Public Announcement on Timeline Project

This is just a brief heads up that a member here has been working on an online timeline maker. It has been a huge effort and has utilized a massive amount of data, including the entire data base of another member, Steve Duffy.

Having had the privilege of looking at what has been done, I am very excited about the possibilities this will bring in terms of resolving many issues. It is not just a timeline maker, but an intelligent timeline maker. 

With that, I'll hand this thread over to the person behind it to give further details (including URL if all is ready) and maybe answer any technical questions. 

I hope everyone gets behind this effort.
Thanks.

Sounds great, I will help how I can. I definitely support a more accurate timeline than most official ones that contend each other. Dispelling the many timeline speculations will help everyone concerned.

Hi all - thank you for highlighting this new research project.

Yes, jfk-timeline.org lives. The official grand opening is July 4th. Before that time, some limited functionality has been publicly exposed (including the search features, for which you don't have to be logged in).

So, what's new and interesting about this site, that you can't find on the others?

The one-word answer is: math.

The jfk-timeline.org web site is basically a gigantic optimization engine. It does constraint-based optimization on sequences of related events.

And, it has a full granular database (which is still being built, but if you look at it you'll get the idea).

And if that doesn't make you drool in your capacity as a JFK researcher.... well.... here is an elementary example of the type of questions you can ask the system:

"Show me all the events that Manuel Rodriguez Orcarberro was involved in, between Aug 1 and Aug 21 1963, and plot them on a timeline so I can see them - oh and by the way, I'd like to know who else was involved in each event, and what kind of evidence we have in support of each".

Now, once you have the timeline in front of you (which is scrollable and fully interactive), you can re-query: "Now show me a similar timeline for Evaristo Rodriguez, and put the two timelines next to each other so I can compare them".

That's where this web site starts. Very shortly, you'll be able to pinpoint events with great accuracy, based on the constraints from the other 60,000 events that are in the system (for instance, the computer knows that a person can't be in two place at once, so it'll tell you when conflicts arise).

In its fully glory, the jfk-timeline.org web site does constraint-based stochastic optimization on sequences of events. There is already an example in the Models section - it's a model of the Tippit shooting, where we are trying to pinpoint the time of the shooting. After iterating a few times based on the information we've given it, the system tells us: "JD Tippit was shot at 1:09:53 pm +/- 37 seconds, with an 81.2% confidence level".

How these numbers are derived, is a very long story. One which we can talk about. In detail! (If you wish).