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Introduction |
Introduction |
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Hypermedia was meant to be an extension to the mind. "As We May Think," |
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Vannemar Bush entitled his famous article (1945__); Engelbart(1962__) |
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set "Augmenting Human Intellect" as his goal, and Nelson (1965__) |
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envisioned a system "holding everything [a novelist or absent-minded |
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professor] wanted in just the way he wanted it to be held." |
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__ http://www.theatlantic.com/unbound/flashbks/computer/bushf.htm |
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__ http://www.bootstrap.org/augdocs/friedewald030402/augmentinghumanintellect/ahi62index.html |
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__ http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=806036&coll=ACM&dl=ACM&CFID=12221347&CFTOKEN=93164645 |
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Today, Nelson suggests that "[i]n the near future, the Wearable |
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computer will be a standard part of the thoughtful person's social ensemble" |
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(1998__), for keeping track of "memoranda, names and addresses, appointments, |
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obligations, things to do, things to buy, things to have fixed, payments to make, |
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transactions, things to say to people, phrases to put into writings, |
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etc." (2000__). |
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__ http://www.xanadu.com.au/ted/zigzag/xybrap.html |
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__ http://www.xanadu.com.au/mail/zzdev/msg02237.html |
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Browsing our notes would be part of our thought process, |
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making links would be part of understanding an idea. |
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Such a computer would become a part of ourselves, an extension |
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to the mind, like the written word. It would *aid the thought |
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process* like scribbling down notes on a piece of paper, |
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unifying all the notes into a single place, an |
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external memory of sorts that would allow us to call up |
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all of our thoughts about a subject with the flick of an |
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electronic stylus. |
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This is yet to happen. |
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Current computer systems are not at all suited to the task. |
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What is needed is a hypermedia system in which the |
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concepts people care about-- the places, appointments, ideas, |
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the *items*, in Nelson's words (2000__)-- are visible in |
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and linkable the system. What is needed, in technical terms, |
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is a hypermedia system in which items are first-class objects. |
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__ http://www.xanadu.com.au/mail/zzdev/msg02237.html |
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In such a system, to remember that we have "a meeting with |
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Carli today at 2:15 about the book", we would create a new |
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item (the meeting) and link it to Carli (another item) and |
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the book (a third item), and also connect the meeting to its |
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scheduled time. |
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Then, whenever we come across the book or the person in any |
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context, we could see their connections to the meeting. |
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For example, when we are mulling about an issue we have noted |
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we must discuss with Carli (a note that would be linked |
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to the Carli-item), we could quickly see that we will meet |
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with her today. We could then link the issue to be part |
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of the meeting's agenda (an item the meeting is linked to). |
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(Using typed links, we could also turn particular types |
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of links on and off, and thus would not have to see the |
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connection *all* the time when thinking about Carli-- |
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only when meetings are on our mind.) |
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Such a system would be able to appropriately represent |
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the interconnectedness of items in our lives, making hypermedia |
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truly a tool for thought. |
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But as long as information is stored in disconnected files, |
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as long as it is not naturally connected to the *items* it |
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is about, this will not happen (and the best we can do |
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even with advanced navigational hypertext tools |
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is to link information *in addition to* |
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entering it into the system, rather than linking it |
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*by* putting it into the system) |
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Therefore, we need a new computer environment, centered around |
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*items* rather than applications and files, an environment |
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where everything we do, all information that we enter, is part |
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of the network of linked items. |
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We need a system in which |
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appointments aren't pieces of data entered into a calendar |
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application, but items linked to other items; a system where |
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letters are not files we need to store in a directory structure, |
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but items connected to the recipients of the letter and the |
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things that are discussed in the letter; a system where our |
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ideas and problems exist as first class objects *at all*, linked |
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to the things that we need to know about them. |
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This is what, we submit, common-use hypermedia can be, |
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ten years from now. |
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In this article, we present the Hyperstructure paradigm ... |
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A Catalogue of Hypermedia Structures |
A Catalogue of Hypermedia Structures |
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