Archive of UserLand's first discussion group, started October 5, 1998.

Glossaries on Nirvana

Author:Dave Winer
Posted:10/17/1998; 7:46:31 AM
Topic:Suggestion: Explore the Calendar
Msg #:246 (In response to 244)
Prev/Next:245 / 247

One of the remaining puzzles for how Nirvana will work is how the various websites and databases are linked together into a cohesive web presence that is truly easy for us to add to, and easy for people to find things on.

I want the search engine to play the central role in this. I don't believe long pages of links to lots of stuff work. I've spent a month using the Frontier 5 site intensely to learn about the product. I *always* use the search engine. I find what I want. I want to rely more and more on the search engine, as I think everyone else does.

So, enter glossaries. What will the global glossary look like for this server? When I want to reference another page, what will I put in "double quotes"? Which pages will broadcast their presence globally by adding a link to themselves in the global glossary? Should any pages do this?

An example, every verb in UserTalk has a web presence that's definitive. There may be other pages that explain stuff about a verb, but the home page for the verb is its DocServer page. So it would be reasonable to add a link to file.exists in user.html.glossary. There's no problem with this case.

Now, here's a case that illustrates the big problem with using the glossary for Nirvana as it is now. Pretend it's January 1998, and I'm writing about a new feature that's coming in Frontier, XML-RPC, but it isn't called that, it's called "HTTP-XML-RPC-MAC-WINDOWS".

It's very early in the process. Haven't figured it out yet. I point to the at-the-time definitive piece from some other page. OK, a few months pass, the feature gets fleshed out, debugged, finalized and specified. Now that it's real, it's got a definitive page. But if someone stumbles across the old piece, they never find the new definitive piece.

The idea now has a home, but the website hasn't changed to reflect that. The reader gets the impression that the idea died, never went anywhere, when in fact, it blossomed and took root and was a great success.

So, what to do? Bonk! Rely on the search engine, which stays current. I'd put an item in the global glossary called "HTTP-XML-RPC-MAC-WINDOWS", and its value would be something like this:

HTTP-XML-RPC-MAC-WINDOWS

And of course the search engine would show a list of articles about XML-RPC, with the main page:

http://www.scripting.com/frontier5/xml/code/rpc.html

At the top of the list.

Still some glitches to work out in this idea, but I like it, and wanted to share it.

Dave

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