valid API token is entered - the application will pull the corresponding data from the census.gov website that matches the parameters selected by the user for the Options inputs.
After the data is retrieved from the Data Selection Table, the buttons to switch to a table or graph of the results will be enabled.
The Results Table panel provides a tabular view of respondents’ answers within the selected Survey, State, and Geographical Grouping.
By selecting multiple rows from this table, the user can choose what bars are plotted in the Results Graph.
The Results Graph is simply a graphical view of the content of the Results Table.
If there are rows selected in the Results Table, those bars will exclusively be plotted.
While in the Results Table or Results Graph screens, the user can also apply data transformations to create more meaningful interpretations. These include:
1. % of Region
the percent of respondents in the corresponding geographical region that provided a specific answer, relative to respondents in that region providing other answers
For example: "__% of respondents in Winnebago County, IL have an income of $30-50k per year.
2. % of State
the percent of respondents in a region that provided a specific answer, relative to the total number of respondents that provided the specific answer in the chosen state
For example: "__% of respondents in Illinois that have an income of $30-50k per year live in Winnebago County.
The user can also adjust what data is returned and where the data comes from.
There are two American Community Surveys (ACS) supported: the 1-year ACS and 5-year ACS. The descriptions and suggested usage scenarios for each can be found here.
Any of the 50 U.S. States are supported.
The ACS survey data within each state can be split into regional categories of different sizes. This allows for more broad or focused examinations, depending on the usage scenario.
Some geography options are only available for the 5-year ACS. This is automatically adjusted for when the user changes between ACS types. The available types are:
1. ACS 1-year
2. ACS 5-year
For an exhaustive list, visit here and here. For in-depth descriptions of each geography type, see this link.