Expanding on my previous writing and research, the next phase of the tracing project was to give substance to the immaterial world of data, date flow, and stored information. I thought the most empathetic solution was to focus on bots moving through data, and to trace out their paths. As these bots roam through the data scape by accessing and interpreting data, their paths in my program grow and branch. Each bot moves through data searching for words, phrases, images, questions, and exclamatory sentences. When a bot find a portion of data that is relevant, it marks the location in its path with a node.
The aesthetics of the space shifted gradually through the development. I had to balance between aesthetic embellishment and accurately representing the movement of these bots through data. Fundamentally, the space is created by tracing bot movement, and therefore accuracy had to be valued above all else. This shifted my forms away from the dense web imaged and towards simple lines. However with continued development I believe this program can yield a space that reveals more about these data scapes that are so fundamental to our lives.
Download:
Mac OS X
Windows XP
prototype_01 I initially wanted a dense woven pattern of bot movement.

prototype_02 The first mock bots: fictitious data sets represented by my program.

prototype_03 A web of mock bots.

prototype_04-07 The first instance of a multitude of real web crawlers moving through the space.

prototype_08-09 As my prototype developed, I wanted better ways to visually cue the viewer to the changes in the bot's movements. I experimented with node shape and color.

prototype_10 I ultimately settled on a line-dominant representation with the background subtly cueing you to the bot's movements.

If you want to explore more spaces, here are some of the prototypes:
Prototype_01:
Mac OS X
Windows - coming soon
The aesthetics of the space shifted gradually through the development. I had to balance between aesthetic embellishment and accurately representing the movement of these bots through data. Fundamentally, the space is created by tracing bot movement, and therefore accuracy had to be valued above all else. This shifted my forms away from the dense web imaged and towards simple lines. However with continued development I believe this program can yield a space that reveals more about these data scapes that are so fundamental to our lives.
Download:
Mac OS X
Windows XP
prototype_01 I initially wanted a dense woven pattern of bot movement.

prototype_02 The first mock bots: fictitious data sets represented by my program.

prototype_03 A web of mock bots.

prototype_04-07 The first instance of a multitude of real web crawlers moving through the space.

prototype_08-09 As my prototype developed, I wanted better ways to visually cue the viewer to the changes in the bot's movements. I experimented with node shape and color.

prototype_10 I ultimately settled on a line-dominant representation with the background subtly cueing you to the bot's movements.

If you want to explore more spaces, here are some of the prototypes:
Prototype_01:
Mac OS X
Windows - coming soon