A digital content viewing system using polymorphic visualization of relations between content as a visual interface

Abstract

In this paper we propose a digital content viewing system which visualizes the polymorphic relationships between digital content interactively and uses it as a visual interface. The relationships are expressed by classifying and corresponding of the content and shown by directed graphs. On the graphs, nodes mean the content files and the groups, and edges mean group members or correspondences. The graphs are archived as relation catalogues separately from content files. We visualize the relations of content on a directed graph. To visualize the graphs, we use a method of locating nodes by horizontal directions and height. Nodes linked with a target node will be located on a horizontal circle and their height is decided by their relation catalogue. After deciding the node location, nodes and links are drawn using 3D graphics and animation. The visualization result called “polymorphic view” is used as a visual interface for selecting content. Selecting content on the visualized graph will expand new links and new content nodes additionally. We can show another content by tracing graph links. It becomes easy to understand the relations between digital content, because we can change the direction and size of the directed graph.