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Adding Timelines to the Narrative Report


https://support.genopro.com/Topic17200.aspx
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By genome - Monday, April 2, 2007
I am posting this in a under a new topic as it is no longer a sugggestion or wish list item and the old post was getting a little cluttered.

Summary. The attached files add an Individual, Family and GenoMap Timelines  feature to the English Narrative Report. To use it, create an empty GenoPro customized skin folder e.g. Customized English Narrative Report with Timelines, and unpack the contents of the attached zip file into it.

 Then generate a report using this custom skin.

Usage Notes.

  1. Config.xml contains a number of new parameters used to customise the Timeline:
        Timelines="Y" set this to "N" if you do not want Timelines to appear in your report
        TimelineMinEventsIndividual="2"  Mimimum no. of events before a Timeline is produced for a particular individual.
        TimelineMinEventsFamily="2"  Mimimum no. of events before a Timeline is produced for a particular family.
        TimelineShowDuration="N" Whether or not 'duration' bars are displayed initially. (Can be toggeld on and off in Report)
        TimelineContemporary="Y" Whether or not 'duration' bars are to be displayed for events that are still current.
    These parameters can of course either be changed in Config.xml or set using GenoPro Document Custom Tags.
  2. Dictionary.xml contains settings for the colours of the text and bars in the Timelines and can be changed if required. Not that the (hexadecimal) RGB color values should be used. Note also that when used for a duration bar, a 20% opacity value is applied to the colour. The Timeline widget also allows other aspects of the theme to be changed but this has not been implemented here.
  3. The GenoMap timelines initially display a 'note' event giving details of how the navigate the timeline. You can also pan the Timeline by clciking the mouse wheel and dragging or by double clicking at the ends of the visible Timeline area when hand cursor is displayed.
  4. Information bubble/balloons are not displayed on the Individual & Family Timelines because most of the information is already available on the same page.
  5. The Simile Timeline Javascripts are now included in the custom skin and will be copioes into the report location rather than being dynamically downloaded from the MIT site when the report is viewed. This is because the scripts have been amended to permit coloured duration bars and will also isolate the generated Report from changes & availability of the MIT site.

Update VI: 14/4/07 Version 2.0.0.3l posted

By fbukolyi - Monday, April 2, 2007
Hi Ron, fabulous job!

A small thing to polish: if an individual has death date filled only, then the timeline element looks like BÓTA, Gáspárd. 18781878 (no space between the name and d., double date). This appears in the popup title as well - the full text in the popup is OK.
By IainTait - Monday, April 2, 2007
Ron (4/2/2007)
Summary. The attached files add an Individual, Family and GenoMap Timelines  feature to the English Narrative Report. To use it, create a new Customized English Narrative skin using GenoPro 2007 version 2.0.0.3 and unpack the contents of the attached zip file into it. This will replace some files and create some new ones. Then generate a report using this custom skin.

Hi Ron, I did exactly as you said with the Customized English Narrative skin I had made a few days ago with version 2.0.0.3  but got this error.

 ?

By haep - Monday, April 2, 2007
Hi Ron,

I got the following error when I try to open a timeline from the timeline index

Line: 2
Char: 1
Error: invalid character
Code:0
URL: file://c:\Report\Timeline.htm

Line: 1228
Char: 2
Error: 'tl' is null or not an object
Code:0
URL: file://c:\Report\Timeline.htm

In the person or family pages it works fine until zoom in or out, or toogle timeline duration bars, or refresh the page. ... got the same error.

Thanks

Hugo

PS. The new feature are excellent! regards!

By genome - Monday, April 2, 2007
Yes I forgot to test this latest version with IE! Firefox however works fine without complaint. I'll investigate - but meanwhile try Mozilla Firefox!

Update: This error is extremely frustrating. The line number and filename  given in the error message seem to be a complete red herring - oh Microsoft why do you do this! And the only decent Javascript debugger, VenkMan,  is for Mozilla Firefox only so is not much use here!

By fbukolyi - Monday, April 2, 2007
I had also problems with firefox, the cure was: Refresh Smile
By EDilena - Tuesday, April 3, 2007
Sorry, i´m spanish and my english is not good.

1) When i press the button "toggle timeline duration bar on/off" some individuals disappear.

2) When i edit the config.xml and set TimelineShowDuration="Y"  i got this error: "Caught exception : SyntaxError : missing : after property id."  (With FireFox),   "Caught exception [Object error]" with IE6.

PD: Congratulations Ron, this software is the great.

Thanks

By genome - Wednesday, April 4, 2007
Welcome to the forum EDilina and your English seems perfectly fine to me, certainly much better than my Spanish. Thanks for the report.

I've corrected the TimelineShowDuration issue and also managed to get it working with IE. So should now be useable with FF 1.5 & 2, IE 6 & 7. See revised attachment, version 2.0.03i, to my 1st post in this thread.

There is a bug in the Timeline API such that if the timeline area has a vertical scroll bar then the information bubbles/balloons are misplaced when the timeline has been scrolled vertically. Also, IE7, poor thing, gets a bit confused with the vertical scroll bar and decides to add one to the frame as well as a completely useless one for the timeline because It spills the timeline out of its containing box.

Could you please provide more info on the 'disappearing' individuals. ¿What attributes do they have in common, start date end date, etc.? ¿Do they really disappear or just yet repainted in a different position?

By EDilena - Wednesday, April 4, 2007
"¿What attributes do they have in common, start date end date, etc.? ¿Do they really disappear or just yet repainted in a different position? "

Ej: Duration bar off : All data

Ej: Duration bar on   Common data : All individuals are dead and end unions.

By fbukolyi - Wednesday, April 4, 2007
Please set TimelineContemporary="Y" Whether or not 'duration' bars are to be displayed for events that are still current.
By IainTait - Wednesday, April 4, 2007
Ron (4/4/2007)
I've corrected the TimelineShowDuration issue and also managed to get it working with IE. So should now be useable with FF 1.5 & 2, IE 6 & 7. See revised attachment, version 2.0.03i, to my 1st post in this thread. There is a bug in the Timeline API such that if the timeline area has a vertical scroll bar then the information bubbles/balloons are misplaced when the timeline has been scrolled vertically. Also, IE7, poor thing, gets a bit confused with the vertical scroll bar and decides to add one to the frame as well as a completely useless one for the timeline because It spills the timeline out of its containing box.

Hi Ron, I downloaded your version 2.0.03i and made a skin from scratch again and added your files but I still got the errors below

Crying

By genome - Wednesday, April 4, 2007
IainTait (4/4/2007)
Hi Ron, I downloaded your version 2.0.03i and made a skin from scratch again and added your files but I still got the errors below

I was beginning to tear my hair out over this one but fingers crossed I hope I have now got to the bottom of the problem. I had made changes to the MIT code and re-built their bundle.js file from the individual js files using the Apache Ant tool. What I did not realise until now was that this build did not include the localisation files included in the MIT sources. Why this omission affected IE but not Firefox remains a mystery. Anyway I have now updated the zip file to include these files, so if you download yet again hopefully it will work. My testing was flawed because I didn't delete the report folder before regenerating the report and these files had been present in an earlier release, so IE appeared to work. Lesson learnt Blush

I still need to understanded what is happening with EDilena's problem as I can't reproduce it yet.

By IainTait - Wednesday, April 4, 2007
Ron (4/4/2007)
[quote]IainTait (4/4/2007)
Hi Ron, I downloaded your version 2.0.03i and made a skin from scratch again and added your files but I still got the errors below

I tried th same download link which still shows 2.0.03i  and only got the first error, the same as above though when I click OK I no longer get the second error message ?

 

More hair tearing!Crazy

I have just had a longer look at the report generated and discovered to my delight the Timelines in the Individual and Family pages (FAB!). The only problem now is the main Timeline which should open from the toc_timelines.htm as the others are perrrrrfect and quite unexpected as far as I'm concerned.Unsure

I have also noticed that the names of the children mentioned at the top of the family pages look like links but dont lead to the child's page and only when "Children" is expanded does the name link to their page.

By EDilena - Wednesday, April 4, 2007
Ron:

I put a backup in my account, if you can access this file, maybe you can test with my data and obtain the same problem.

I tried to download again, erase the report folder and i obtain the same problem than IainTait.  

My PC is a P4, W2K SP4, IE6 SP1

Eduardo Dilena

By haep - Wednesday, April 4, 2007
Ron (4/4/2007)I still need to understanded what is happening with EDilena's problem as I can't reproduce it yet.

Hi Ron,

I have the same problem as EDilena in personal and family timelines, and the missing data is on events without ending date, (birth, education, occupation and marriages).

Update: The problem with missing data is in Firefox (2.0.0.3) too, not only in IE6; curiously in Opera (9.1) works fine.

I hope it help you to find the problem.

Sincerely,

Hugo

PS. The other problem is fixed in family and individual embedded timelines, but still in main Timelines (from the timeline index)

By haep - Wednesday, April 4, 2007
Hi Ron,

I found this, the education events disapear only if termination field is "Still attending" and termination date is empty...

Same case with occupation events, disapear only if end date is empty, and termination field is "Still working"

Hugo

By genome - Wednesday, April 4, 2007
Yes I found the cause of the disappearing events problem by transporting myself to France (figuratively speaking, by changing locale). End date is set to the reporting date which was being set in the user's locale. I've updated util.vbs to correct this in version 2.0.0.3j. I have also uploaded a Harry Potter report to http://familytrees.genopro.com/Ron/HarryPotter/ and it seems to be OK with IE7 but IE6 is still a problem with GenoMap timelines.
By IainTait - Wednesday, April 4, 2007
Hi Ron,

I tried your Harry Potter tree and found the same problem as I have IE6.

By haep - Wednesday, April 4, 2007
Ron (4/4/2007)
Yes I found the cause of the disappearing events problem by transporting myself to France (figuratively speaking, by changing locale). End date is set to the reporting date which was being set in the user's locale. I've updated util.vbs to correct this in version 2.0.0.3j.
Thanks Ron,

Individual and Family timelines are now ok Wink It´s a magnific addition! BigGrin:

Regards,

Hugo

By maru-san - Wednesday, April 4, 2007
Ron, what does it mean if I get following error message:

[16.34] Processing template 'timeline.htm'...
[16.48] Processing template 'timeline.json'...
Error at line 981 (Code/Util.vbs) : Invalid procedure call or argument: '[string: "(null)"]'
Microsoft VBScript runtime error 800A0005

I do get this only on one file, on others not, so it could mean also a corrupted file.
By genome - Wednesday, April 4, 2007
The only suggestion I can come up with at the moment is that you have a Custom Tag defined below a date tag e.g. Death.Date.MyTag.  This is a known limitation of the Report Generator and should be avoided. Death.DateMyTag is OK.
By idrisi33 - Thursday, April 5, 2007
I deleted all custom tags but I still have the same problem:
...
[1.87] Processing template 'timeline.json'...
Error at line 981 (Code/Util.vbs) : Invalid procedure call or argument: '[string: "(null)"]'
Microsoft VBScript runtime error 800A0005

By maru-san - Thursday, April 5, 2007
There were no custom tags as mentioned by you, Ron.
Made a report from each 62 genomaps in this file to find the culprit. Two gave me problems. Removed those from the file and the report came out ok.
Tried to make a report from those 2 bad genomaps (new file), the message is now as follows:

[0.88] Processing template 'timeline.json'...
Error at line 933 (Code/Util.vbs) : Type mismatch: 'DateValue'
Microsoft VBScript runtime error 800A000D


Hope this will help.
By IainTait - Thursday, April 5, 2007
I installed Firefox and tried my test report again and of course it worked ! So the problem seems to only trouble those using IE.6Pinch

This problem only seems to apply to the main timeline charts as the individual and family ones are fine.

By genome - Saturday, April 7, 2007
maru-san (4/4/2007)
[16.34] Processing template 'timeline.htm'...
[16.48] Processing template 'timeline.json'...
Error at line 981 (Code/Util.vbs) : Invalid procedure call or argument: '[string: "(null)"]'
Microsoft VBScript runtime error 800A0005

This original problem seems to be a quirk in the Report Generator with the IsDead property in the line

     ElseIf Not oType.Parents(1).IsDead Then

I expect .IsDead to give a Boolean value of True or False but on this occasion it appears to return a null string. Changing the line to

     ElseIf Not oType.Parents(1).IsDead = True Then
seems to fix it because any String value is always 'false'.

I also have a fix for the IE6 issue but I am doing some tidying up before releasing another version. My thanks to all the patient testers who have helped in debugging this.

P.S. The error occurs when a family has only one parent defined and that parent is dead. An attempt to access the 'IsDead' property of the non-existent parent causes a null string to be returned.

By IainTait - Saturday, April 7, 2007
Ron (4/7/2007)I also have a fix for the IE6 issue but I am doing some tidying up before releasing another version. My thanks to all the patient testers who have helped in debugging this.

Sorry to have been a pain about this problem as I seem to be almost the only one with IE6Blush

I look forward to seeing your solution and am wondering what other amazing ideas will be coming out of the woodwork in the future !Hehe

The Timeline and djvu were quite unexpected for me but greatly appreciated and I am thinking of other possible uses for the djvu.

Keep up the good workTongue: and Thanks

By genome - Sunday, April 8, 2007
I have now posted an updated skin, 2.0.0.3k, as an attachment to the first post of this thread. This is a Full Skin unlike the earlier partial skins so can be unzipped into its own skin folder. It also includes all skin corrections since 2.0.0.3 and an enhancement for including html in Description, Comment & Custom Tags and is a 'Release Candidate' for GenoPro 2.0.0.4. If after a few days no show stopper bugs are found I'll ask Dan to include it in GenoPro.
By Poolzone - Sunday, April 8, 2007
Excellent end result Ron.   

I think that anybody wanting to print the report would like the 'help' tip removed. 

You have not as yet updated the config file with paramater descriptions.

This visual presentation is very valauable to all Genopro users, and brings genopro's stored information to life on the screen.

By IainTait - Sunday, April 8, 2007
Fabulous job Ron, I made a small test report with your skin "as is" and it was perfect even with IE.6. Wow

I will make a copy and personalise it with djvu etc and see how it goes tomorrow.

By ccampos - Thursday, April 26, 2007
Hi Ron,

Thanks for the timeline feature. It is great!

A single suggestion: For Occupations, please display the name of the company instead of the position name. It will be more informative and will use the same rule used for Education, where the name of the institution is displayed.

Carlos

By hjdl - Friday, May 11, 2007
Great job Ron. Thanks a lot for a timeline gift !

I've a small trouble with it. I've 488 individuals. When you have more than 10 individuals for genomap, and when you roll-down in a timeline tab, the information about individuals appeared to much down (i think proporcionally to the number of individuales)


Examples:


http://familytrees.genopro.com/wjs/Searls/


Thanks !
By genome - Wednesday, May 16, 2007
I know of a problem when there is a vertical scroll bar for the timeline. The information bubble does not seem to take account of the scroll position and places the bubble where it would have been had there been no scroll bar. This is an issue with the Javascript from MIT. Unfortunately there is no maintenance activity on this code and no response to queries I have posted on their forum in the past. This is one reason why I have included the code within the GenoPro skin rather than loading it dynamically from their site, which is what happens with the other 'widget' used, Google Maps API.

I will review their code to see if I can find a solution.