Tangled^™ user guide - user interface

A hierarchical classification list, the class list is the hub of the Tangled lists and can access a variety of information from other lists.

A list of the available photographs, the photo list can have up to 256 photographs of each species.  When multiple photographs of a species are available, the default order is reverse chronilogical (e.g., adults first, eggs last).

A list of the available recordings, the audio list can have up to 256 recordings of each species.  When multiple recordings of a species are available, the default order is from complex to simple (e.g., songs first, calls last).

A list of the available videos, the video list can have up to 256 videos of each species.  Currently, the Tangled birds of North America multimedia does not include any videos.

A list of documented attributes, the attribute list displays the name of the files included in the SD card's attribute directory.  The attribute files are simply lists defining sets of species.  For example in the birds of North America phenotypic directory, there is an attribute file listing the species that eat primarily seeds, and another attribute file listing the species that have some red plumage.

Attribute files are easy to create using the class list's 'select/create list report' menu item.  And once they are linked, they are automatically listed in the attribute list and therefore can be accessed by the Tangled check projection logic to help with species identification.

Any set of species can be added to the custom list (e.g., your life sighting list).  The custom list included in the Tangled birds of North America phenotypic directory includes the check lists from most of the bird record committees in the United States and Canada.

The review list is a set of product reviews, sans advertisements.

The ecology list is the nexus between field guide topics.  The Tangled check projection logic can project checks between the ecology list and the class lists of the guide topics checked in the guide topic list.

The geographical coverage of Tangled is broad, and the geography list is the way to localize it.  For example in the Tangled birds of North America guide topic, check your particular Bird Conservation Region (BCR) in the geography list.

The photo list can present a slide show that flips through just the checked photos (i.e., the unchecked photos are skipped) every few seconds.  To start the slide show, tap the play icon at the bottom of the photo list.

Siimilarly, the audio list can play a play list of just the checked recordings (i.e., the unchecked recordings are skipped).  To start the play list, tap the play icon at the bottom of the audio list.

The icons at the bottom of the class list denote that the highlighted species is associated with some documentation (e.g., ‘E’ for etymology).  To see which species has a certain type of documentation, it is possible to manually scroll through and highlight each species in the list while looking for the icon associated with that documentation to appear.  However, a more efficient approach is to have the Tangled application check the species that have the documentation of interest.  For example, to determine which of the species have identification tips available,

• switch to the class list,
• select the ‘check/included’ menu item,
• in the automatically displayed 'check included information' dialog, check 'ID tip', check 'reset' (to clear any existing checks in the class list), check 'or' (so species with ID tips are checked), and tap the 'OK' button.

The result is 696 checked species (i.e., species associated with ID tips included in the Tangled phenotypic directory) in the class list.

Checks in the Tangled lists are used in so many different contexts, they are often overwritten.  The check favorites are persistent checks (in an SD card file in the /tangled/<topic>/admin/favorite directory) that users can save and restore.  For example, suppose that you want to keep track of the vocalizations that sound stranger-than-fiction in order to play them some day for the amusement of others.  The Three-wattled Bellbird might be a good start.

• Switch to the audio list.
• Clear the checks by selecting the 'check/clear all' menu item.
• Scroll to the Three-wattled Bellbird byentering the text ‘d bel’ (i.e., starting at the last letter of the first word).
• Check both recordings of the Three-wattledBellbird.
• Save them as favorites by selecting the 'check/save as favorites' menu item.
• Optionally, to confirm the favorites were saved, clear the checks by selecting the 'check/clear all' menu item, and restore them by selecting the 'check/restore favorites' menu item.

Often, checks are sparsely distributed throughout a list.  Although scrolling a page at a time while looking for checks is a possible approach to scrolling to the previous/next check in the list, the Tangled application offers a more efficient approach: check-to-check scrolling.  To use the Tangled application's check-to-check scrolling

• highlight an item in the list (checked or not),
• press the left/right side of the 5-way navigation button to scroll to and highlight the previous/next checked item in the list.  An alternative to pressing the left or right edge of the 5-way navigation button is to select the 'view/previous check' or 'view/next check' menu item.

Reports are a way to transfer results in a Tangled list to other applications, such as a spreadsheet or an email application.  To create a tab delimited text file of the checked items in a list, select the ‘select/create list report’ menu item.  The tangled application generates the report in the SD card’s /tangled/<topic>/admin/report directory.

In the Tangled application, Quick Find is the name of the feature that scrolls the list to text as the user enters it (i.e., without an intermediate search dialog).  Quick Find can also be used to check all the items in the text that contain the text the user enters.  For example, to check all the species in the class list that contain the text "hawk"

• switch to the class list,
• clear the checks in the class list by selecting the 'check/clear all' menu item,
• enter the text "hawk", and
• select the 'check/quick find text' menu item.

The result in the class list is 40 species checked because the names include "hawk".

Check projection is the Tangled application's alternative to dichotomous identification keys commonly found in paperback field guides.  There are several advantages of check projection and they are notable enough to warrant a separate page to describe them.