javascript/html ideas/examples sought

[Jill Burgchardt <jburgcha -at- PESTILENCE -dot- ITC -dot- NRCS -dot- USDA -dot- GOV>]

Help! I'm finding myself in that grey area between technical writing and
programming today. I'm out of my depth on this and I know it.

I'm working with dynamic choice lists from a database that are taking up way too
much real estate on my screen. I'm hoping someone has a sample of code (or URL)
that uses the solution I'm considering. Even if you can't share the sample, I'd
like to know if it's possible.

Situation:
Choice list may contain 1-500 entries.
Multiple choices may be selected.
Selected list needs to display by itself so user can see all selections at once.

Current method:
Two side-by-side boxes with scroll bars, item moves from one to the other.

Problem:
The info in each box is actually three pieces of info delimited by : to save
horizontal width. It's ugly and hard to read.

If only I could . . .
Set up items in each box in a collapsible directory structure. Similar to the +
and _ boxes used on a windows directory. Select and move chosen items between
lists. (BTW, the list contains plant species/cultivar/symbol so the hierarchical
structure is conceptually what I want as well.)

I've used Javascript to expand menus (tree/branch/leaf approach) from a menu
frame to display info in another frame. I'm looking at that approach now with
some differences:
        dynamic data list, not static (or even dynamic) menu items
        frames are not currently an option
        result won't call an href, it'll move the item to a selected list
        resulting list is used for additional processing

Has anyone seen or done something of this type using Javascript?

Alternative ideas are also welcome. Solution needs to work on Netscape 4.0 and
IE 4.0. Platforms include Windows 95, Unix, Windows NT. I desperately need to
improve the interface on this screen before a March 1 release.

Thanks in advance,
Jill Burgchardt
jburgcha -at- pestilence -dot- itc -dot- nrcs -dot- usda -dot- gov