Illustrative Browsing: A New Method of Browsing in Long On-line Texts

We have developed a new method, called illustrative browsing, for users to get an overview of long on-line texts. When users begin their work, we assume the text to contain no illustrations, but that structured geometric models are available for the domain of the text. Users first select such a model; a collection of tools we have implemented – called the TEXTILLUSTRATOR – then couple the text and the geometric model with one another. This enables users to interact with the text to obtain automatically graphical illustrations. Interaction on the image can also be performed in order to browse in the text. An advanced feature enables the use of the automatically generated images individually as bookmarks. Finally, the users can tune the generated images and embed them in the text for the purpose of illustration.