Extension:EasyTimeline/syntax/es

La herramienta EasyTimeline produce una imagen enbebida desde wikitexto. La imagen puede ser un diagrama unidimensional (horizontal o vertical), o uno bidimensional. El nombre "EasyTimeline" refiere a la posibilidad de aplicar la característica con una escala de tiempo horizontal o vertical, posiblemente con otros parámetros en la otra dirección, pero existen varias otras posibilidades.

Introducción

Las líneas de tiempo gráficas se pueden producir proporcionando un script entre etiquetas especiales:

<timeline> script </timeline>

EasyTimeline invocará el renderizado a una imagen PNG y (opcionalmente) un mapa clickable.

Disclaimer: Aun cuando EasyTimeline está diseñada para tener un uso fácil, una línea de tiempo gráfica complicada no es un asunto trivial. Una línea de tiempo simple puede tomar una media hora de composición (o menos, cuando se usa como base un ejemplo adecuado). Una línea de tiempo grande puede tomar algunas horas de composición y ajuste de detalles. Como sea, agregar o corregir una linea de tiempo, sin importar cuán compleja sea, debería ser un asunto relativamente sencillo, incluso para contribuidores sin conocimientos expertos sobre la sintaxis descrita aquí.

Siéntete libre de hacer llegar tus consultas al autor de EasyTimeline.

Comandos disponibles

Definición de los comandos del script:

• Diseño general ImageSize, PlotArea, Colors, BackgroundColors, AlignBars
• Interpretación y presentación de datos y periodos: DateFormat, Period, ScaleMajor, ScaleMinor, TimeAxis
• Abreviaturas de fragmentos de código del script que aparecen varias veces: Define
• Cómo ordenar, dividir y nombrar grupos de eventos y periodos: BarData, Legend, LineData
• Eventos, periodos y textos descriptivos: PlotData, TextData

Reglas generales del código

Un script puede contener comandos y comentarios. Cada comando es seguido por uno o más atributos.

Tipo de letra: los comandos y sus atributos pueden ser escritos en minúsculas, mayúsculas o ambas. Por favor, trate de ser coherente en el uso de mayúsculas y minúsculas, ya que esto aumentará la legibilidad, por ejemplo, use mayúsculas y minúsculas para todos los comandos y minúsculas para todos los atributos.

Los siguientes comandos son obligatorios:

• ImageSize, determina el tamaño de la imagen de la línea de tiempo
• PlotArea, determina los márgenes
• Period, determina el periodo de tiempo que se mostrará en el gráfico
• TimeAxis, la orientación (horizontal/vertical) del eje tiempo

Por lo menos uno de los siguientes comandos es requerido (alguno o ambos pueden ocurrir multiples veces):

• PlotData y/o
• TextData.

Todos los demás comandos son opcionales.

Comentarios

Comentarios individuales y múltiples pueden ser especificados:

• Texto seguido de un hash # será entendido como un comentario
• Texto entre #> y <# también será entendido como un comentario. Los comentarios pueden contener últiples líneas cuando son etiquetados de esta manera.

Ejemplos:

DateFormat = dd/mm/yyyy # European date format

Period = from:01/09/1939 till:02/09/1945 #> this chart will show
  the complete duration of World War II <#

Commandos

Los comandos deben empezar en la primera posición de una línea.

Algunos comandos pueden ser seguidos por múltiples líneas de datos y/o opciones. Estas líneas extras deberán empezar con, por lo menos, un espacio o estar completamente vacío (la letra es útil para la visualización grupal de lineas de datos relacionadas).

Los comandos tienen una de las siguiente formas, dependiendo del tipo de comando:

Comando = atributo(s)

DateFormat = dd/mm/yyyy

Nombre de comando = atributo(s)

Define $US = text:"United States"

Comando =

atributo(s)

atributo(s)

etc.

PlotData =
  fontsize:XS width:20
  bar:Japan from:start till:19/02/1945 color:JT
  bar:Japan from:19/02/1945 till:14/03/1945 color:AI

Atributos

Cuando varios atributos pueden ser especificados para ciertos comandos, estos son anotados como pares 'name:value'. Cuando varios valores pueden ser especificados para un atributo, éste se escribe entre paréntesis. Algunos comandos como Color, usan otros formatos.

Ejemplos:

BackgroundColors = bars:darkgrey
PlotData = at:5 shift:(10, -7) text:Foo
Color SB = value:rgb(0.8,0,0.7) legend:Sea_Battles

Parametros vs data items

La mayoría de los comandos acepta únicamente los atributos cuando son especificados en la misma línea.

Bloque de datos

Algunos comandos como BarData, PlotData, TextData, Colors hacen referenci a un bloque de datos o data block que consiste en una o más líneas de datos o data lines. Las líneas de datos deben empezar con uno o mas espacios. Un bloque de datos es considerado completo cuando se encuentra una línea que empieza con un no-espacio (excepción: se ignoran las líneas vacías, pueden usarse para agrupar líneas de datos relacionadas dentro de un bloque).

Atributos en un bloque de datos pueden ser conceptualmente divididos en parámetros y data items. Los bloques de datos pueden contener parámetros y data items entremezclados.

Data items

En los atributos de data lines text(texto), from(desde), till(hasta) y at(en) siempre aplicará únicamente para la línea en la que aparezca.

Parámetros

En las líneas de datos (data lines) los atributos como color y fontsize (tamaño de fuente) tienen diferentes implicaciones dependiendo del contexto. Si esos parámetros aparecen en una línea sin data items, se configuran en nuevos valores determinados para la línea que sigue. Si ellos aparecen en una línea mezclada con data items, ellas aplican solo para esa línea, así redefiniendo los valores previamente configurados.

Ejemplo:

# In this example two sets of bars are drawn, in red and blue respectively,
# but in each set one bar (marking war periods) will be drawn in green.

PlotData =
  color:red fontsize:S                               # set defaults
  bar:USSR from:1919 till:1922 text:Lenin            # red bar
  bar:USSR from:1922 till:1953 text:Stalin           # red bar
  bar:USSR from:1939 till:1945 text:WWII color:green # green bar
  bar:USSR from:1953 till:1964 text:Krushchev        # red bar
   
  color:blue                                         # change default color
  bar:US from:1913 till:1921 text:Wilson             # blue bar
  bar:US from:1917 till:1918 text:WWI color:green    # green bar
  bar:US from:1921 till:1923 text:Harding            # blue bar

#> this multiline comment does not end command PlotData,
   even when the previous line does not start with a space<#

   bar:US from:1923 till:1929 text:Coolidge           # blue bar

TextData =                                            # now PlotData is considered complete
   tabs:...etc

Reglas para el ingreso de datos

Medidas

Las medidas puedes ser absolutas o relativas al tamaño de la imagen dependiendo de la unidad especificada en los atributos.

En los atributos se toman pares de coordenadas, la primera coordenada es horizontal de izquierda a derecha, la segunda es vertical hacia arriba.

Medidas absolutas

Pueden ser usadas para especificar la medida total de la imagen, posiciones y cambios de posición. Los valores pueden ser especificados en pixeles (px), pulgadas (in) o centímetros (cm) agregando la unidad para el valor. Los valores pueden ser fracciones decimales.

Ejemplos:

PlotArea = left:50 bottom:50 right:50 top:90

Las siguientes medidas absolutas equivalen a:

• 800px
• 800 (la unidad predefinida es pixel)
• 8in (asumiendo una resolución de pantalla de 100 pixels por pulgada)
• 3.15cm (asumiendo la misma resolución de pantalla, convertida a centímetros)

Medidas relativas

Pueden ser usadas para especificar medidas y posiciones de acuerdo a la medida total del tamaño; no se pueden usar para especificar los tamaños totales de imagen (ver ImageSize) pero puede usarse para definir el tamaño del PlotArea.

Para mediciones horizontales el porcentaje es relativo al ancho de la imagen, para mediciones verticales será usará la altura de la imagen.

Especifica un número entre 0 y 100, inmediatamente seguido por un símbolo de porcentaje %.

Ejemplos:

PlotArea = left:10% bottom:5% right:5% top:15%

Ingresar texto

Para ingresar texto deben seguirse algunas reglas:

1. Only a subset of Unicode is allowed for font rendering, but Unicode in links should work for all characters. See also Font support.

1. When text should contain spaces, either specify these by using underscores (_) or place the text between "double quotes".

1. Exception: when the text attribute is the last attribute on a line, spaces are allowed (no confusion will arise where the text stops and the next attribute starts, that is—to be precise—when no colons occur in the text).

1. In data lines following command TextData two characters have special meaning:

1. ^ (caret) means tab

1. ~ (tilde) means newline

Example: (the following are all equivalent)

BarData =
  text:Japanese_mandate_since_1914 bar:Marshalls

BarData =
  text:"Japanese mandate since 1914" bar:Marshalls

BarData =
  bar:Marshalls text:Japanese mandate since 1914

Example showing tabs:

TextData =
  tabs:(4-right,12-right,14-left,34-left)
  text:^1^1940^27/9^Berlin Ger,It,Jap sign Tripartite Pact
  text:^10^1944^1-22/7^Bretton Woods 44 nations establish
  text:^^^^^IMF and World Bank

# will be shown as:
#
#      1    27/9 Berlin Ger,It,Jap sign Tripartite Pact
#     10  1-22/7 Bretton Woods 44 nations establish
#                                    IMF and World Bank

Clickable maps

Both output formats available in MediaWiki, i.e. PNG and SVG, can contain clickable links. Texts shown in blue, and bars, may then be clicked, to surf to another web page.

Links can be specified with commands BarData, PlotData and TextData, either with attribute link, or as embedded links, via attribute text.

Embedded links

Embedded links are links that are (part of a) displayable text, specified with attribute text. Their counterpart are explicit links (URL only) which are defined with attribute link.

Both type of links can be specified with commands BarData, PlotData and TextData and are used for clickable maps.

In embedded links, internal link style is as usual, interwiki link style does not work, external link style is as usual with single brackets, but here with a pipe instead of a space.

Examples:

  text:example [[Help:Link]] internal link

will be shown as:

  text:[[Help:Link|Link]]

will be shown as:

  text:[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rembrandt|Rembrandt van Rijn] paints Night Watch

will be shown as:

Using interwikis

An attempt to use interwiki link style:

  text:[[en:Main Page]]

and similar with nl: and m: gives:

The third one to Meta-Wikipedia works properly, except from Meta itself, the other links work like Main Page (internal page, the prefix is ignored) or e.g. //www.mediawiki.org/w/Main_Page (gives File not found), depending on the URL of the referring page (e.g. different for a preview page and a diff page).

Special characters

• #, #>, <# (hash, hash+"greater than", "less than"+hash): see Comments
• ~ (tilde) in texts means: line break
• ^ (caret) in texts means: tab
• _ (underscore) in texts means: space
• $ (dollar sign) precedes any user defined constant

Blank spaces and underscores in a url should be written as %20.

The tilde character (~) is normally interpreted as line break. When a tilde is part of a url write it as is two tildes.
For example, link to www.site.com/~mysite as:

  text:[www.site.com/~~mysite|My site]

The number sign (#) is normally interpreted as start of comment. When a number sign is part of an url make sure the text is embedded in double quotes as follows:

  text:"More at [www.site.com/~~mysite#section2|My site]"

Actually it may be a good idea to always put texts between double quotes.

Command Reference

For each command the valid attributes are listed. Some commands are mandatory, and some attributes in commands are optional.

For some commands certain attributes are mutually exclusive (will be explained where applicable).

AlignBars

Bars will always be drawn at equal distances. This command specifies whether the bars should be spaced as much apart as possible, or some white space should be reserved between the left/top side of the chart and the first bar or between the last bar and the right/bottom side of the chart.

early (default)

The first bar will be placed on the leftmost/topmost position of the chart ('glued' to the axis), leaving space between the last bar and right/bottom side of the chart.

late

Opposite from early: the last bar will be placed as far to the right/bottom side of the chart as possible, leaving space between the axis line (left/top side of chart) and the first bar.

justify

The first and last bars will be placed as far apart as possible, leaving no empty space on either side of the chart. When only one bar is present, justify will be interpreted as "centered".

The exact alignment depends on the orientation setting in the TimeAxis mandatory command.

Examples:

Alignbars =	early	late	justify	(default)
TimeAxis = orientation:horizontal
TimeAxis = orientation:vertical

BackgroundColors

This command allows the specification of background colors for various parts of the chart. Any color-ids specified should be defined first using Colors.

canvas:color-id (optional)

Specify a background color for the whole image.

bars:color-id (optional)

Specify a background color for all bars.

Examples:

BackgroundColors = bars:darkgrey

BackgroundColors = canvas:lightgrey bars:darkgrey

BackgroundColors = canvas:lightgrey

BarData

This is an optional command which if present determines which bars will be drawn on the chart and in which order. If it is omitted then bars will be drawn in order of their appearance in command PlotData.

For complex timelines with many bars, usage of this command is recommended:

• It will ease reordering of the displayed data.
• Bar names specified in PlotData can be validated against this list, thus preventing typing errors.

bar:bar-id (optional)

Defines the bar id. Other commands (notably PlotData) will expect this id for reference. This will also be the label to be shown along the axis, unless attribute text is present. The bar id should not contain any spaces: use underscores instead, these will be converted to spaces, as with article titles.

bar:barset-id (optional)

Specifies the barset id to be used for other commands. Like the bar id, underscores should be used as opposed to spaces.

text:some_text (optional)

When specified this specifies the text to be presented along the axis, instead of the bar id. See also rules for text input. The text may include one embedded link (see Note 1).

link:local-URL (optional)

Specify a web link (see Note 1) (URL). The label along the axis will be shown as a blue clickable link.

Notes

1. Either use attribute link, or an embedded link in attribute text, not both.

Examples:

BarData =
  bar:Japan
  bar:US       text:"United States"  # refer in PlotData to bar "US" but show "United States"
  bar:China    text:[[China]]        # label China will be shown as blue clickable link to the English Wikipedia article about China

The following lines produce the same output (only reference in PlotData changes):

bar:US            text:[[United_States]]

bar:US            text:"United States" link:http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States

bar:United_States                      link:http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States

Colors

This command allows colors to be defined and coupled to an id (identification tag). Other commands will refer to colors with the id specified here. This command expects one or more color definitions, each on a separate indented line.

id:color-id

Other commands will use this id to specify text, bar or background colors.

value:color-space(coordinates)

Actual color definition. Color values can be either be specified as:

• predefined-color-name: 32 color constants are predefined and recognized (see the Ploticus color page where all these constants are defined).

• rgb(red,green,blue): specify 3 numbers between 0 (minimal) and 1 (maximal)

• hsb(hue,saturation,brightness): specify 3 numbers between 0 and 1.

• gray(value): specify a number between 0 (black) and 1 (white).

Notes

1. 0 and 1 colorspace coordinates must be specified as integers only, intermediate coordinates require a dot as the decimal separator after 0.

1. To create RGB or HSV colors please see RGB/HSB Color converter

Hexadecimal to rgb()

To convert from hexadecimal (#D09916) to rgb (rgb(0.816,0.600,0.086)):

1. Visit ColorHexa, and search for your hexadecimal colour.

1. Read the line of text at the start along the lines of "In a RGB color space, hex ... is composed of RR.R% red, GG.G% green and BB.B% blue".

1. Divide the three numbers (RR.R, GG.G and BB.B) by 100, and use the resultant number (between 0 and 1) as the values for rgb().

legend:some_text (optional)

Specifies the text that should be displayed in the legend for this color. If this attribute is omitted no entry will appear in the legend at all.

Notes:

1. See Text Input for rules.

1. Embedded links are supported in legend texts, see Clickable maps.

Example:

Colors =
  id:war       value:red   legend:War_Period
  id:peace     value:blue  legend:Peace_Time
  id:treaty    value:rgb(0.6,0,0.6)
  id:lightgrey value:gray(0.9)
  id:darkgrey  value:gray(0.1)

Predefined colors

Reference to Colors in HTML

#000000	#b29999	#e5d3c9	#ffffff
#ffcccc	#ff9999	#ff4c7f	#b24c4c	#ff0000	#dc143c
#ff7f00	#ff9e23	#ffcc99	#ffd800	#eaea00	#ffff00	#ffe599
#00ff00	#00b200	#4c994c	#007f33	#99cc99	#99e599	#ccffb2
#b2ccff	#007fcc	#0066cc	#0000ff
#770077	#aa4caa	#9999ff	#b2b2ff	#ccb2cc

DateFormat

This command defines how dates, specified in other commands, should be interpreted.

Valid date formats are:

dd/mm/yyyy (dates in most English-speaking countries)

Dates are interpreted as day/month/year

Note: this format is only allowed for dates starting from 01/01/1800

mm/dd/yyyy (dates in US)

Dates are interpreted as month/day/year

Note: this format is only allowed for dates starting from 01/01/1800

yyyy (this is the default format)

This deals with integers from -9999 to 9999 without leading zeroes

Note that the following formats are still not supported:

• the ISO 8601 standard format: yyyy-mm-dd (standard in Canada).
• the alternate Central-European standard format: yyyy.mm.dd.
• the date formats with month but without day: mm/yyyy or ISO 8601 yyyy-mm.
• the date formats with quarters: qq/yyyy or ISO 8601 yyyy-Qq.
• other date element separators, multilingual abbreviated month names...

Example:

DateFormat = mm/dd/yyyy

Define

This command allows definition of text constants, i.e. shorthands for pieces of script code that occur multiple times. Text constants should always start with a $ (dollar sign).

Example:

Define $broad       = width:30
Define $narrow      = width:10
Define $bardefaults = $broad fontsize:S

ImageSize (mandatory)

This command defines the overall size of the final image. Specify values in absolute measurements.

width:pixels/auto

Width of final image in pixels: maximum is 1600 pixels, minimum is 25

(can also be set to auto if the TimeAxis direction is set to vertical).

height:pixels/auto

Height of final image in pixels: maximum is 1200 pixels, minimum is 25

(can also be set to auto if the TimeAxis direction is set to horizontal).

barincrement:pixels

Amount in pixels that should be added to the image size for each bar specified

(only allowed in combination with width:auto or height:auto, and then mandatory).

For maximum flexibility you can let the script calculate the height or width of the image, based on the number of bars and the amount in pixels to add per bar. Specify height:auto (for horizontal time axis) or width:auto (for vertical time axis).

This is especially helpful when the number of bars in a timeline is likely to change over time again and again. Or to ensure equal distances between bars in images with many narrow bars where differences in amount of white space would soon be noticed (see for a real example :en:Template:Vocal and instrumental pitch ranges). Or to make sure several related timelines always use the same distance between bars, no matter how many bars each contains (see for a real example :en:List of popes (graphical). In short it is a good idea most of the time.

Examples:

ImageSize = width:800 height:600

ImageSize = width:800 height:auto barincrement:30

Legend

A legend will only be shown when this command is present, and at least one of the colors has the legend: attribute specified. There are several ways to define the appearance and position of the legend. Some attributes are mutually exclusive (see below).

orientation:hor/ver (optional)

Specify hor[izontal] or ver[tical] (default).

restriction: orientation = 'horizontal' and position = 'right' are mutually exclusive

position:top/bottom/right (optional)

Defines placement of the legend relative to the chart area. Specify top, bottom (default) or right.

restriction: orientation = 'horizontal' and position = 'right' are mutually exclusive

columns:integer (optional)

Specify 1, 2, 3 or 4.

When this attribute is omitted the number of columns is determined as follows:

• orientation horizontal: Attribute columns does not apply here. All entries will be on the same line.

• orientation vertical:

• • position right: All entries will be in one column

• • position top or bottom: The number of columns depends on the number of entries to be shown:
    1-5 entries: 1 column, 6-10 entries: 2 columns, 11 or more entries: 3 columns.

Tip: you may consider omitting the following parameters at first, and only add them when defaults settings are not satisfactory.

columnwidth:distance (optional)

Defines the distance between columns. You can specify an absolute distance or a relative distance (as percentage of the image width).

restriction: this parameter is ignored when columns = 1 is defined or implied.

left:distance (optional)

Defines the distance between the left side of the legend and the left side of the image. You can specify an absolute distance or a relative distance (as percentage of the page width).

top:distance (optional)

Defines the distance between the top of the legend and the bottom of the image. You can specify an absolute distance or a relative distance (as percentage of the page height).

Examples:

Legend = orientation:vertical position:bottom columns:3 columnwidth:140

Legend = orientation:horizontal position:bottom

Legend = left:100 top:120 columns:3

LineData

Some timelines extend over several clearly distinct periods. A line demarcating these periods may serve as a visual aid.

at:time

Draws a line perpendicular to the time axis (between minimum and maximal positions, see also below).

Specify the date/year where the line should be drawn, in compliance with the specified DateFormat.

color:color-id (optional)

Specify the color in which the line should drawn.

Note: The color id specified should be defined first with command Colors.

layer:front/back (optional)

Specify front or back (default). Defines whether the line should appear in front of or behind all time segment bars.

width:distance (optional)

Specify value between 0.1 (very thin) and 10 (very thick); the default value is 1

Advanced positioning options

You can draw lines in any direction. Only in rare cases the following extra attributes may be needed for full flexibility:

1. Parallel to the time axis with arbitrary start and stop times:

1. atpos:position

1. from:time (optional)

1. till:time (optional)

1. Specify the absolute or relative position on the axis orthogonal to the TimeAxis.

1. Specify the dates/years between which the line should be drawn, in compliance with the specified DateFormat (default is the full range of time as set in the mandatory Period command, see also below).

1. Orthogonal to the time axis with arbitrary start and stop positions:

1. at:time

1. frompos:position (optional)

1. tillpos:position (optional)

1. Specify the date/year where the line should be drawn, in compliance with the specified DateFormat.

1. Specify the start and stop absolute or relative positions on the axis orthogonal to the TimeAxis (default is the full length of the DrawArea).

1. Draws a line orthogonal to the time axis (default at full range of time as set in the mandatory Period command, see also below).

1. In any direction with arbitrary start and stop points:

1. points:(x1,y1)(x2,y2)

1. Specify the absolute or relative positions as coordinates, independently of the direction of the time axis.

Example:

LineData =
  layer:front                                            # all lines in front of bars unless stated otherwise
  at:1                         color:yellow              # perpendicular to time axis full length
  at:2                         color:orange  layer:back  # perpendicular to time axis full length but behind bars
  at:4  frompos:50 tillpos:105 color:green               # perpendicular to time axis, with specified start and stop points
  from:5 till:8 atpos:50       color:red                 # parallel to time axis
  points:(100,20)(170,105)     color:blue    width:3     # from one arbitrary absolute position to another, extra thick

Period (mandatory)

Defines the time period that will be displayed in the chart. Both parameters are mandatory. Specify dates in compliance with specified DateFormat.

from:time

Timeline starts here. The specified value can be referenced as start in commands like PlotData and TextData.

till:time

Time ends here. The specified value can be referenced as end in other commands.

Example:

Period = from:01/09/1939 till:02/09/1945

PlotArea (mandatory)

left:distance

Margin between left side of image and left side of plot area. Specify value in absolute or relative measurements.

top:distance

Margin between top of image and top of plot area. Specify value in absolute or relative measurements.

right:distance (recommended)

Margin between right side of image and right side of plot area. Specify value in absolute or relative measurements.

This attribute and the deprecated width attribute are mutually exclusive.

bottom:distance (recommended)

Margin between bottom of image and bottom of plot area. Specify value in absolute or relative measurements.

This attribute and the deprecated height attribute are mutually exclusive.

The minimum value for this attribute is 20 pixels if you have specified legend labels (see Legend).

width:distance (deprecated)

Specify value in absolute or relative measurements.

do not use anymore, see the right attribute above.

height:distance (deprecated)

Specify value in absolute or relative measurements.

do not use anymore, see the bottom attribute above.

Notes:

1. The width and height attributes are only retained for downward compatibility. Earlier a plot area could only be defined by its total width and height, and left and bottom margins.
2. Now you can specify all four margins, and are advised to do so, and not use width and height attributes anymore.
3. The advantage is added flexibility: when you change the overall image size, you do not need to adjust the plotarea definition as well. This is even more important when the image size is calculated automatically (see ImageSize).

Example:

PlotArea = left:40 bottom:60 top:10 right:10 # e.g. extra space to the left and below the plot area for axis labels and legend

PlotData

Used to define bars (symbolizing a time period), and add text next to these bars on a specific position.

For texts which are not related to a certain period or date/year or which require extensive formatting use command TextData.

Attributes text, at, from and till always apply only to the line on which they occur. All other attributes, when not combined with one of these four, act as default for the remainder of the command block or until a new default is specified, and may be overruled for a single line. See Parameters vs data items for more info and an example.

PlotData accepts a lot of attributes, some of which are mutually exclusive. These attributes can be grouped as follows:

• Positional attributes
• Bar related attributes
• Text attributes
• Marker attribute

Positional attributes

at:time (applies only to current line in data block)

Specifies at which date/year a text or marker should be positioned. Depending on attribute align the text either starts, ends or is centered at this position. Use date/year format as specified in DateFormat or specify start or end which refers to time frame defined by command Period.

Note: This attribute can not be combined with attributes from and till.

from:time (applies only to current line in data block)

till:time (applies only to current line in data block)

Specifies at which date/year a bar should start and end. Use date/year format as specified in DateFormat or specify start which refers to time frame defined by command Period.

Note: These two attributes should be used in combination and can not be combined with attribute at.

shift:(x,y) (optional)

Specifies a horizontal and vertical displacement in absolute measurements for a text. This allows:

• Texts to be shifted to avoid overlaps between successive bars;
• Placement of text beside a bar, instead of on top of it.

Examples:

PlotData=
  bar:Japan from:start      till:19/02/1945 color:JT
  bar:Japan from:19/02/1945 till:14/03/1945 color:AI
  bar:Japan from:02/09/1945 till:end        color:AO

  at:07/12/1941 shift:(0,-15) text:"<-- WW2 reaches Asia"

Bar related attributes

bar:bar-id

Specifies to which bar all other attributes apply (including the optional marker attributes and text attributes).

The bar-id specified here will also be the text presented along the axis, next to the bar.

• When command BarData has not been used, bars will be drawn in the order in which they occur in any PlotData data block.

• When command BarData has been used, bars will presented in the order specified there, also the bar-id specified here will be validated against that list. Also the text presented along the axis will depend on the definition in BarData.

barset:barset-id (optional)

Restarts the bar display "from the top", allowing multiple bars on the same line.

The specified barset-id must have been declared in BarData.

The default barset is anonymous and needs not be specified if there's no BarData.

Blank lines may be added to skip over lines that you do not wish to add to with declarations such as at:1234 with no further attributes. Multiple bars may then be specified on after this attribute.

color:color-id (optional)

Specifies the color is which the bar should be drawn.

The color id specified should be defined first with command Colors.

The default value will be the same color as the previously specified bar.

width:distance (optional)

Specifies the width of the bar in absolute or relative measurements.

The default value will be computed according to the total size of the PlotArea, and the maximum number of bars in all barsets (including the default anonymous barset).

Example:

BarData=
  bar:US text:United States
  bar:SB text:Sea Battles

Colors=
  id:US value:blue legend:United_States
  id:SB value:rgb(0.8,0,0.7) legend:Sea_Battles

PlotData=
  width:0.3                                                            # see note 1
  bar:SB     from:07/08/1942 till:09/02/1943 text:Guadalcanal color:SB # see note 2
  bar:US     from:start      till:end color:US                         # see note 3
  bar:Midway from:start      till:end color:US                         # see note 4
  bar:US     at:07/12/1941   text:7/12 Pearl Harbour                   # see note 5

Notes:

1. this line establishes a default bar width for the remainder of the data block
2. this line specifies a bar to be drawn and a text to placed on it at the same time
3. bar US will be drawn before bar SB, even when specified after it, because command BarData determines the sequence
4. bar Midway will be rejected because it is not declared with command BarData
5. the last line will not result in a bar being plotted, it merely specifies on which bar the text should be placed

Text attributes (optional)

text:some_text (applies only to current line in data block)

Defines a text that should be plotted on or near a bar.

Notes

1. See also Text Input for rules.
2. The text may include embedded links (see Notes 1 & 2) for use in clickable maps.
3. See Clickable maps for information about texts with embedded links and limitations.

textcolor:color-id (optional)

Defines the color of the text. The color id specified should be defined first with command Colors. When not specified color black will be assumed.

fontsize:integer/tag (optional)

Specify a point size between 6 and 30, or (preferably) one of tags XS, S (default), M, L or XL. See Font support for more details.

anchor:middle/from/till (optional)

Specify the anchor position. If not defined, the anchor position is either explicitly set with the attribute at, or implicitly with the attributes from and till. In the latter case the text will be positioned in the middle of the defined bar segment.

align:center/left/right (optional)

Specify center (default), left or right.

link:URL (optional, applies only to current line in data block)

Specify a web link (see Note 1) (URL) for use in clickable maps. The text will be shown as a blue clickable link.

Notes

1. This attribute can only be used with the text attribute.

1. Either use attribute link, or an embedded link in attribute text, not both.

1. On PNG images rendered as clickable maps, only one clickable link will be shown per text segment: text with line breaks (~) constitutes several segments.

1. See Clickable maps for information about texts with embedded links and limitations.

Ejemplo:

PlotData=
   bar:US at:07/12/1941 align:left textcolor:black fontsize:XS text:7/12 [[Pearl Harbour]]

produces the same result as:

PlotData=
   bar:US at:07/12/1941 align:left textcolor:black fontsize:XS text:"7/12 Pearl Harbour" link:http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pearl_Harbour

Marker attribute (optional)

mark:(symbol,color-id)

Places a marker in a bar at the specified position.

• The only value for symbol supported to date is line.
• The color-id specified should be defined first with command Colors. When not specified color black will be assumed.

Example:

PlotData=
  bar:test width:15 color:red
  from:1900 till:2000
  at:1990 mark:(line,white)

will be shown as:

ScaleMajor

This command divides the timeline into smaller periods, either

• Graphically, through thin vertical or horizontal lines in the chart
• Textually, through stubs in the time axis, below or to the left of the chart
• Both graphically and textually

gridcolor:color-id (optional)

Defines the color for the grid lines.

When this attribute is omitted no grid lines will be drawn.

The color-id specified should be defined first with command Colors.

unit:time-unit (optional)

Specifies the time unit by which the grid spacing is incremented.

Specify day, month or year (default).

When DateFormat = yyyy is specified, only unit year is allowed.

increment:integer (optional)

Specifies the (non zero) number of units by which the grid spacing is incremented.

The default increment is 1.

start:time (optional)

Specifies where the first grid line and/or stub should be displayed.

Defaults to start of defined Period.

Note: the orientation of the lines and/or placement of the stubs depends on the orientation of the TimeAxis.

Examples:

ScaleMajor = gridcolor:red start:1940

ScaleMajor = gridcolor:red unit:month increment:3 start:01/09/1939

ScaleMinor

This command defines a further subdivision of the timescale (see ScaleMajor for attributes syntax).

Example:

ScaleMajor = grid:red  unit:year  increment:1 start:01/01/1940
ScaleMinor = grid:blue unit:month increment:3 start:01/10/1939

TextData

Used to define a text block that can be positioned anywhere on the chart.

text:some_text

The actual text.

See also Text Input for rules.

The text may include embedded links (see also Notes 1 & 2).

pos:(x,y)

Defines the top-left corner of the text block in absolute or relative measurements.

link:URL (optional)

Specify a web link (see Note 1) for use in clickable maps.

The label along the axis will be shown as a blue clickable link.

textcolor:color-id (optional)

Defines the color of the text to draw.

The color-id specified should be defined first using Colors.

When not specified, the color is black.

fontsize:integer/tag (optional)

Specify a point size between 6 and 30, or (preferably) one of tags XS, S (default), M, L or XL (see Font support for more details).

tabs:(x₁-alignment₁,x₂-alignment₂...) (optional)

Defines position and alignment for tab character: ^ (caret).

Specify multiple tab settings as a comma-separated list of x_n-align_n where

• x_n is the horizontal displacement in absolute measurements from the left side of the text;

• alignment_n is the alignment for the text segment (specify center, left or right).

lineheight:distance (optional)

Defines spacing between consecutive lines in absolute measurements.

Specify a value up to 40 pixels (or 0.4in).

When not specified a default lineheight will be based on the font size currently in use.

Notes:

1. Either use attribute link, or an embedded link in attribute text, not both.
2. On PNG images only one clickable link will be shown per text segment (text with tabs (^) constitutes several segments).

Example:

TextData =
  pos:(20,67) textcolor:black fontsize:S
  tabs:(10-right,14-left,50-left,90-left,230-left)
  text:^1^1940^27/9^Germany,Italy and Japan sign [[Tripartite Pact]]
  text:^10^1944^1-22/7^Bretton Woods 44 nations establish
  text:^^^^^IMF and World Bank

will be shown as:

TimeAxis (mandatory)

Defines the orientation of the time axis, and textual representation of stubs along that axis.

format:time-format (optional)

Specify in which format dates should be presented along the time axis.

Currently only format yyyy (default) is supported. This means that if a the unit: attribute for ScaleMajor is set to anything other than year, the major grid lines will not be in sync with the axis labels. For instance, setting unit:month and increment:6 will result in major gridlines every 6 months, but axis labels every 6 years. Support for more formats may follow.

orientation:hor/ver

Specify hor[izontal] or ver[tical].

The default time axis orientation is horizontal.

order:reverse (optional)

Specify reverse as the option to reverse the time flow.

The default is the forward time flow.

Example:

TimeAxis = orientation:horizontal format:yyyy

Presets

Presets are a shorthand for often used settings. They save a few code lines and promote standardisation, but may be confusing, as the timeline script become less self documenting.

At the moment two presets are available:

• Preset = TimeVertical_OneBar_UnitYear, which expands to

PlotArea   = left:45 right:10 top:10 bottom:10
TimeAxis   = orientation:vertical format:yyyy
DateFormat = yyyy
AlignBars  = early
ScaleMajor = unit:year
ScaleMinor = unit:year
PlotData   =
   mark:(line,white) align:left fontsize:S width:20 shift:(20,0)

• Preset = TimeHorizontal_AutoPlaceBars_UnitYear, which expands to

ImageSize  = height:auto barincrement:20
PlotArea   = left:25 right:25 top:15 bottom:30
TimeAxis   = orientation:horizontal format:yyyy
Colors = 
  id:canvas value:gray(0.7)
  id:grid1  value:gray(0.4)
  id:grid2  value:gray(0.2)
BackgroundColors = canvas:canvas
DateFormat = yyyy
AlignBars  = justify
ScaleMajor = unit:year grid:grid1
ScaleMinor = unit:year
Legend = orientation:vertical left:35 top:130
PlotData =
   align:left anchor:from fontsize:M width:15 shift:(4,-6) textcolor:black

Implementation and integration limitations

Font support

Timeline has somewhat limited Unicode support:

• it uses the FreeSans.ttf font, which supports a subset of all the possible glyphs ;

• for instance, it supports the West- and East-European diacritics for the Latin alphabet, as well as the Cyrillic, Greek and Armenian alphabets, the Hebrew abjad (but without visual reordering), the Devanagari, Bengali, Gurmukhi, Gujarati, Tamil and Kannara abugidas for Indian languages, the Kanas alphasyllabaries (for basic Japanese only), and a good subset of extended general punctuation, currency unit symbols, subscript/superscript digits, letterlike symbols, fractions and Roman numbers, some arrows and mathematical operators;

• but it lacks the Georgian alphabets, the Arabic abjad, the Hangul alphabet and syllables, the Oriya, Telugu Thai, Lao and Tibetan abugidas, the Kanji and Han ideographs (so Chinese, Korean, Georgian, Arabic and Thai are not supported, and Japanese must still be transliterated to basic Kanas or to Latin);

• also it does not support Dingbats, as well as non linguistic symbols like box drawing characters that should be drawn using the supported line drawing commands.

• Different fonts can be set in LocalSettings.php which may have better Unicode support. For example, the Malayalam Wikipedia uses a different font which has better Malayalam language support.

As a legacy of bitmap font usage, only five font tags are predefined. They will render at slightly different sizes in PNG and SVG images to produce optimal readability for both platforms. It is advised to use these tags instead of numbers whenever possible. They are: XS=eXtra Small, S=Small (default), M=Medium, L=Large, XL=eXtra Large

EasyTimeline code with template parameter or magic words

If you want to use easy timeline with template parameters or things like {{CURRENTDAY2}} you can use #tag syntax:

{{#tag:timeline|
Timeline code here
}}

However, one must replace all |'s with {{!}} (which should be a template containing just |). See the section on #tag at Ayuda:Palabras mágicas for details

Known bugs and limitations in embedded links

• You can currently specify only one link per text segment.
• Link trailers are not recognized, you must put the full text that is part of the link within "[[]]".
• Links that are not specified at the beginning of the text (or the beginning of a new line after a line break specified by a tilde) are incorrectly positioned (the normal text color is used at the correct position, and the text with the blue link color is overdrawn on top of it with the wrong horizontal position). See the first example trying to show "Help:Link" above in this section.
• If the displayed text in bar legends of a PlotData contains newlines (represented by a ~), the targer URL is broken, keeping only the first word in it.

  For example the following code in bar data:

    from:1935 till:2004 text:"[[Françoise Sagan|Françoise Quoirez,~alias Françoise Sagan]]" color:writer
  

  currently renders as

  

  where the target links to Françoise instead of Françoise Sagan, and shows the incorrect tooltip text "Françoise Sagan/.." with extra characters. This bug does not occur if the target link contains a single word. Surrounding the full text (with the link itself) with quotes does not solve the problem. Additionally, this requently causes the timeline to fail without showing the error during its rendering (no image rendered on the browser).

• In addition the target is assumed as belonging to the same parent page as the current subpage even though the target link does not start with a "/" (with the wiki syntax), so timelines containing links are not usable in subpages (like this one).