passing-the-beat

This repository holds source code for the Passing The Beat visualization created by Steven Braun. The visualization can be accessed here:

http://www.stevengbraun.com/dev/passing-the-beat

Source code provided here includes the framework for the visualizations as well as some sample data files.

For answers to any questions, contact Steven via email at braunsg[at]gmail.com.

What's in here

index.php
	The index page into which the data and visualizations are loaded
	
inc/config
	Default configuration files (e.g., data sources, stylesheet)

inc/content
	The main HTML content for index.php
	
inc/data
	The data used to create the visualizations
	
inc/data-analysis-scripts
	PHP scripts used in the original data analysis, as well as example MySQL tables
	
inc/img
	Images used in index.php
	
inc/lib
	JavaScript libraries/functions used to generate the visualizations

General workflow

The directory inc/data-analysis-scripts includes samples of the PHP scripts used to aggregate and analyze all data for these visualizations. The general workflow is as follows:

ingest-musicid-data.php
	A script that ingests into a MySQL database the raw historical chart data for the U.S. Billboard Top 100, U.K. Top 200, and J-Wave Tokio Hot 100 music charts
	
map-single-ids.php
	A script that goes through the raw data and maps potential song duplicates to single authority IDs
	For example, songs that are released under multiple record labels across multiple countries may be misunderstood as distinct; here, those errors are reduced by finding matches between records based on single title plus artist name
	
echonest-retrieve-artist-location-genre.php
	A script that uses the EchoNest API to retrieve data about locations/countries of origin for each unique artist presented in the visualizations

ingest-musicid-crossovers-mapped.php
	Determines all crossover songs -- singles by one artist that make an appearance on the top music chart(s) of other countries
	
get-single-crossover-artist-data-mapped.php		
	Creates static CSV files for all crossover singles identified above
	
generate-chart-data-file.php	
	Aggregates and reduces all data in the above song data CSV files into a single file for faster loading in the visualization
	
generate-artist-history.php
	Generates CSV files holding historical crossover data for individual artists