Best UX for filtering

Question

I have a text files which looks like this:

1 0.9 0.2 0.9
1 0.5 0.2 0.5
1 0.1 0.2 0.5
1 0.5 0.2 0.5
1 0.2 0.2 0.0
1 0.5 0.9 0.5
1 0.1 0.2 0.9
1 0.5 0.4 0.5
2 0.3 0.6 1.0
2 0.8 0.6 1.0

Where first column is the id of series and then x y z. I am drawing models based of these x y z, but I would like to filter them. Draw only 7,14,15 or draw 1 or draw 1,2,3,4,5 etc.

What is the best UX for this problem?

I though of one textbox and a button. Below there would be numbers listed with thiny x to cancel this filter. Also, user can input filter seperated with comma (1,2,3).

[ 1 ] [add button]

1^x

Any better solution for WPF?

Answer 1

Two important questions are whether your users are computer-savvy and how many items you're going to have in a list.

A good UI for a large number of items is the MS Word Print dialog:

Here you can combine numbers and ranges in the same textbox (1, 4-11, 21-34), so it's similar to the textbox you suggested. But in this case writing the items out below with the Xs is unnecessary and it complicates things more than it helps - it's usually faster to edit the textbox manually rather than click through the items using the mouse. This is a good UI for people who are comfortable around computers.

If your users aren't that advanced, a standard solution is just providing checkboxes next to each item, with select/clear all buttons - but when dealing with large amounts of data, it can become very inconvenient.

Answer 2

Given that it's for scientific users a command line type of argument would be best. If they can batch some visualizations and then review them as a whole it would be best. Remember to output the user input for the result in case they want to retry or change parameters.