hi
elobrate your first point ( what method you are look for, etc)
try using the database_history_node (id, set)
in smp run it outputs nodeout which has following header with time stamp
nodal point x-disp y-disp z-disp x-vel y-vel z-vel x-accl y-accl z-accl x-coor y-coor z-coor
in mpp run it will be output in binout you can also check the elout database
cheers, ram