Evaluation of HTML5 graphics for data structure visualization

Includes bibliographical references (pages 62-63)Graphics have become a major part of the digital world, including the web. The latest era of the web is HTML5 and it provides many new features for web developers and users. Some of theses features are new ways to render, interact with, and animate graphics inside a web browser ??? CSS3, Canvas, SVG, and WebGL. This paper is a study on these graphics technologies, and the ability to use them to visualize data structures in a browser as an alternative to using plugins like Flash. The four technologies were compared in an effort to understand each one, and from this comparison a determination was made on which is the best choice for visualizing data structures. The technology of choice was used to build a tool that allows for native web-based data structure visualization. The criteria for success of the tool are its usability, performance, and feature set. The tool successfully demonstrates that the modern web???s native graphics technologies are a viable alternative to traditional Flash-based data structure visualization tools