Squarified tree maps
Squarified tree maps don’t look like trees or maps. And they may not be square. They give us a way to present a visualization of proportions within hierarchies.
See some at Google images or download Sequoia View to see a tree map of the files on your own computer.
General background
Wikipedia, as always, has a good introduction and a good set of links.
History and algorithms
- Ben Shneiderman at the University of Maryland has prepared a history of tree map research, Treemaps for space-constrained visualization of hierarchies, with several examples.
- Source code for a DiggMapper, an application to produce a tree map of digg data at code zen.
- Source code for a php/css web application to produce tree maps from neurofuzzy
- Microsoft Research’s paper on Treemap Visualizations of Newsgroups
Tools to make your own squarified tree maps
- TreeMap by Macrofocus. Free to try for 30 days. $US195 after that.
- Microsoft’s Treemapper with Excel Add-In is free but can’t produce the fancy tree maps you see in something like Sequoia View
- Treemap by the University of Maryland. Free for evaluation or non-commercial use. No info on pricing at the website.
Last reviewed 17 September 2007