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Abstract |
Abstract |
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======== |
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Relationship between item-based and files: |
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Computers should help us with **organizing our lives**, rather |
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than making them more difficult. We need |
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a system **structured** around **items** -- |
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**things that we care about**, such as people, arguments and ideas, |
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and able to express the relationships between them, |
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so that connected to e.g. an idea we see all arguments |
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we have considered for or against it. |
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[1]: mention the smallness of space here, and that |
[1]: mention the smallness of space here, and that |
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we distinguish between explored and unexplored spaces |
we distinguish between explored and unexplored spaces |
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and that it affects our user interfaces |
and that it affects our user interfaces |
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1 Introduction |
1 Introduction |
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============== |
============== |
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s/a system, in technical terms/in technical terms/ |
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Remove the "irrelevant computery abstractions" goof, |
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replace by discussion about document-centric vs. item-centric: |
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This system |
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should **center around the things we care about**, |
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the people, appointments, plants, articles we read, 3D models we create |
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and so on. We need a system |
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in which these **items** (`Nelson 2000`_) are visible things |
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that can be connected to each other; |
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in technical terms, a hypermedia system in which items |
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are first-class objects [#can-use-structcomp]_. |
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In contrast, in the mainstream file system paradigm, |
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only documents and categories of documents are represented |
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as first-class objects. |
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While documents certainly qualify as things that we care about, |
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other items like people, theories, or places are not |
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explicitly represented in this paradigm at all. |
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Additionally, file systems are simple hierarchies, |
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rather than allowing arbitrary relationships between items |
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to be expressed. Information like "In this meeting, we discussed |
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possible solutions A, B, C to problem X, and our consensus |
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was that...," for example, might be hidden in a document called |
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"Minutes 2003-07-24." |
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In an item-centric system, this information would be expressed |
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as relationships between a couple of items-- the problem, the meeting, |
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the solutions discussed, the arguments raised in this discussion, |
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the decisions reached. Looking at the problem item, for example, |
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the user would connect to it the solutions that have |
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been discussed for it, and to them |
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the arguments that have presented in favor or against each |
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of the solutions-- no matter in which meeting, in which e-mail, |
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in which memo or in which chat session they were made. |
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(On the other hand, the user could just as well look at all the points |
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made in a particular meeting, no matter which topic they were about.) |
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[4],[5] Make explicit the difference between a file |
[4],[5] Make explicit the difference between a file |
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and items, "a thing we care about": |
and items, "a thing we care about": |
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Things currently represented by files or folders, |
Also, many items that do have a representation in current systems-- |
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such as documents or projects, are usually |
for example appointments (often all appointments are stored |
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items, but there are several items that are not files: |
in a binary, proprietary database file) and e-mail |
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appointments (often all appointments are stored |
(usually several stored in one file)-- are not represented as files. |
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in a binary, proprietary database file by programs), |
It is not possible to make connections |
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emails (usually several stored in one file), ... |
between an e-mail and an appointment if they are stored |
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in different files. |
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XXX |
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(XXX mention longhorn calendar?) |
(XXX mention longhorn calendar?) |
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Defer to ZZ tutorial for details (say that explaining |
Defer to ZZ tutorial for details (say that explaining |
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how zzstructure is used is beyond the scope of this paper). |
how zzstructure is used is beyond the scope of this paper). |
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[22] Add screenshot of Gzz in action, to illustrate ZZ |
[22] Add screenshot of Gzz in action, to illustrate ZZ: |
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change2.png, hop1.png (rename :)) |
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3.2 Resource Description Framework (RDF) |
3.2 Resource Description Framework (RDF) |