AI 中文总结
研究说阿拉伯语的可视化从业者为RTL脚本设计的情况，通过分析七个工具及采访11位从业者，揭示从业者在多种因素间的权衡及工具存在的问题，进而讨论RTL可视化工作现状并给出支持RTL从业者的研究方向与设计建议。
AI 中文摘要
设计指南和最佳实践在可视化设计过程中为设计师提供支持。尽管已识别出有助于有效数据可视化的元素，但对语言（脚本和阅读方向）、工具支持和文化背景如何影响设计决策关注甚少。我们研究说阿拉伯语的可视化从业者如何为从右至左（RTL）脚本设计。对七个基于GUI的可视化创作工具进行分析评估，并采访11位从业者。结果显示从业者在阿拉伯阅读习惯、“通用”LTR视觉规范和有限工具支持间权衡，工具分析揭示了对RTL镜像支持零散、数字渲染差等问题。我们讨论了RTL可视化工作在诸多限制下的开展情况，并提出研究方向和设计建议以更好支持RTL从业者。
英文摘要
Design guidelines and best practices serve as references that support designers throughout the visualisation design process. While considerable effort has identified the elements that contribute to effective data visualisations, little attention has been paid to how language (scripts and reading direction), tool support, and cultural context also shape design decisions. As a result, assumptions of homogeneity persist, with visualisation practices predominantly benefiting users of English and left-to-right (LTR) scripts while overlooking the needs of over two billion Arabic script users. We investigate how Arabic-speaking visualisation practitioners design for right-to-left (RTL) scripts. We report on an analytical evaluation of seven popular GUI-based visualisation authoring tools using an Arabic dataset complemented by interviews with 11 Arabic-speaking practitioners across journalism, design, and data analysis. Our findings reveal that visualisation practitioners constantly negotiate tensions between Arabic reading conventions, "universal" LTR visual norms, and limited tool support for Arabic text, Eastern numerals, and maps. They engage in substantial labour, such as manually mirroring charts, fixing alignment issues, and stitching together multi-tool workflows, while making strategic compromises in language choice, interactivity, and chart type. Our tool analysis further reveals fragmented, inconsistent support for RTL mirroring, poor numeral rendering, and map defaults that encode geopolitical assumptions. In light of these findings, we discuss how RTL visualisation work is carried out under many constraints that affect agency and creativity. We argue that visualisation tools and defaults operationalise linguistic and geopolitical power in RTL contexts, and offer research directions and design implications that more robustly support RTL practitioners.
CommentsAccepted for publication at the IEEE VIS 2026 conference
