I’ve always wanted to do something like this, so I decided to give it a shot. There is one core node, and the others are all nodes of the core node or of other nodes. Each node orbits around its parent. This swf is driven by two AS 2.0 classes: SolarCore and SolarNode. There is one more, SolarElement, but that servers more as a dummy parent class for both to be able to use Strict Data Typing when targetting a parent node (could be either a SolarCore or a SolarNode).
The speed of each node is determined by the distance from its parent node: the further away, the slower it will orbit, and vice versa. The size of each nodes is based on both the size of the core node and the level of the node. By clicking on each node, you can see the links with its child nodes.
[swf=http://www.voetsjoeba.com/lab/view/solar.swf]width=700 height=500[/swf]
