Extension talk:EasyTimeline/syntax

Tabs do not work in PlotData
"^ (caret) in texts means: tab" does not work, as seen. Den fjättrade ankan 03:15, 19 Jun 2004 (UTC) at:1719 shift:($dx,0)   text:^^ Interregnum

Reply: Tabs are only used in TextData, see w:meta:MediaWiki User's Guide: EasyTimeline Syntax.

In PlotData you can shift texts to the right by adding spaces (put double quotes around text).

at:1719 shift:($dx,0)   text:"                  Interregnum "

But a better way is to add a shift value,

at:1719 shift:(130,0) text: Interregnum

As far as the layout is concerned, this makes the picture much wider, why not use a linebreak and shift the text slighty upwards? Erik Zachte 11:55, Jun 19, 2004 (UTC) from:start till:1720 shift:($dx,5)  text:" Ulrika Eleonora ~ Interregnum "

Answer to remarks on sv:Användardiskussion:Den fjättrade ankan
I find it quite easy to use the EasyTimeline Syntax. But there is a few things that does not work:
 * The character å does not work, as seen at sv:Sveriges historia: Tidsaxel, for example at 1974: 1974 års regeringform.
 * > I use Ploticus for the actual rendering. It has a built in font with an unusual set of characters. See the table at, bottom of page. Unfortunately no å. Ploticus does support unicode and user defined fonts, and I certainly want to support that as well, but that may take some time, I can't test it myself, no Linux here (it works with freetype, which is not part of the Windows build of Ploticus which with I can test offline). So I will have to ask someone to help with this.
 * >In the meantime you might use an alternate for display without the å like alternate text


 * The id: for colors= does only work sometimes. I have tried to set id:Krig (=war) and color:Krig with red color at sv:Mall:Tidsaxel stormaktstiden, but it only works at one place from, 1632-1648, althuogh I had set it to 1630-1648... At other times (1611-1613), (1675-1979) and (1700-1718) it does not work.
 * > Look again, you have defined overlapping periods. For example:

from:1611 till:1613  color:Krig text:.. from:1611 till:1632  color:Vasa text:.. So the last bar overwrites the first. Den fjättrade ankan 01:36, 21 Jun 2004 (UTC)
 * It would be nice to have DateFormat = dd/mm/yyyy work from at least 1500, not only from 1800.
 * > I am afraid this is not possible. Ploticus uses an internal date/time format in which 01/01/1800 is zero. Many programming languages have a similar internal representation. Of course this could have been implemented otherwise, but I assume in the seven years Ploticus exists noone used it for historical timelines, it is often used for scientific plots. Maybe I can ask Steve Grubb to look at, but even if he wants to modify this it will not be soon, new releases are some half year apart. Erik Zachte 03:46, Jun 21, 2004 (UTC)

Example of define
the given example Define $broad      = width:10 Define $narrow     = width:30 Define $bardefaults = $broad fontsize:S is not intuitive. Why is the value of $broad defined as 10, but $narrow is set much bigger. Is this a joke or am I misunderstanding how "width:" works? --141.53.194.251 08:45, 2 Jul 2004 (UTC)
 * Oops. I'll correct this. Erik Zachte 19:51, Jul 2, 2004 (UTC)

Vertical down?
Is it possible to make a vertical timeline that goes from TOP to BOTTOM? That is, say, having 2001 at the top and 2004 at the bottom, instead of 2001 at the bottom and 2004 at the top? --24.74.121.185 01:55, 11 Aug 2004 (UTC)


 * Yes, add 'order:reverse' to TimeAxis command. This is not documented yet on meta syntax page, many script syntax enhancements aren't. It will be done in due time, but I have several other Wikipedia projects that need attention first, sorry. Erik Zachte 05:29, Aug 11, 2004 (UTC)


 * Unfortunately, it only works with DateFormat yyyy. My plans to create a timeline of the hurricane season will have to wait. :( --24.74.46.255 05:00, 24 September 2005 (UTC) (Golbez on en)

Nifty Features Should Include Applicability Notice
Readily discerning whether a nifty feature doesn't work on one's personal wiki because the configuration is wrong or because that feature is implemented in a newer version of MediaWiki would be a good thing.

For instance, EasyTimeline appears to be a new feature in 1.3. . But what is not clear is exactly when it was added. Should I expect it to be present on my 1.2.6 site? Will I get this feature if I upgrade to 1.3.2? And then, in the future, if this feature is removed, in what version will that change of state occur?

Complex features with many sub-parts should probably indicate when the sub-parts were added and removed.


 * Agree, but this is not the most likely page to be read by the persons involved. You might try a post at e.g. the Village Pump, or the wikitech mailing list. Erik Zachte 22:32, Sep 16, 2004 (UTC)

Adding EasyTimeline
Hi, I am running a MediaWiki-based Wiki about History. How can I add Timeline functionality? I cannot manage to make timelines!


 * I'll post instructions about this in the coming days, probably Friday. Erik Zachte 10:12, Dec 1, 2004 (UTC)


 * Thanks! --Pptudela 06:21, 2 Dec 2004 (UTC)


 * Instructions added at Help:EasyTimeline activation Erik Zachte 18:27, Dec 4, 2004 (UTC)

Timelines and Templates
Is there some hope for template-based timelines, which would allow using in the timeline (like  )? --Glimz 15:59, Jan 24, 2005 (UTC)
 * You mean like this:


 * &hellip;where it would seem that parameter substitution is not being performed within the  code: maybe this should be registered as a bug? --Phil | Talk 10:44, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * Has this bug been fixed? 144.137.2.250 06:11, 22 September 2010 (UTC) (This comment was Awils1 06:21, 22 September 2010 (UTC), sorry for not logging in!)

Need to be able to change the link color
Is this possible? Can someone hack it up quickly? It should be an easy hack. Flamurai 07:00, 4 Mar 2005 (UTC)

New Feature Request for ScaleMajor
Could you add an additional optional parameter, maybe called "End", that would stop the scale labeling, similar to how "Start" delays the labeling on the scale? --65.28.5.69 22:41, 12 May 2005 (UTC)
 * I'll put it on the todo list Erik Zachte 09:10, May 14, 2005 (UTC)

Rendering Change Request for PlotData
When the 'till' parameter of a bar excedes the scale, currently an error is generated. Could instead, maybe just a warning be generated and the table be rendered, just like 'till:end'? Maybe even add an indication in the table that shows the bar would continue off the scale (like an arrow). Our scales are constantly changing and updating the 'till' parameters take a lot. --65.28.5.69 22:41, 12 May 2005 (UTC)
 * Can you show me an example of scales that are constantly changing? Erik Zachte 09:10, May 14, 2005 (UTC)
 * We have a lot of timelines of composers. Sometimes the Medieval era timeline will end at 1400, sometimes at 1450.  We have changed it 3 times so far.  (I guess that's not constant.)  A person who died in 1420, for exampe, is the problem.  If the ScaleMajor goes to 1400, we use a bar with till:end.  If scaleMajor ends at 1450, we change the bar to till:1420. If we could leave it always at till:1420 and the rendering figures out to stop at 1400 if that is where the scaleMajor ends, that would be great.  Am I being clear?  This lets us focus on different sections of the barSet without re-editing all the bar data. --65.28.5.69 03:28, 15 May 2005 (UTC)
 * OK, got it. I hope to start working on ET again within a few weeks. Erik Zachte 09:57, May 15, 2005 (UTC)

Dead link for Measurements
The Measurements link inside the TextData section for the pos operator is a dead link.
 * Fixed Erik Zachte 00:33, Jun 20, 2005 (UTC)

Lines connecting points on two bars?
Is it possible to create a line between points on two bars, specified as times?

For example, to draw a line from the 1920 point on bar A to the 1945 point on bar B, I'd like a syntax something like: LineData = frombar:A from:1920 tillbar:B till:1945

Does this already exist, or would it be easy to add?
 * This variation does not yet exist. I can put it on the todo list, but don't expect it too soon. By the way what would you use it for ? Erik Zachte 00:56, July 22, 2005 (UTC)
 * I've continued this conversation at w:User talk:Erik Zachte --MarcSherman 15:46, 22 July 2005 (UTC)

NEW PROJECT
Hi, I am compiling a timeline of Australian Prime Ministers, but the first few years saw rapid changes of government, so it is very squashy. I am basing it on the data from [w:en:Prime_Minister_of_Australia]. The timeline is at [w:en:Brisvegas/Template:Timeline_Australian_PM]. Would anyone like to help (e.g. shift the text to be legible etc.) Thanks! User:Brisvegas 04:39, 15 September 2005 (UTC)

Using the ImageSize auto and barincrement
Hi, I'm just trying to make my first EasyTimeline. I've tried to copy bits from existing timelines, but I haven't seen one that does exactly what I envisage (which possibly means what I envisage is not suitable for EasyTimeline, but rather a plain table or something).

My attempt thus far is at w:User:Pfctdayelise/Template:2006 Australian Open and I'm happy it works how I want. (Nevermind I haven't got all the data filled in yet.) I have this line: But what I really want to do is have. But it won't let me because I have. I have a feeling I am not really using it as it was intended. :)

Having the barincrement statement would be great because then when I put Round 2 next to it, all I need to do is make that barincrement twice as big, offset the things slightly somehow, and then it would emulate this tennis draw (PDF) perfectly.

Any help? I would appreciate comments on my Talk page. TIA, w:User:pfctdayelise 15:22, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

Barset syntax?
found some examples 1 2 utilizing "barset" which it seems gives one the capability to be able to add a "skip", unfortunately I have had trouble applying it, does anyone know the rules / syntax for this? I am trying to place "barset:skip" between sets of data to create a space between columns, for example between B & C. something else seem to cue off the split, but I just haven't worked it out. Any help would be appreciated. -- dwxyzq 22:21, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

Is this what you want to get ?


 * Seems simpler like this (using "from:start till:start" to skip the column, no shift needed, and a single barset used):
 * note that this keeps the right bar right-justified (Alignbars=late) 90.5.254.9 01:12, 14 June 2008 (UTC)
 * note that this keeps the right bar right-justified (Alignbars=late) 90.5.254.9 01:12, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

"Clickable maps"
By this I assumed it was meant that you could have a map image as a background and place elements over the top of it. But it seems not, unless I'm missing something...? Any help appreciated. pfctdayelise 14:35, 15 March 2006 (UTC)
 * 'Clickable maps' is a html term, it has nothing to do with geographical maps. You can define clickable regions for any image. In EasyTimeline it is used to make texts in a generated chart (png or gif image) clickable. Erik Zachte 23:45, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

Links don't work
When I try to put links in the plot area, like so:

from:1939 till:1945 color:WWII text: World War II ~1939-1945

it still doesn't become a clickable link to WWII. What do I have to do, so that the links will be clickable? Ludde23 15:01, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
 * Can you point me to the article in question? Erik Zachte 18:26, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

Varying height of marks
I'm using a horizontal time line very similar to the vertical one in Joseph Addison, but some of my text is naturally going to overlap with itself. I can shift the text up so it doesn't interfere, but I would like to extend the mark of the "at" so that it extends up to the text instead of having blank space. Is there any way to accomplish this? My experiments with "width" only seemed to vary the size of the (invisible?) bar, resulting in the same size mark being placed further away from the scale.
 * Please name article where your timeline can be seen Erik Zachte 06:45, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

Link in text drawn incorrectly
In the example below, a link in a bar label is drawn incorrectly. This used to work; perhaps a text measurement bug crept in when the timeline font changed.

A solution is to write Popes of the Western Schism instead of Popes of the Western Schism. Cdlt, VIGNERON 13:44, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

Variable today entry
I want to add a mark into my timeline that will indicate the current day without having to modify it everyday.

Any ideas?

What I am trying to do is show when people will be out of the office nicely.
 * This is not possible. EasyTimeline images ar generated are generated on article save time, and after only loaded from disk, until the script changes and a new image is generated. So no dynamic behaviour like described is possible. Even more, templates are not possible because in the Medaiwiki parser the EasyTimeline exntension is invoked before templates are processed. Erik Zachte 00:06, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

Another thing that I'd like to be able to represent properly is putting in background blocks to indicate weekends and holidays. I tried fudging it using markers but they do not quite line up properly.

Chris


 * Would be very useful to see the day/week/date labels on the x axis, not just a single label with the year (2006.83 in the example above). Can it be done? --62.119.44.122 10:03, 1 December 2009 (UTC)

Floating start point
Hi. On fr:Albien, I would need to start a period from a floating value, since Albian spans from 99,6Ma to 112Ma. How could I achieve this? Both 99,6 and 99.6 trigger errors. jd ❂ 22:59, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

HELP! Timeline won't go before 1800
I'm trying to promote List of Justices of the Supreme Court of the United States to feature list status and the timeline will not go before 1800. It's the oddest thing and I have no idea what is going wrong. Here is the code im entering: ImageSize = width:800 height:auto barincrement:12 PlotArea = top:10 bottom:50 right:130 left:20 AlignBars = late

DateFormat = dd/mm/yyyy Period    = from:01/01/1789 till:09/03/2008 TimeAxis  = orientation:horizontal ScaleMajor = unit:year increment:10 start:01/01/1789

Colors    = id:justice  value:rgb(0,0,1)   legend: justice

Legend    = columns:4 left:150 top:24 columnwidth:100

TextData = pos:(20,27) textcolor:black fontsize:M text:"Justices of the Supreme Court of the United States: "

BarData = barset:PM

PlotData= width:4 align:left fontsize:S shift:(5,-4) anchor:till barset:PM And here is the error message that I'm getting: EasyTimeline 1.9

Timeline generation failed: 3 errors found

Line 5: Period = from:01/01/1789 till:09/03/2008 - Period attribute 'from' invalid. Specify year >= 1800.

Line 7: ScaleMajor = unit:year increment:10 start:01/01/1789 - Scale attribute 'start' invalid. Date '01/01/1789' not within range as specified by command Period.

Line 16: PlotData= - PlotData invalid. No (valid) command 'Period' specified in previous lines.

Any ideas on how to fix it or what could be the problem. Thank you. 193.1.172.163 16:55, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
 * If you read Help:EasyTimeline syntax it says date format dd/mm/yyyy and mm/dd/yyyy are only supported to 1800. If you want to use pre 1800 you can only specify in years. I guess you probably need to make a bug report if you want this fixed Nil Einne 13:55, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

Hash that is not interpreted
I need a hash sign that is not interpreted, for interwiki links like: Geschichte_des_Jazz#Oldtime_Jazz. How do I get it, so that the text afterwards is not interpreted as comment?. --de:Benutzer:Roomsixhu
 * put the complete text (including the surrounding the link) between double quotes in your text: attribute, i.e.
 * However note that this only works if there's no space (replaced here by "_") before the hash sign. This is a bug: the link gets broken after "Geschichte", even though it is correctly displayed. 90.5.254.9 01:29, 14 June 2008 (UTC)
 * However note that this only works if there's no space (replaced here by "_") before the hash sign. This is a bug: the link gets broken after "Geschichte", even though it is correctly displayed. 90.5.254.9 01:29, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

ISO 8601
The two Dateformats specified for full dates are not enough. The method referred to as the "European" format (dd/mm/yyyy) are never used in my part of Europe. Please add support for ISO 8601, the real international format. / 90.227.172.20 08:32, 13 June 2008 (UTC)
 * ISO 8601 is no more "real" than any other format. E.g. it is extremely seldom used in my part of Europe. (Denmark) 83.89.43.14 08:40, 13 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Yes this is needed: but the ISO 8601 format is "yyyy-mm-dd" (standard in Canada, missing) when the Danish would use a dot separator instead for the same order... 90.5.254.9 01:23, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

where have text labels gone?
I have noticed very strange problem with EastTimeline syntax. While creating this graph:

all text labels have disappeared in both legend and scale values. Any suggestions are very appreciated :)


 * I have no suggestion, but I can confirm the legends above do not render for me either. All I see are coloured vertical bars on a grid with four coloured boxes below. I am also finding timelines render sporadically if at all. -78.14.226.227 01:02, 4 November 2008 (UTC) Update: I have just seen that this bug has been reported that may explain the above problem. (I was not logged in earlier) -84user 01:11, 4 November 2008 (UTC)
 * Thanks for your reply. I have learned that number of empty lines before  marker determines whether or not the timeline is rendered. 212.14.56.38 22:06, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
 * It seems to be FIXED now. Hurray :D 212.14.56.38 21:29, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

partial rendering?
Timelines either do not render or render only partly for me on wikipedia. See my simple tests on wikipedia. Either the imagemap is not generated on wikimedia, or it is generated but something, such as text, is missing. Is it just me or is this a known problem? -78.14.226.227 01:02, 4 November 2008 (UTC)
 * Update: it seems it has already been reported as a bug here. (I was not logged in earlier) -84user 01:11, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Need help with implementation
I have attempted to use the timeline from w:List of Jewish United States Supreme Court justices to produce a similar timeline graph at w:Category:Roman Catholic United States Supreme Court justices. In the attempt no text shows, and I wonder if someone could take a look at what is wrong? __Meco 09:32, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

"Current Date" parameter?
Is there a way to go from a set year in the past to whatever the current year (or date in general) is? This would especially be useful for things that are currently ongoing, such as Membership timelines (one example) for sport's conferences and whatnot. 75.76.206.214 12:41, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
 * By the way, I should say that I have attempted to use 2024,, etc., and they just cause errors. If nothing else, they should probably be allowed to be used in the template. 74.247.11.248 13:21, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

Transparent canvas?
Would it be possible to support  for the canvas color? --Mollerup 09:04, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

Dates / dateformat
Since when did mm/dd/yyyy (dates in most English-speaking countries) become common in most English speaking countries? Nil Einne 00:55, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

having trouble finding a solution to "invalid image map generated by EasyTimeline"
I've been working on the following timeline for the Southern Conference Wikipedia Page:

and it renders an error message at the top. I can't figure out what I'm doing wrong. any help would be greatly appreciated. Thx in advance! 68.62.220.79 03:09, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
 * The error message is "Invalid image map generated by EasyTimeline". This might be a bug in the Timeline rendering code, but the problem happens when the link contains an ampersand, as in en:The College of William & Mary. As a workaround I replaced it with "and" above. Here is a short version demonstrating the problem:


 * -84user 06:14, 1 November 2009 (UTC)

Text beside Timeline
how can I put timeline beside text (right or left) in a page? --87.21.178.215 10:06, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Changing with the mouse
Is there any way to change the image when the user scrolls over it with a mouse. For example: in a band's timeline, it would only show the studio albums be default, but it would also show the live albums if you scroll over it with your mouse. Woknam66 talk James Bond 19:37, 17 April 2011 (UTC)
 * And please inform me if anyone answerers my question. Woknam66  talk James Bond 19:43, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

Underscores for spaces
"The bar id should not contain any spaces: use underscores instead, these will be converted to spaces"

That is certainly not what I am seeing today, at least in a timeline near the bottom of the en:Steeleye Span page.

Varlaam 23:14, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

dateformat yyyy.mm.dd foes not work
despite this page saying that :

Notes 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.

it seems to be broken.

Line 1: DateFormat = yyyy.mm.dd - Invalid DateFormat. Specify as 'dd/mm/yyyy', 'mm/dd/yyyy', 'yyyy' or 'x.y'

--Richlv (talk) 21:46, 11 March 2013 (UTC)

black background makes the automatically generated numbers unreadable
I can use "BackgroundColors = canvas:black" to make the background color black but then the automatically generated numbers at the bottom (which are black) are not readable and there does not seem to be anyway of changing their color. Just granpa (talk) 02:48, 25 June 2013 (UTC)

Alternating background row colour
Some timelines are hard to make out which information relates to which bar when a time line has a lot of data (horizontal), Is it possible to have background colours on rows? so you can colour alternative ones. or is there already an alternating background option i am overlooking?

Link color: always dark blue?
We can control the color of text, but there's nothing apparently that allows changing the default dark blue color used by links. This limits the kind of background colors we can set on bars. I have examples that would require white text, but the ark blue links in text are unreadable.

Unfortunately we cannot embed a  within the value of , notably between double brackets delimiting links.

Please, could I request the addition of  on lines with   containing wikilinks (or lines with   and no link in  ) ?


 * Note: there's a parsing bug in  if this is a wiki page name containing spaces or some characters allowed in pagenames like "+" or "*". Delimiting quotes around the value of the "link:" subtag are ignored, so links are incorrectly broken on space, and such lines are incorrectly declared invalid on the remaining words (some times lines are generated by templates that will use PAGENAME's, these links should remain readable/wikified abd not necessarily URL-encoded).

Timelines should really more wiki-friendly.

Thanks. Verdy p (talk) 12:20, 7 July 2014 (UTC)


 * I, too, would very welcome the possibility of changing the link color, because I need to be able to click on individual faculties of a university, shown in a timeline, while giving the individual bars the background color corresponding with the official color of the respective faculty. However, I am afraid that this extension has been abandoned – is that true? (This particular feature request has been recurring for ten years now, without any response on this talk page.) --Blahma (talk) 19:00, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

does Not working on urdu wikipedia
--Obaid Raza (talk) 11:48, 16 October 2014 (UTC)

Error Date not within range as specified by command Period
Can someone please help me out at wikipedia:User:Jacedc/sandbox10? I'm getting a lot of  errors. I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong. My date formats conform to specifications, etc. I think this may be a bug, but in the event that I'm missing something I thought I'd ask over here. Thanks in advance. Jacedc (talk) 22:50, 24 July 2015 (UTC)

Colons in links cause errors, replacing with "&amp;#58;" generates a different error.
EDIT: Workaround found! See bottom of section.

So I made the following change to remove an EasyTimeline error from a page:

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sonic_the_Hedgehog&type=revision&diff=728852187&oldid=728827418

The original (https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sonic_the_Hedgehog&oldid=728827418) had this error sprawled across half the article:

EasyTimeline 1.90

Timeline generation failed: 3 errors found Line 46: at:2016 text:Sonic Boom: Fire and Ice

- Invalid attribute 'Ice]]' ignored. Specify attributes as 'name:value' pair(s).

Line 46: at:2016 text:Sonic Boom: Fire and Ice

- Invalid attribute 'and' ignored. Specify attributes as 'name:value' pairs.

Line 46: at:2016 text:Sonic Boom: Fire and Ice

- PlotData definition invalid. Invalid attribute 'boom' found. Syntax: 'PlotData = [align:..] [anchor:..] [at:..] [bar:..] [barset:..] [color:..] [fontsize:..] [from:..] [link:..] [mark:..] [shift:..] [text:..] [textcolor:..] [till:..] [width:..]'

Swapping out the ":" character wit the HTML number reference "&amp;#58;" for "Sonic Boom: Fire and Ice" allowed the timeline to generate (see here: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sonic_the_Hedgehog&oldid=728852187), however despite the timeline contents now being correct - displaying the colon character and everything - the timeline has an error above it stating "Invalid image map generated by EasyTimeline". Removing the HTML number code removes the error - oddly, using HTML codes like &amp; for ampersand have no such issues.

Obviously this is preferable to the huge error that was generated before, and could be resolved by just removing the HTML code "&amp;#58;" entirely - But I like accuracy in my timelines, and would like to be able to use the colon character. Can anybody suggest the proper syntax?

Workaround found!
I replaced the offending line with an explicit wikilink, with HTML encoded characters in the actual link, and HTML encoded characters in the link description, like so:

at:2016 text:Sonic Boom&amp;#58; Fire &amp;amp; Ice

The timeline now generates properly, as do the links, however I wouldn't consider this particularly intuitive! --Rohaq (talk) 03:27, 8 July 2016 (UTC)

Pie chart?
Can EasyTimeline also be used to create pie charts?