AI Suggestions

Preceden has an experimental feature to help you generate content for your timeline using artificial intelligence.

How do I access the tool?

Above your timeline, click the AI Suggestions button:

The buttons above a World War II timeline, with AI Suggestions sitting beside Add Event

If you don't see the button, your browser window is too narrow to show it. Switch to a desktop or widen the window. See Offline or Mobile Version of Preceden for what a phone can and cannot do.

How do I use it?

Type in a topic and click Generate Ideas. Preceden will then generate suggestions related to that topic that you can add to your timeline:

The AI Suggestions dialog with World War II as the topic and a checked list of suggested events and their dates, above an Add to Timeline button

Here is the resulting timeline: The timeline built from those suggestions, running from the Munich Agreement in 1938 through to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan

A few things to know:

While Preceden is working, you can click Cancel Generating to stop it.
Once the suggestions appear, Generate Again gives you a fresh set of ideas for the same topic.
You can uncheck suggestions to only add certain ones to your timeline.
You can edit an event's name and dates in this tool, or wait until after you've added it to your timeline.
To change an event's icon, color, or notes, edit it after adding it to your timeline.
If your timeline has multiple layers, you can choose which layer the events go to. Choosing New Layer... asks you to name a new layer and then creates it for you. Note that when your timeline has more than one layer, the button to add the events reads Add to Layer rather than Add to Timeline:

The bottom of the dialog on a timeline with more than one layer, where a layer dropdown set to Milestones sits beside an Add to Layer button

Can I use this for project planning timelines?

The tool currently works best for historical timelines, though we plan to support project planning timelines in the future.

How does it come up with suggestions?

It uses a large language model, the same kind of AI technology behind tools like ChatGPT and Gemini.

These models are trained on information found on the internet, so what they produce can be inaccurate. They also sometimes make things up entirely, especially for uncommon topics. For this reason, we highly recommend verifying the accuracy of suggestions before you add them to your timeline.

How many events can I add to my timeline?

Preceden's free plan allows up to 10 events per timeline, and suggestions count toward that limit. If you have already added 6 events yourself, you can add 4 more from this tool.

All of our paid plans include unlimited events, so you can build larger timelines.

How do I remove suggestions I already added?

Click the Bulk Editor button above your timeline, then click Delete All AI Suggestions... at the bottom of the editor. Preceden asks you to confirm, then deletes every event on the timeline that came from the AI Suggestions tool, leaving the events you created yourself alone. The button only appears when your timeline has events from the tool to delete.

What if I run into issues?

If you run into any issues, or have suggestions for improving this tool, email us at [email protected].