files the approach described herein provides a new kind of graph showing the history of files that were opened edited and closed over time in one embodiment a graph is generated that shows a timeline along the bottom of the graph stretching backwards in time from u2018 now u2019 each file that has been opened is represented by a horizontal bar stretching backwards in time between the time it was opened the starting point and the time it was closed the ending point and the starting point and ending point have corresponding labeled time points on the timeline in other embodiments other kinds of graphs may be used in which each object in the graph represents a file and indicates its time of opening closing and intermediate saves fig1 illustrates a bar graph showing file status over time according to an embodiment of the invention the graph is drawn with portions of the y axis representing distinct files and the x axis representing a timeline the bars of the bar graph may be drawn parallel to the timeline each bar in the graph corresponds to a single file and multiple bars occupying the same portion of the y axis may represent the same file opened and closed multiple times more specifically bars at the same height on the y axis.