Hierarchical Browser

Updated: 01/13/2004, G. Waloszek

Figure 1: The R/3 Session Manager used a hierarchical browser to select and start an application

Figure 2: The Masterfinder from Olduvai was an alternative to the Macintosh Finder and used a hierarchical browser

Figure 3: Hierarchical browser view in the Mac OS X 10.2 (Jaguar) finder

Purpose

The hierarchical browser is used to display hierarchies (trees) and to navigate within them.

Applications

Display of tree structures like file systems, report hierarchies, application hierarchies etc.

Authors

The original authors are unknown to me.

Widely used in the NEXT operating system NEXTStep. The R/3 Session Manager also used a hierarchical browser (figure 1). Macintosh OS X also offers a hierarchical browser view in the Finder (see figure 3).