Miller Columns

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A browsing/visualization technique whose application to tree structures is most well known today as the "View Columns" mode of the Mac OS X Finder. It is closely related to techniques used earlier in the Smalltalk browser, but was independently invented by Mark S. Miller in 1980 at Yale University. The technique was then used at Project Xanadu, Datapoint, and NeXT. The Miller Columns in Mac OS X descend directly from the use of Miller Columns at NeXT.

While at Datapoint, Miller generalized the technique to browse directed graphs with labeled nodes and directed graphs with labeled nodes and arcs. In all cases, the technique is appropriate only for structures with high degree (large fanout). For low-degree structures, outline editors or graph viewers are more effective.

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