To check out my sample timeline click this link.
https://www.chronoflotimeline.com/timeline/shared/4076/IT-Babble-Rocks/
I have to admit I am a sucker for a good timeline maker. Way back in 2011 Omar Ghosn (the co-founder) and myself decided to review a bunch of timeline generators to find the best one (at the time). You can find all those articles here.
Sadly many of those are no longer (RIP Dipity and TimeGlider) but now there is a new contender:
This review will take a look at this new site and see if it is worth your time.
Signing up
This is pretty easy, but it will require you to create a username, give an email address and create a password. There is no SSO for Google Microsoft or other social media accounts. Once you give them that information it will take you to their dashboard
Dashboard
The dashboard is very straight forward. If you have any timelines, you can find them here. If you want to start a new timeline, again you’re in the right place.
You can also update your profile such as your password and email.
Pricing
Finally you get to the pricing. The free account will allow you to make a single fully functional timeline, but you cannot embed it into a website or upload your own videos or images. You can add photos that are already hosted someplace on the web and videos (YouTube, Vimeo) already hosted on the web.
I know this is a new company and maybe there are educational pricing but I couldn’t find any on the website. For $120 a year I would expect to be able to make more than 5 total timelines. The Silver account will run you $354 a year and a limit of only 25.
It just seems a little steep for students/schools/teachers right now.
Creating a Timeline
This is obviously why we’re all here. What can you do with this tool? To get started, name your timeline and pick a theme. There are only 8 themes to chose from but they all look nice. Here is what they offer:
- Standard timeline – The timeline is at the bottom of the page and all the events are above it.
- Split timeline – The timeline is in the middle of the page and the events are above and below it.
- Vertical timeline – The timeline goes up and down and they offer a standard and a split timeline.
- 3D timeline – The event cards and timeline are staged a little to make it appear 3-D.
- Snake timeline – The timeline looks like a snake instead of a straight line.
I picked the split time line theme and named it IT Babble Rocks.
Note, I didn’t see a way to rename a timeline or to change the theme. This can be changed! I found it in the Options menu on the right hand side of the screen and it is very easy to make those changes.
When working on your Timeline here is the workspace.
Before we get to adding an event, let’s talk about this time scaler tool. Click the magnify glass and you can change the span of what you are viewing, increase or decrease the time (I’ll let you decide what that all means and more.
To see this in action check out my super cool GIF below.
Adding an event is all pretty straightforward. Just click that + sign in the bottom left hand corner. From here you the even will appear on the timeline and a new side menu will slide out from the right hand side.
As you can see you can add the basic information such as the title of the event, a description of said event and date. Then there are some nice features below that. You have the ability to categorize the event. When people think category, they think of some text tag that is applied to that content.
Not in ChronoFlo folks!
You get a tremendous amount of customization. You can change the accent color, is above or below the timeline, they style of the card and more.
What this means is that when you add an event, just categorize it and ChronoFlo will go ahead and do all the formatting for you. AWESOME!
This is also a good lesson for students about presenting data and how to work smarter, not harder and to introduce them into CSS, it is a little similar.
Technology in the Classroom 