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I have a diagram showing wires that are color-coded, but the diagram is not
in color; the color name is merely typed alongside the wire. I want to add
color to the diagram as visual information . The systematic use of color
will enhance the information, making it more amenable to use. The color
information will dispense with much of the need to pore over the denotative
text. Color does carry some responsibilities for accessible design with
respect to the color blind users, but I think I can work around that with a
new color scheme in a separate version that has been designed with
accessibilty requirements. I don't believe that most color-coded wiring has
been done that way.
Your tentative interpretation gets at the core of interactivity. Using mouse
clicks as the interaction, I am simply using hypermedia to enrich the
depth/breadth of information at the user's fingertips.
A specific example that uses the "drill-down" model: You are diagramming a
process flow. Some of the steps are distilled down to a prompt ("Perform
nightly backup of billing data"), but your requirements state that a new
hire must be able to review the details of any step of any procedure. You
link the shape containing the distilled step to the detailed procedure
diagram for "Nightly Backup of Billing Data".
I like your suggestion that there are other ways to interact with diagrams.
Got thinkable ideas?
I am still sorting out the fallout from brainstorming how to add value to a
diagram, and I'm wary of "creeping featuritis", but I think that clickable
lists or indexes, linked to diagrams, has a lot of potential for my current
project.
Hope this helps. Bill Darnall's pointer to the Visio / .NET features is
also right on.
Ned Bedinger
Ed Wordsmith Technical Communications
doc -at- edwordsmith -dot- com http://www.edwordsmith.com
tel: 360-434-7197
>
>
> --- Doc <doc -at- edwordsmith -dot- com> wrote:
> >
> > I have a new documentation project: creating
> > interactive color wiring
> > diagrams from existing b&w hard copy.
> >
>
> This is something I've never heard of before. Do you
> mean a diagram that is somehow conditional, so there
> is only one diagram but the visible content changes
> depending on something the user does? How does an
> 'interactive' diagram work?
