LifeLines: Visualizing Personal Histories

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LifeLines Visualizing Personal Histories

• Catherine Plaisant, Brett Milash, Anne Rose, Seth
  Widoff, Ben Shneiderman

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LifeLines - Overview

• Lifelines provide a general visualization
  environment for personal histories that can be
  applied to a wide range of biographical data.
• Started out as a graphical interface to juvenile
  records for the Maryland Department of Juvenile
  Services.
• In 1997 Univ. Of Maryland began a collaboration
  with IBM to bring lifelines to the web for
  patient medical records.

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LifeLines - Graphical Interface

• Facets are shown as groups of events with
  alternating background colors.
• Events are shown as lines of varying size and
  color.
• Size and color dictate where different periods
  begin and end within the lifespan of the event or
  the severity of the event.
• Discrete events are shown as icons on the screen.

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LifeLines - Capabilities

• Zoom capabilities, to more accurately pinpoint
  areas of interest.
• Collapsible facets make it easier to view data of
  interest.
• Text searches allow the user to locate specific
  pieces of data.

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LifeLines Capabilities (cont.)

• By double clicking on any event you are given
  detailed information and thus the lifelines
  interface acts a large menu.
• Control panel allows the user to decide how the
  information should be displayed.

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LifeLines - Advantages

• Reduce the chances of missing information.
• Facilitates the spotting of anomalies and trends.
• Streamline the access to details (lifelines act
  as large menus).
• Simple and tailorable to a large variety of
  applications.

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LifeLines - Problems

• Too much space is left unused. Data-pixel ratio
  is too low.
• Possible bias associated with color and thickness
  coding.
• Need of a more integrated data entry process
  (i.e. Direct data entry into the interface).

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HCI Metrics

• Very easy to learn.
• Good first impression and easy to use.
• User satisfaction was very high.
• High retention over time.
• Error-recovery is easy due to the fact that it is
  hard to make errors.

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Thank You