Graphically Displaying Text

Abstract There are many examples of text data bases, including literary corpora and computer source code, in which statistics are associated with each line. A visualization technique for this class of data represents the text lines as thin colored rows within columns. The position, length, and indentation of each row corresponds to that of the text. The color of each row is determined by a statistic associated with each line. The display looks like a miniature picture of the text with the color showing the spatial distribution of the statistic within the text. Using this technique, SeeSoft™, a dynamic graphics software tool, can easily display 50,000 lines of text simultaneously on a high-resolution monitor.