

The (logarithmic) calendar I want  - pankratiev
http://abstractfactory.blogspot.com/2011/01/logarithmic-calendar-i-want.html

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ctdonath
"Logarithmic". That's the word I needed. I've been trying to visualize a
calendar that captures everything from seconds to years (akin to the marvelous
but abandoned "once around the sun" work some years back), and at last
pondering was wondering how to scale a spiral-of-spirals-of... which would
capture the cyclic nature of our model of time; problem was scaling. Some
application of logarithmic scaling may work...

~~~
DanI-S
Since I can remember, I've visualised time as a set of continuous spirals -
years are the largest, with Christmas at the top and early summer at the
bottom. The years lie on top of one another and fade off into the distance,
like a slinky viewed end-on. I see days, weeks and months separately, but in
continuous spirals of their own. I don't know how common this is, but I
vaguely recall reading that it is a form of synaesthesia.

I've always found this pretty useful. I can see the positions between events
and intuitively judge their distance. I can see how recurring events are
'pinned' through multiple years. I see time periods - like months, or vacation
times, as segments of the coil that are somehow 'different' (like being a
different colour, except not). If I'm trying to remember when something
happened, or is going to happen, I mentally flip through the slinky layers.

Does anyone else think this way? How do people regularly visualise time? I've
always thought it'd be a pretty fantastic digital calendar UI, since it seems
so intuitive to me - how does it sound to others?

Edit: Here's an article I just found. There are some people with similar
visualizations to mine, and someone who perceives a year as a giant numeral
'7'! Interestingly, the article talks about this perception underlying
unusually good memory - but my memory of the past is actually pretty
atrocious.

[http://scienceblogs.com/neurophilosophy/2009/11/the_cognitiv...](http://scienceblogs.com/neurophilosophy/2009/11/the_cognitive_benefits_of_time-
space_synaesthesia.php)

~~~
iandanforth
This exactly how I view time. Freaky. If I zoom into one small period of time
however the view often feels more like standing on a small ring-world planet.
I can see waaay off into the distance, but only big things are visible.

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s-phi-nl
See <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1248496> and especially
<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1248922> for another discussion of the
same idea.

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praptak
The 43 folders system bears some resemblance to this idea. If you haven't
already heard about it a hundred times, it's about having 31 "day of month"
folders - the shorter time frame, plus 12 "month" folders - the longer time
frame. The shuffling of tasks is pretty obvious: the tasks from upcoming month
get reshuffled into their respective day folders. You could extend it with one
or two more levels (year? decade?) and get something similar to what the
author describes.

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epaga
Would love this for a paper calendar.

I remember being stumped by the same problem of wanting a better overview over
periods of time, and so came up with a scrollable-zoomable-timeline
visualization called LineTime (<http://www.linetimeapp.com>). Smooth pinch-to-
zoom and it displays days, weeks, months, years, decades, centuries.

At this point, LineTime isn't a productivity app but a history timeline. But
actually I like this idea almost better for a productivity tool, since it
enables you to "compartmentalize" a bit better than with a flowing timeline
like LineTime.

~~~
praptak
_"Would love this for a paper calendar."_

This one would be tricky - it looks like this needs continuous re-scaling.
This would probably need a system of movable paper parts - labels, post-its or
whatever. There's a serious danger you'd spend more energy tweaking those than
thinking about the actual tasks :)

~~~
dredmorbius
A magnetic / whiteboard planning calendar might work though.

You'd have current month large, then scale down through future 3 months,
remainder of year, future years. Post-its / whiteboard marker / magnetic
markers for various events.

The advantage of software is of course that you can have scaled views but
infinite (or at least very large) storage capacity.

~~~
mbreese
Well, the other advantage of software is that you wouldn't have to re-draw
your paper version of a calendar when the months change. Imagine having to
move important events from the smaller "future" boxes to the now much bigger
"soon" boxes.

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kilovoltaire
This is a great idea, and fits nicely with the observation that humans seem to
perceive many things, including time, logarithmically:

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weber–Fechner_law>

~~~
iansinke
One thing I've always wondered about is the dials or sliders for temperature
settings in the car. Many of them (especially the linear sliders) seem to be
set up in a logarithmic way rather than a direct linear scale. Although I'm
not sure whether I'm basing that on the scale of the tick marks next to the
slider or on my actual perception of the temperature -- probably the former...

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jqueryin
I posted a submission to the JavaScript 10K apart competition last year which
was an HTML5 calendar utilizing localStorage. It essentially gave you a view
of all twelve upcoming months in a snapshot. Perhaps even something as simple
as this would help with the visual aspect. As far as the "bindings" are
concerned, I think you could use tabs along the top and do some redesigning
for the different timeframes.

<http://10k.aneventapart.com/1/Entry/233>

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pbnjay
I actually created a logarithmic calendar app for a class a few years ago...
Maybe I'll dig it out, update it and post since other people seem to like the
idea...

~~~
runjake
Just do it and post it. Don't post a comment with "Maybe..."

~~~
pbnjay
Pay for my time and I will. Don't post a comment with "Just do it..." when you
have no idea what other stuff I have going on or how much effort it would be
to get it to any sort of presentable state.

Lighten up man.

~~~
lwat
Do or do not, there is no 'try' \-- Yoda

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dm5037
Spot on. I feel quite sure people do think in something like this way. I've
thought about it in the past as well and have been working on some similar
ideas for mapping:
[http://danieljmaxwell.tumblr.com/post/12074739965/a-better-k...](http://danieljmaxwell.tumblr.com/post/12074739965/a-better-
kind-of-mapping)

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Gambit89
Combining this long-range view with a short-range view like SpiraClock (
<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2605709> ) might be an interesting app.

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Robin_Message
Dave Allen's _Getting Things Done_ suggests having multiple levels of
task/tactical/strategic/life tracking and review, roughly like you are
describing, although doesn't suggest a special view for it.

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bettse
caliander

