Website Changes

Layout

  • Wider page content on desktop (1000px instead of 800px)
  • Time series chart is 20% taller for better readability

Dashboard

Better accessibility for screen readers:

  • All interactive elements now have proper labels for users with assistive technology
  • Dynamic content (like hover info and selection details) announces changes to screen readers

Improved usability:

  • Added intro text explaining what the dashboard does
  • Election level dropdown now shows year ranges (e.g., “Federal (1980–2025)”)
  • Added “No data” indicator to the legend
  • Added hint text below map: “Scroll to zoom · Drag to pan”
  • Minor label improvements (“Show on map” instead of “Map variable”)

Fixed loading spinner:

  • The loading indicator was nearly invisible before (light gray on light background)
  • Now shows a clear white spinner on dark overlay
  • Appears immediately when page loads, not after a delay

Improved color scale:

  • Map colors now use a symlog (symmetric logarithmic) scale
  • Better distinguishes differences at low values where most variation occurs
  • Previously linear scale made it hard to see variation among municipalities with low vote shares

New “Winning party” map view:

  • Added option to color each municipality by whichever party has the highest vote share
  • Shows party colors at a glance: black (CDU/CSU), red (SPD), green (Greens), yellow (FDP), magenta (Die Linke), blue (AfD)
  • Legend displays party color swatches instead of gradient
  • Hover info shows the winning party name

R Package Page

Completely rewritten for clarity:

  • Shows current version (0.4.0) with link to CRAN
  • Functions organized by purpose: loading data, adding covariates, party mapping
  • Added documentation for newer functions:
    • add_gerda_covariates() - append socioeconomic data to elections
    • gerda_covariates() - get raw covariate data
    • gerda_covariates_codebook() - variable descriptions
    • party_crosswalk() - map party names to ParlGov database
  • More practical code examples
  • Links to vignette, PDF manual, and GitHub
  • Added citation format for the R package

Homepage

  • Fixed broken internal links (were pointing to .md files instead of proper URLs)
  • Added descriptive text for the main map image (helps with accessibility and search engines)
  • Current page is now highlighted in the navigation bar (bold text with underline)
  • Added “Skip to main content” link for keyboard users (appears when pressing Tab)

Data Download Page

  • Added file sizes next to CSV download links (e.g., “CSV (43 MB)”)
  • Helps users know what to expect before downloading

Usage Notes Page

  • Added table of contents at the top with links to each section
  • Makes it easier to jump to specific topics on this long page