Timeline - Enhancements/Improvements

We are going to be undergoing work in the near future on the Timeline tool. I would be greatly interested to hear about what enhancements and/or improvements you would personally like to see. We already have some thoughts on this internally but would like to gain additional feedback from the forum as well.

It would also be good to know if there are there specific parts of the current Timeline tool that you really like. That feedback will also be helpful as we proceed with this project.

Thank you!

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Comments

MJ. Smith

Finally! I've never quite forgiven FL for taking away our ability to create our own timelines as we could in Libronix.

I like

the links to the sources for the date
the ability to filter Bibllical vs. World events etc.
the ability to adjust the scale of the timeline

I need

the ability to hyper-focus (screen) to a single topic e.g. only prophets of Israel, only Kings of Judeah, only wars, dates of the pseudepigrapha, life of Augustine of Hippo...
the ability to add items to the chart e.g. the patriarchs of Antioch, the Coptic Popes ... i.e. my interests in church history don't match yours - they're not even close. Ideally, we could share these additions.
the ability to save a set of parameters and recall it in a presentation

Nice to have

a way for the users to link the FL flags to the timeline ... think of it as similar to the BK community tagging ... so that one could make the dates in a resource one is using for a textbook to be active links to the timeline

Rosie Perera

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1193617#Comment_1193617

I've never quite forgiven FL for taking away our ability to create our own timelines as we could in Libronix.

Yes, it would be really nice to have this back again! Though I confess I rarely use the current timeline feature so I probably wouldn't use the ability to create my own either. I just like toys to play with, so I'm probably not your target serious user audience anymore.

John Fidel

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1193617#Comment_1193617

Finally! I've never quite forgiven FL for taking away our ability to create our own timelines as we could in Libronix.

I like

the links to the sources for the date

the ability to filter Bibllical vs. World events etc.

the ability to adjust the scale of the timeline

I am with MJ on these positives.

Dislikes:

The timeline is cluttered chaos. Using the search and limiting type can declutter a bit. There needs to be a way to consolidate and then let the user open more references if they want to rather than start with an unworkable number of items and try to find just what they want. So if I type Paul, i would get the life of Paul as a timeline then click on that and begin expanding his life events within that timeline.

Layers for different regions would also be helpful, so as the user works down the timeline different regions would be organized for them to review.

Selection for types of people such as prophets, kings, popes etc. so the user can create a timeline that shows just the items selected.

Consistency in titles for searching.

I do not use the timeline as it currently is because it overwhelms or the search does not provide what I am looking for.

I wish you well in this. Please reply back with questions.

DMB

Not trying to be obsessively critical, but the event dumping, relative to a query, makes it pretty useless. The old Libby timelines were organized, so they could be used in Bible class. As also current Accordance.

I'm not sure how you'd organize, vs the dump-it approach. Maybe MJ's customizing would also allow organizing for presentation.

Armin

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1193622#Comment_1193622

In this post, I suggest an improvement related to the timeline:

https://community.logos.com/forums/p/197602/1159212.aspx#1159968

xnman

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1193651#Comment_1193651

Personally, I find the Timeline to be way too cluttered, but I do use it and often copy parts of it to some of my personal documents. I would suggestion the following:

1. Ability for me to be able to "pair down" on the clutter by having a menu and select what I would like to see or what I would like to omit.

2. Ability for me to select a date range (which I can do now) but have ability to go back to the way it was before I chose the date range. I often kill the page, then restart it to get there.

3. Have some way for me to enter my own timeline of things of my choosing, within the framework.

danwdoo

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1193717#Comment_1193717

I never use it because I find it a cluttered mess, but I would really like to if it were simple and intuitive. I would like to see it function something akin to a stock market chart where I can easily add/remove individual items to a single chart that is simple to view.

The workflow would be something like: I'm working in a Logos resource and come across a person, place or thing I would like to see on a timeline. I right click it and select something like add to timeline (Or have a timeline visual filter set like Factbook so I can click on underlined entries). The timeline then pops up with only that entry scaled appropriately for that object. I should be able to easily add entries from other tools such as Factbook as well with a single click.

Then in the timeline I see the entry I selected and on the page is a handy search box along with a Bible browser like tool, either which I can use to easily select individual people, places or things to add to my current timeline. The timeline tool should retain the ability to display everything that falls within a specified timeframe, but that should not be the default behavior as it will usually result in an overwhelming number of entries that few will fine helpful.

SineNomine

I don't use it because I can't filter it in ways that are or would be useful to me.

Greg

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1193979#Comment_1193979

Very happy to hear you are working on the Timeline! Thank you!

1. The vertical sorting of events that Timeline does is a problem and a challenge

When there are so many events, how can you possibly sort the ones at the top that are meaningful to me, and show them next to other events that are also meaninful Currently I have to look high and low to find another event that is interesting. Currently I get distracted by many other events that are curious, but not what I want to see. Sometimes I forget why did I come to Timeline in the first place.

Having the ability to filter better on Biblical events that matter is a challenge.

2. As I mentioned in a prior post linked here, I took a photo of a physical copy of the well curated essential timeline of Biblical events by Rose Publishing ("Bible Time Line"), which I bought and paid for, and then photographed and added this as a personal book, that I can access from Logos wherever I am with my devices, and zoom in on. I refer to this all the time. It's great.

There should be a version of timeline like this Rose Publishing Bible Timelines that covers the most important events needed to understand where do I fit in this essential events timeline.

Jan Krohn

Needed: Assign early, middle and late chronology to all remaining biblical events (up to the time around the exile), and allow filtering, so that only the selected chronology events are shown.

MJ. Smith

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1194019#Comment_1194019

(up to the time around the exile)

I object. All Biblical events up through the time of the apostles ...