Refining Timelines

Overview

After creating a timeline, you'll often need to make refinements—adding missing events, correcting details, reorganizing structure, or adjusting based on new information. Thea provides several ways to refine and improve your timelines iteratively.

Conversational Refinement

The most powerful refinement tool is the Feedback Panel, which lets you make changes through natural conversation.

Opening the Feedback Panel

1. Open your timeline
2. Click Refine Timeline or the chat icon in the toolbar
3. The feedback panel opens on the right side

How It Works

The feedback panel maintains a conversation about your timeline:

• You describe what you want to change
• Thea makes the changes and explains what was done
• You can make follow-up requests
• All changes are tracked and can be reviewed

What You Can Ask For

Adding events:

• "Add an event on March 15th when John Smith sent the termination letter"
• "Create 5 events for the payment schedule in Exhibit A"

Modifying events:

• "Change all events involving ABC Corp to show them as the plaintiff"
• "Update the June 3rd meeting to include Jane Doe as a participant"
• "Make all the financial events use the 'Transaction' category"

Removing events:

• "Delete all events before January 2023"
• "Remove the duplicate meeting on April 5th"

Reorganizing:

• "Split this into two timelines—one for communications and one for payments"
• "Merge the 'Email' and 'Letter' categories into 'Communication'"

Correcting errors:

• "The contract signing date should be March 15, not March 16"
• "John Smith's title should be CEO, not CFO"

Tips for Effective Refinement

• Be specific: "Change the date of the contract signing to March 15" is better than "fix that date"
• Reference clearly: Use dates, names, or event descriptions to identify what you're talking about
• One topic at a time: Make one type of change, review it, then move to the next
• Review changes: After each request, Thea shows what changed—verify it's correct
• Iterate: Don't expect perfection in one message; refine gradually

Attaching Documents

You can upload documents to reference during refinement:

1. In the feedback panel, click Attach file
2. Select a document from your computer
3. Reference it in your message: "Based on the attached exhibit, add these payment events..."

Thea can extract information from attached documents to make updates.

Version History

Thea automatically saves versions of your timeline as you make changes.

Viewing Version History

1. Open your timeline
2. Click Version History in the settings menu
3. See all saved versions with:
   • Version number
   • When it was created
   • Summary of changes made

Reverting to a Previous Version

If you need to undo recent changes:

1. Open Version History
2. Find the version you want to restore
3. Click Revert next to that version
4. Confirm the reversion

Your timeline will be restored to that state. This is useful if:

• You made changes you want to undo
• You want to try a different approach
• You need to recover from mistakes

Note: Reverting creates a new version—you don't lose your current work completely.

Manual Refinement Tools

Batch Event Editing

For making the same change to multiple events:

1. Switch to List View
2. Select multiple events (shift-click or ctrl-click)
3. Click Batch Edit
4. Choose what to change:
   • Category
   • Player assignments
   • Add/remove exhibit
5. Apply to all selected events

Drag and Drop Reorganization

In Category Rows view:

• Drag events vertically to move them to a different category
• Drag category rows to reorder categories
• Changes save automatically

Quick Event Edits

• Double-click an event to edit it
• Right-click for context menu with delete, duplicate, move options
• Keyboard shortcuts for faster navigation (see Keyboard Shortcuts)

Finding and Fixing Issues

Common Refinements

Missing dates:

• Use the feedback panel: "Find events without specific times and add approximate times based on the source documents"

Inconsistent naming:

• "Change all instances of 'John' to 'John Smith' for consistency"

Category misassignments:

• Review in Category Rows view
• Drag events to correct categories
• Or use feedback: "Move all payment-related events to the Financial category"

Duplicate events:

• "Find and remove duplicate events"
• Review suggestions and confirm deletions

Missing players:

• "Add Sarah Johnson as a party to all events where she's mentioned in the description"

Quality Checks

Before finalizing a timeline:

1. Date accuracy: Verify all dates are correct
2. Completeness: Are there gaps in the chronology?
3. Category consistency: Do similar events use the same category?
4. Player links: Are all relevant parties linked?
5. Exhibit citations: Are key events supported by evidence?

Refinement Workflows

Initial Draft → Final Timeline

1. Create initial structure (conversational or from suggestions)
2. Add missing events (manual or via feedback panel)
3. Correct errors (as you find them)
4. Reorganize (adjust categories, split/merge if needed)
5. Polish (consistent naming, complete descriptions)
6. Review (use version history to track progress)

Document-Driven Updates

When you get new documents:

1. Upload to your project
2. Open feedback panel for the timeline
3. "Based on the newly uploaded documents, add any relevant events"
4. Review and accept suggested additions

Collaborative Refinement

If working with colleagues:

1. Export current version for review
2. Gather feedback
3. Use feedback panel to implement changes: "Based on review comments, make these changes..."
4. Version history tracks all iterations

Best Practices

Incremental Improvement

• Don't try to perfect everything at once
• Make one type of change at a time
• Save versions before major changes
• Review changes immediately

Conversation Style

• Be conversational and natural
• Provide context: "The exhibit shows three payments, but we only have two events"
• Ask for explanations: "Why did you categorize this as Communication instead of Legal Action?"

Quality Control

• Review changes before moving on
• Use version history as a safety net
• Test exports after major changes
• Get a second opinion on complex refinements

Advanced Techniques

Conditional Updates

"For all events in January involving ABC Corp, add them to the 'Pre-litigation' category"

Pattern-Based Changes

"Find all events with payment amounts in the description and create separate exhibit entries for each"

Structure Changes

"This timeline is too long. Split it into three timelines: one for 2022, one for 2023, and one for 2024"

Next Steps

• Version History - Track and revert changes
• Feedback Panel - Conversational refinement
• Working with Events - Manual event editing
• Filtering & Search - Find specific events to refine