Alexander,
The issue was with events that overlap in time. If their labels were
simply drawn horizontally next to their icons (typically blue circles),
then those labels would overlap as they all lie on the same line. Some
slightly smarter algorithm is needed to separate out the labels. I was
experimenting with using lines to pull labels apart from icons here
http://people.csail.mit.edu/dfhuynh/misc/detailed-layout/jfk.html
but it was still only for horizontal timelines. Some labor is needed to
code that up for vertical timelines. Alas, we're a bit short of labor at
the moment.
This sort of thing would be great to get done through Google Summer of Code
http://code.google.com/soc/2007/
in which Google pays for the labor. I wouldn't mind mentoring on the
technical side, and perhaps you can mentor on the other aspects like
visual design and usability.
David
Alexander Nakhimovsky wrote:
> A vertical timeline would have several advantages:
>
> 1. Users much prefer vertical scrolling.
>
> 2. Labels would align with events instead of stretching over unrelated time
> intervals.
>
> 3. The hierarchy of events in bands at different time scale could be made
> visually clear.
>
> 4. Because of screen proportions,there is more horizontal space than
> vertical space. The width of text components needs to be constrained anyway,
> for usability reasons.
>
> From earlier discussion, it appears that the main concern was with
> arrangement of labels in bands that get narrow as new bands are added.
> Perhaps the number of vertical bands can be constrained, or application
> creators can exercise self-control. Are there significant technical issues in
> adding the VERTICAL option?
>
> Alexander Nakhimovsky
> Computer Science Department
> Colgate University Hamilton NY 13346
> http://cs.colgate.edu/~sasha
> Director, Project Afghanistan
> http://www.colgate.edu/projectafghanistan
>
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