A minimalist view can often be more effective as it reduces the amount of information users are subjected to, producing a clean, clear chart.

Although KeyLines has many features that can be useful, it's never a good idea to include all of them in one view, as this causes sensory overload.

Having a simpler feel to your chart can be useful when highlighting certain items. A bright colour stands out more against a less vibrant background.

You can also create custom controls for your charts and time bars. Here we've used overlaid page elements with the and font icons for toggling the time bar and fitting the time range into the view respectively.

Simple views can be visually striking when done well. Using a dark background with contrasting lighter items reduces the strain on users' eyes and can increase readability.

You can also let users toggle the visibilty of components. Try clicking the button in the top right to hide and show the time bar.

You can also link the chart and time bars to respond to user interaction simultaneously. Try clicking on the chart and scrolling in on the time bar to see how they interact with each other.

Although chart items are designed for specific purposes, their flexibility enables you to use them in almost limitless ways.

This view shows glyphs being used as a label and halos creating a 3-dimensional effect through adding shadows to nodes. The nodes are connected smoothly with links following a curve.

The styling of items can also be easily updated when they are selected. In this view node borders and links are highlighted in red and given a dashed line style. The styling of selected items can be set using chart options.

Making sure that data is displayed intuitively means that you can give more value in a single view. By using donuts you can easily convey large amounts of metadata for each node in a clean, easy-to-understand format.

You can also use a variety of different layouts that come built into KeyLines. This view uses the sequential layout (with links following a curve) to intuitively imply a hierarchy.

With KeyLines you can easily configure the chart to respond to user actions. Using the selectedNode styling option is a good way to draw attention to items.

You can also set item styles individually, giving intuitive visuals to items so users understand the data quicker and easier.

This view uses relevant font icons on nodes to show if they are a movie or an actor, and the movie nodes are also enlarged to make them stand out.

KeyLines supports all font families as well as custom images.

It's important to make it easy to navigate charts. KeyLines has an overview window that shows where the view window is in relation to the whole network, giving users a sense of where they are.

Try clicking the box in the bottom right of the chart.

Other controls such as a 'home' button can also help users to return to a comfortable starting point. Try zooming into the chart and then clicking the icon in the top left to zoom to fit the network back into view.