# VegaLite.jl; what needs doing?

**URL:** <https://discourse.julialang.org/t/vegalite-jl-what-needs-doing/31940>\
**Category:** Visualization\
**Created:** [December 6, 2019, 6:22pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/vegalite-jl-what-needs-doing/31940 "2019-12-06T18:22:53Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 13\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Usor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/8dc957/32.png) [@Usor](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/Usor)\
**Post date:** [December 6, 2019, 6:22pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/vegalite-jl-what-needs-doing/31940/1 "2019-12-06T18:22:53Z")

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I do not consider myself great at VegaLite.jl and I don’t know all its elements. I am still getting used to it more and more and don’t always have much time. Still I am interested in possibly helping with this project.

I remember that documentation needed some care. What is exactly necessary?

I may not have time to already start, but if I know what’s needed, maybe I can give it some thought once in a while, so that there could be some preparation for later.

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**Author:** ![Tamas\_Papp](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/tamas_papp/32/25949_2.png) [@Tamas\_Papp](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/Tamas_Papp)\
**Post date:** [December 6, 2019, 7:52pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/vegalite-jl-what-needs-doing/31940/2 "2019-12-06T19:52:25Z")

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See the issues on Github:

[https://github.com/queryverse/VegaLite.jl/issues](https://github.com/queryverse/VegaLite.jl/issues)

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**Author:** ![davidanthoff](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/davidanthoff/32/223493_2.png) [@davidanthoff](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/davidanthoff)\
**Post date:** [December 7, 2019, 1:07am UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/vegalite-jl-what-needs-doing/31940/3 "2019-12-07T01:07:03Z")

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@Usor, awesome, any help would be greatly appreciated!

I think an excellent (and easy) way to get into contributing is to add more of the examples from the original vega-lite documentation to our own documentation. I once made a big push, but I didn’t manage to finish all of them. I found that was a super useful exercise for myself as well, because I actually learned more about the features of vega-lite 🙂 So in my mind this is probably the lowest hanging fruit in terms of contributing to the docs.

But any other help with the docs would also be appreciated.

We also have a fair number of more low level coding exercises. If you want to contribute to these, let me know, and I can guide you!

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**Author:** ![Usor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/8dc957/32.png) [@Usor](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/Usor)\
**Post date:** [December 7, 2019, 4:44pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/vegalite-jl-what-needs-doing/31940/4 "2019-12-07T16:44:01Z")

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Thanks.

Normally, yes, but I figured I may as well ask here.

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**Author:** ![Usor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/8dc957/32.png) [@Usor](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/Usor)\
**Post date:** [December 7, 2019, 4:58pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/vegalite-jl-what-needs-doing/31940/5 "2019-12-07T16:58:16Z")

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Good. That already gives me something to think about once in a while if I squeeze it in. (Just don’t know when.)

I remember that I found that some or even many of the examples in their original documentation are very convoluted or aren’t getting to the point quickly and easily. Is this a correct assessment? At least to me it looked liked it, like it’s easy to miss the whole essence in the first place, which may be why I had trouble with some of them.

And I see you recently opened on Github the first few issues for documentation. I hope to have a look at that soon.

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**Author:** ![davidanthoff](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/davidanthoff/32/223493_2.png) [@davidanthoff](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/davidanthoff)\
**Post date:** [December 7, 2019, 5:24pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/vegalite-jl-what-needs-doing/31940/6 "2019-12-07T17:24:05Z")

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So my thinking for the docs was that we have simple tutorials (and right now there is only one) that start easy and walk one through, and that we have examples that might be quite advanced. The examples we have I just copied from the original vega-lite and altair documentation…

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**Author:** ![alejandromerchan](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/alejandromerchan/32/10500_2.png) [@alejandromerchan](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/alejandromerchan)\
**Post date:** [December 9, 2019, 7:49pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/vegalite-jl-what-needs-doing/31940/7 "2019-12-09T19:49:44Z")

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At some point I had some VegaLite.jl code to complete some of the map examples missing from the documentation, however it wasn’t clear to me how to submit the PR and check it produced the expected results, because I couldn’t update the documentation on a local copy. I guess I could just submit the code? I really don’t know what the expected route is, but I did use VegaLite mapping for some fun stuff for a project a while ago.

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**Author:** ![davidanthoff](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/davidanthoff/32/223493_2.png) [@davidanthoff](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/davidanthoff)\
**Post date:** [December 9, 2019, 7:58pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/vegalite-jl-what-needs-doing/31940/8 "2019-12-09T19:58:37Z")

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You should be able to just build the documentation locally by running `docs/make.jl`, right?

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**Author:** ![alejandromerchan](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/alejandromerchan/32/10500_2.png) [@alejandromerchan](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/alejandromerchan)\
**Post date:** [December 9, 2019, 8:29pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/vegalite-jl-what-needs-doing/31940/9 "2019-12-09T20:29:55Z")

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I haven’t done it, but I assume you’re correct. To be honest, my experience with package development and package creation is almost nil, and only recently, following Chris Rackauckas’ tutorial, a lot of thing clicked for me and I thought exactly about something like that for VegaLite. I need to find some time to try it and if it works, I will gladly submit the PR.

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**Author:** ![davidanthoff](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/davidanthoff/32/223493_2.png) [@davidanthoff](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/davidanthoff)\
**Post date:** [December 9, 2019, 8:50pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/vegalite-jl-what-needs-doing/31940/10 "2019-12-09T20:50:27Z")

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Yes, and feel free to ask for help, happy to provide guidance!

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Usor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/8dc957/32.png) [@Usor](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/Usor)\
**Post date:** [December 25, 2019, 8:58pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/vegalite-jl-what-needs-doing/31940/11 "2019-12-25T20:58:08Z")

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That sounds nice. I suppose they’d have to be tailored to types of people with different backgrounds (skill-wise, knowledge-wise, etc.).

I’d be glad to write some tutorials. This month has been so busy and I hardly have energy these days. I expect to be pretty busy next month too. I also still need to get my head around some of the more advanced Vegalite stuff. So it might take some time before you will see me picking that low-hanging fruit.

Merry Christmas by the way (to anyone reading this). (Mine wasn’t so merry, by the way.)

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![davidanthoff](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/davidanthoff/32/223493_2.png) [@davidanthoff](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/davidanthoff)\
**Post date:** [December 26, 2019, 12:07am UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/vegalite-jl-what-needs-doing/31940/12 "2019-12-26T00:07:01Z")

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@Usor, don’t stress yourself over this, whenever you’re ready any contribution is welcome 🙂

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Usor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/8dc957/32.png) [@Usor](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/Usor)\
**Post date:** [December 26, 2019, 1:24pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/vegalite-jl-what-needs-doing/31940/13 "2019-12-26T13:24:50Z")

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Yes, I should take it easy, or maybe there won’t even be an opportunity to contribute.