Alternatives for Tree structure [duplicate]

Question

Possible Duplicate:
What's the best way to view a deep hierarchy?

In a desktop application what are the innovative, alternate methods to a tree structure?

Provide me some example links to go through.

Answer 1

For arbitrary numbers of levels:

• Cascading windows

• There are numerous possible presentations of tree hierarchies. The variants shown below are all from http://vis.stanford.edu/protovis/ex/, which is web based, but nothing stops the algorithms being used to render hierarchies in a desktop application:

• Google's Image Swirl is a web based tree browsing of images - similar presentation could be used for a desktop application - and in any case a web browser is a desktop application. Modern application development tools can make including a browser window in an application a good choice.

• The Open Source Walrus Program provides interactive 3D visualizations of very large trees.

• Any method for showing networks can equally show a tree, because a tree is just a network with the least links necessary to stay connected in one piece.

• GraphViz can be used to generate displays of trees of all kinds. This circular example below is for visualizing the hailstone sequence. Another program, Circos, specializes in diagrams in a circular format, and as well as networks can also show tree structured data.

• Menus are a form of tree. So are menus in disguise like Microsoft's Ribbon.

• Miller Columns

_{(source: google.com)}

For one or two levels:

• Accordions

• Tabbed control

• One nested inside the other to get to two levels.

For a small fixed number of levels

• A table with a column for each level, each row representing one leaf node and giving the full breadcrumbs-path to the node represented.

• Table using indents

• Most of the methods in Tag-wiki Master Details

• Other examples are in topics discussed under hierarchy such as What's the best way to view a deep hierarchy?

Answer 2

Multi level pie menu

Tree map

Zoomable interface