This is a very substantial upgrade, taking Timeline from the status of a metatool to a fully fledged presentation application in its own right.

Timeline's original functionality was to take a set of date based occurrences and rapidly format them into a time-line. It was simple to use, and rather simple in its output. Typically we would either stick with its default 'clean' look, or post-operate in Illustrator. Bulk operations on time-lines required exporting and then operating in a spreadsheet app before reimporting.

Timeline 2 builds very substantially on this, now offering multiple rows, a much better handling of dates, superior management of events that want to occupy the same space, massively improved formatting and styling, the inclusion of pictures if you want them, and the ability to bulk edit dates in a spreadsheet type format without exiting the application. You can also add URLs to dates, and Timeline has its own presentation mode.

Ultimately this is an extremely welcome upgrade, particularly as it is at no cost to existing registered users — a slightly odd choice, given the increased functionality.

The only downside is that, despite a simple and intuitive interface, there is no built-in help.