Lex Devlin

Lex strives to be a thoughtful learner and helpful friend in all he does. With consistent motivation to explore the “whys” behind anything and everything, he studied philosophy, psychology, and economics at NYU and led his own elementary school classroom post-graduation. Upon realizing the paradigm-shifting nature of modern data analytics and its potential to answer some of those “whys,” Lex pivoted, completing an intensive project based program with CareerFoundry.

Craving an understanding of not only how data can be used but also how it should and should not be used, he has developed strong roots within the Responsible Technology community in New York City. Although Lex maintains passionate intellectual interests in public education, urban design, and regenerative economics, the wicked problems of AI ethics, particularly the alignment problem, draw him in most deeply.

Eager to develop the art of communicating profoundly yet subtly, Lex is thrilled to be a part of The Data School’s program. Outside of professional life, he enjoys reading, practicing aikido, multi-instrumental live looping, spending time with friends, and doing nothing.

Certifications

Blog Posts

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Fri 29 Sep 2023 | Lex Devlin
The Ten Commandments of Scope Heaven (Part 1)
As a collaboration with my esteemed colleague Sakif Chowdhury, and after each of our recent victories (mine, Sakif's) with scoping during Dashboard Week, we have decided to compile the Ten Commandments of Scope Heaven in two parts. 1. Answer whether thy work will be explanatory vs
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Fri 29 Sep 2023 | Lex Devlin
Linear Regression, Skeleton Scoping, and Fast Stats (Dashboard Week #5)
It's Dashboard Week here at the Data School, where in our final week of training we soon-to-be-graduates are given a topic or dataset and tasked with putting together a whole dashboard - every day
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Thu 28 Sep 2023 | Lex Devlin
Music Genres, LODs, and Algorithmic Scoring (Dashboard Week #4)
Music genres are fascinatingly multiplicitous. As a musician myself I love finding out about new ones and where they "fit into" the wide-ranging scheme of all genres. One genre can break down into ten others, which may each break down further into dozens or potentially hundreds of sub-genres
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Thu 28 Sep 2023 | Lex Devlin
Help! I Can't Place This Sheet Inside This Container in Tableau!
Greetings ye adventurous analyst. Have you encountered a snag in your dashboard production process? Are you trying, mercilessly, to force a sheet into a container which is, as they say, just not having it? Fortunately, I have the solution
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Wed 27 Sep 2023 | Lex Devlin
Scope Success, API Calls, and More URL Actions (Dashboard Week #3)
Did you know that there is an entire API for Rick and Morty data? Yup, there is, and we analyzed it today. Axel Fuhrmann and Talita put it together for no other reason than their love of the show and ability to do so
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Tue 26 Sep 2023 | Lex Devlin
K-Means Clustering, Jitter Bars, and Personality Traits (Dashboard Week #2)
One survey question is scarcely enough to tell someone's personality trait, especially one that's simply on a scale of 1-5. Are three? Probably also not, but maybe patterns will begin to emerge through the use of statistics
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Wed 20 Sep 2023 | Lex Devlin
Nothing At All
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Mon 25 Sep 2023 | Lex Devlin
Webscraping, URL Actions, and Football Chants (Dashboard Week #1)
Are you a sports fan? I'm not. I understand however the binding, inspiring force that sport represents. Some people meet spouses at sporting events, for others its a primary pastime, even a reason to live. For Germany, the Bundesliga has now been around for 60 years
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Wed 13 Sep 2023 | Lex Devlin
Building a Box & Whisker Plot
My fellow Tableau wizard, I am thankful to have found you here, with your eyes keenly fixed upon the words of my blog. Tonight we will perform a powerful spell ... we will summon a Box & Whisker plot. This spell will require several components, including Tableau, and the Superstore dataset
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Wed 06 Sep 2023 | Lex Devlin
Basic Statistics: Interquartile Range (IQR)
Fellow Tableau wizards ... by the power I possess, I shall herein bestow upon you the deep astral knowledge of ... STATISTICS ... and later on, the extraordinary capacity to construct a Box & Whisker plot ... beware neophyte, ye have been warned ... First, let it be known what constitutes a median
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Fri 11 Aug 2023 | Lex Devlin
Two Techniques to Transform Tableau Tooltips
Formatting tooltips in Tableau can be troublesome and tedious. By default, Tableau will include in the tooltip all relevant measures and dimensions in the view, but often in rather boring and occasionally distracting ways
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Thu 17 Aug 2023 | Lex Devlin
Iterative Macros in Alteryx: A Simple Example
In this blog, I'll walk through what an iterative macro is and provide a simple example for how you might use one. I'll assume you're already familiar with the general concept of a macro
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Wed 05 Jul 2023 | Lex Devlin
Joins vs. Relationships: Logical & Physical Layers
When you boot up Tableau and drop some data in, the first thing you're met with is the infamously named "noodle" view. This view provides an easy way to create "relationships" between data sets - an alternative to joins
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Fri 30 Jun 2023 | Lex Devlin
Color Consistency with Measure Switching
This is a tutorial for when you want to have one "chart" that swaps between different measures while maintaining a unique color for each measure
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Mon 26 Jun 2023 | Lex Devlin
Resolving the Google Drive Desktop Storage Capacity Glitch
On the first day of my new job at The Data School NY, I dutifully installed Google Drive to keep my files backed up. The next day, I was graced with a fatal technical disaster
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Wed 12 Jul 2023 | Lex Devlin
World Tile Map
Tile maps are absolutely wonderful. They can be helpful for alleviating the primary weakness of a filled map, namely that each geographic area's size can either overemphasize or deemphasize the values you're showing that pertain to it
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Thu 29 Jun 2023 | Lex Devlin
Too Much Tuna!
KPI Dashboards. We love them because they show us heaps of business intelligence all at once. It can however get quickly overwhelming to have dozens of KPIs on a single dashboard. Too much of a good thing, such as tuna on a tuna sandwich, can turn the good thing into a bad thing. As George St
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Mon 12 Jun 2023 | Lex Devlin
What Makes a Data Visualization Good?
In the vast world of data visualization possibilities it is only natural to wonder what exactly makes a visualization "good." Such a question mirrors the perennial philosophical matters of life and living
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Wed 07 Jun 2023 | Lex Devlin
Resources for Early Data Schoolers
Greetings fellow data schooler. Welcome to the program
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