Depth of view in maps

Hi… I mis-read the use of $InteriorScale and thought it would allow me to see more ‘depth’ in map view… i.e. see notes two levels down. After monkeying around I realized that’s not the purpose of $InteriorScale. It literally does as its name suggests. Change the scale.
In fooling around though I realized that when I push a two-level container into another note (essentially making a 3-level outline or construct) that temporarily I DO see three levels in maps. Let me show you:

but this is temporary. After clicking into the container and back out, it defaults to the standard 2 level view:

It would be sooo great if I could see three levels in maps. I know I can see all levels in an outline, but to see 3 levels in maps would multiply my ability to see detail, and show that to others.

Even the ability to see a lower level note’s $Text in the higher level container in maps would enhance my ability to use the visual tool with others.

Any suggestions?

You haven’t missed anything. Map containers show only children and for those only a subset of the full map visual customisations.

Don’t overlook Outline or Treemap views. It’s easy to get fixed on using one view.

Or Chart view. Chart view is excellent for viewing of this sort.

In my experiments, seeing “inside” children in maps is not often very useful, because it’s unlikely that the grandchild you want to see will actually happen to be in the viewport. But I’m happy to be persuaded by an example!

But treemaps and charts are both greatly improved, and neither gets nearly as much attention at they deserve.

thanks both :+1: . You are correct (of course). I tried out chart view, which I haven’t used in a while. It’s a little more visual than outline view, and with a text pane on the side it’s easy to follow where one is, and the detail inside the text pane. I may use that more often!
One question on treemap view if you’ll allow. I can see that this view is ‘compiled’ into a sort of picture. With any changes, unlike other views, it gets ‘re-compiled’ from scratch (probably the wrong words, but hopefully imparts the idea).
In other views, I can highlight the note (map, chart, outline) and see which note is highlighted. So I know when I’m looking at a right side text pane, which note is selected for that text pane. I’m pretty sure that the way the treemap is built it’s not possible to highlight specific notes? I can click on a note in treemap and see the text pane, but no indication (color, border, etc) that I’ve selected that note in the treemap itself.
thanks, this feedback has been very helpful.

The selected note is not highlighted in Treemap, because

  • treemaps can use the color of the note rectangle to represent the value of an attribute
  • treemaps can’t draw note handles, as there’s no place to draw them
  • typographic changes (e.g. drawing the selected title in bold face) conflict with existing conventions (e.g. $NameBold)

I’m all for emphasizing the selected note, if you have a good way to do it!