SpatioTemporalNarrative

This project enables storytelling in the style of the NYT "Snow Fall: The Avalanche at Tunnel Creek" article. We visualize and provide interaction along space, time and narrative structures. This was a warmup project for Niels Joubert's 2013 CURIS Students, teaching them a JavaScript stack (NodeJS with Backbone), Literate Programming, and Github etiquette.

Spatio-Temporal Narratives explore stories based around movement through space and time on the iPad

Read the annotated code

We extensively commented the code with explanations and elaborations. We suggest reading it from front-to-back in the order we wrote it - it isn't very much! - so kick it off with the server.js entrypoint! It's rendered in a literate programming style using docco-husky.

• The node.js server entrypoint is src/server.js

• The client entrypoint is src/public/client.js

The Interface for the iPad

All the text in this comes from the NYT boston bomber aticle. It is reproduced here purely for educational purposes to demonstrate a system.

When you open the app, you see a list of stories, each incorporating events over time and space:

Touching a story title loads the timeline, text and map showing the events.

Scrolling the text highlights the current event on the map and the timeline

Scrolling further moves the map and the timeline to new events

Touching locations on the map or events on the timeline updates the text accordingly

Example Narratives:

• Hunt for the Boston Marathon Bomber Suspects
• Snowfall, the avalanche