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• Doug 7:59 pm on December 30, 2003 | 0 | # |
  Tags: Environment, Outliners, Tinderbox, World

  When we talk about lists in Tinderbox, two very different concerns pop up.

  • Using Tinderbox to make lists of things — ideas, things you plan to do, factors you want to consider

  • Using Tinderbox to format lists — usually in HTML — to be embedded in documents or Web pages.

  This page is mostly about topic #2 — HTML lists — but naturally the two topics are often related.

  A good tutorial on the various means for list making in Tinderbox. This is primarily a reminder to myself on where to find this information; I routinely forget the various techniques for efficiently producing HTML formatted lists.

  http://www.doug-miller.net/blog/archive/earthquakeinbam.html
  Sat, 27 Dec 2003 10:47:36 -0500
  http://www.doug-miller.net/blog/archive/earthquakeinbam.html

  World

  Environment

  demiller@gmail.com (Doug Miller)

  code: theWebSocket; - Mercy Corps: Mercy Corps Responding to Devastating Earthquake in Iran: Little Beirut (AKA Portland, OR) is the home of Mercy Corps, a “not-for-profit organization that exists to alleviate suffering, poverty, and oppression by helping people build secure, productive, and just communities.” Ther’re good folks, and they’re sending

  code: theWebSocket; - Mercy Corps: Mercy Corps Responding to Devastating Earthquake in Iran: Little Beirut (AKA Portland, OR) is the home of Mercy Corps, a “not-for-profit organization that exists to alleviate suffering, poverty, and oppression by helping people build secure, productive, and just communities.” Ther’re good folks, and they’re sending a stat team to Iran to help out with earthquake disaster relief. They could use some financial assistance, though.

  The money you send will go to disaster relief, not fundraising efforts and inflated advertising budgets. If you can, help out.

  The Doc Searls Weblog : December 27, 2003: Last week we had an earthquake in Big Sur that hit 6.5 on the Richter Scale, killed two, and dropped several buildings in downtown Paso Robles.

  Yesterday we had another quake of exactly the same size in Iran. It killed twenty thousand or more and destroyed the ancient city of Bam, which comprised perhaps the largest mud brick structure in the world.

  Talk about terrorism. Mother Nature gives us the real deal.

  Here are just a few reports coming from Iranian bloggers…

  Good posts from both Al and Doc concerning the horrifying earthquake in Iran yesterday. The scale of destruction in Bam is unimaginable, judging from the news reports. This is one of those times to set politics aside and respond according to human need. Give money if you can to support relief efforts. If nothing else, post and spread the word about relief efforts to direct more attention toward helping with this disaster.

   

• Doug 7:31 pm on December 29, 2003 | 0 | # |
  Tags: Outliners, Semantic Web

  I’m still not entirely sure what Dave Winer is trying to do at Scripting News with the changes he’s made over the past couple of days. It’s interesting, though, to see an increasing number of blogs taking stabs at some of the same things I’m trying to do here at DSD. In particular, Dave points to Muxway and Delicious, both novel and interesting developments.

  I’m also interested that Dave is so fascinated with hierarchy. If he’s really shooting to create a directory of the web, I suppose hierarchal classification is an obvious, and for most people preferred means of doing that.

  However, based on much of what I’ve read of his writings, and his work on outliners, it’s pretty clear to me that he has a bias toward categorizing things in hierarchies. That’s not a bad thing, but I’m interested in how that (speculated) bias impacts his thinking and makes it different than mine. More and more, I find myself ambivalent or down right opposed to categorizing things into hierarchies; the nodes and links approach of true hypertext seems to match my style of thinking more comfortably.

  Not that I think that the two things need be mutually exclusive; it’s obviously possible to create a hierarchal classification system and still have the items in the hierarchy or outline also act as hypertext links and nodes. Yahoo does this, Tinderbox in Outline mode works this way, and it looks like this is more or less the direction Dave is heading as well. Still, I always end up feeling stifled and constrained by the hierarchy - Dave himself alludes to this when discussing the issue of getting people to agree on taxonomy.

  Classification is difficult, and often subjective. Moreover, I’m finding it’s also relative. Today, when I first seek to classify something, I may feel it belongs in category X, because I’m thinking about it in relationship to other items in category X. However, next Tuesday, it occurs to me that it also has a relationship with things in category Y, which I happen to be thinking about then. That relationship may be more or less subtle to the relationship with category X items, and, in fact, my perception of the strength of that relationship may vary depending on my interest level in and understanding of category X or Y. Of course, two hours or two days or two months later I’m thinking about category Z, and I discover a relationship between the original item and that category as well…and now category Z may seem to me to be the most relevant category to classify the item under.

  Of course, one can just keep adding classification categories to an item as they come up, but at some point it seems to me that becomes counter-productive. Items, ideas, and thoughts (at least in my case) end up classified under a myriad of categories to the point where one needs meta-categories to handle classification of all the categories now we’re creating a hierarchal outline…), and then meta-meta-categories ad infinitum. Worse, the darn thing’s always a work in process, since I’m probably going to continually tweak the taxonomy as I redefine my perception of how any particular document, idea, or item relates to any particular category or level in the hierarchy. In the end, this sort of system is just too damn inflexible and unwieldy for me.

  Worse, if someone else creates the taxonomy, it’s almost guaranteed that it isn’t going to make sense to me. I’m not going to necessarily see the logic of classifying item A in category X, sub-category X.1, sub-sub-category X.1.2. I have to first understand the taxonomy (how well I remember my botany, zoology, and dendrology classes!), learn to navigate it, and then make judgments on how well I feel the taxonomy agrees with my perception of how things are organized and relate to each other. Hence, I’ve never been able to stand Yahoo! or DMOZ or any other web directory. To me, they seem arbitrary and confining at the same time.

  Finally, at the end of the day, what tends to interest me most are the relationships…and relationships are often the most relative thing in the world, at least when one is talking about people or ideas. Relationships between people and ideas change and evolve constantly, and so any system that seeks to reflect those relationships has to change and evolve constantly as well. That makes maintaining taxonomy and hierarchy, particularly shared taxonomy and hierarchy a very, very high-cost task, if not down right impossible.

  So, I’m very interested to see how Dave and others are going to try and tackle this distributed directory idea. It seems to me to be a daunting task, and I freely admit that I don’t understand enough about the organizing principles behind something like this to make any real contributions or offer constructive ideas. I’ll be interested to read what others more educated than I have to say on this subject.

   

• Doug 7:30 pm on December 29, 2003 | 0 | # |
  Tags: Tinderbox

  Over the past couple of days I’ve put forth a request for other Tinderbox users to provide some more concrete examples of how they use Tinderbox in their own work. There are a number of good examples of how Tinderbox is being used as a blogging tool, but little discussion on the order of the post I wrote a few weeks ago: Remembrance Tinderbox.

  James Vornov is the first to rise to the challenge in Jazz and Tinderbox. James describes how he finds himself writing while using Tinderbox:

  I find that while writing in Tinderbox I think of a related topic and I quickly dash off a placeholder note. Then on reviewing notes, I see connections and build links or dash off yet another note.

  I find myself doing the same. Further, I find myself doing the same for notes that are weeks, or even months old when I’m writing a new note. I’ve found that I’ve had to develop the habit, though, of running quick keyword searches or building agents to search my larger documents for themes on an ongoing basis or I’ll forget the notes I built in the past.

  James also discusses some of the challenges in presenting an ever-evolving, highly hyper-linked document to a web audience:

  Two problems that I see in creating this kind of hyperlinked document. One is that readers will be likely to enter the maze of connections via a search engine to a page that may be a quick note that can’t stand alone. I don’t see any solution for this right now other than to have an obvious link further into the document that the new reader will use to explore more.

  The other difficulty is one I’ve noted before, which is the inherent fluidity of this kind of document. Its fine for the reader on first approach. But if an update is simply adding a new link or two, there’s nothing to attract repeat visits to a particular essay. I’m considering making the left column on the news page be a collection of newly created notes which is where regular visitors will probably want to head first.

  I think James’ solution to the first problem is spot on, and pretty much what I’ve done here. As for the second problem, my approach has been to adopted Anders Fagerjord’s suggestion of using topical overview pages. The next step is to add RSS syndication on a per-topic basis, so that readers can subscribe to just the topics they’re most interested in. Alternately, they may subscribe to both the main feed and one or more topic feeds, to help them see the posts in both the context of the main document as well as the context of that topic.

  For documents I don’t publish on the web, I use Tinderbox agents to help me keep abreast of what I’ve written lately. As mentioned above, I use agents to search my documents for specific keywords or topics, which helps me see connections I might not otherwise see. Beyond that, I also use a set of time-based agents that help me track when I’ve written any given note. At a glance, I can see what I’ve written in the last hour, day, week, month, and quarter.

   

• Doug 3:47 pm on December 27, 2003 | 0 | # |
  Tags: Environment

  The Doc Searls Weblog: Just felt a substantial earthquake here. (11:20am) Phones are dead, though electricity is on. Can’t get anybody on the cell. Circuits are busy, I’m sure. It lasted a long time: low rolling motions, like you’d feel on a large boat in moderate seas.

  The pool in back is still sloshing. We lost the top three or four inches of water, I’d say. Not bad as these things go. We lost the entire contents of a hot tub in Palo Alto during the Loma Prieta quake. (Picture coming.) The Landers quakes moved about a foot of water out of the pool at the house where we were staying in San Marino.

  Good round up of links and info on the quake over at Doc’s.

   

• Doug 2:23 am on December 27, 2003 | 0 | # |
  Tags: Apple, Tinderbox

  I had my first closing yesterday, which meant for the first time in about ten months, I earned a significant amount of money. Of course, this meant that I had to immediately tear out and buy more RAM for my PowerBook. I thought this machine rocked before. Doubling the RAM made an amazing difference.

  Of course, now I want to take the darn thing all the way up to 1Gb…

  Spent some time this evening trolling through a Feedster search on Tinderbox. Interesting reading. A couple of things become immediately apparent:

  1. I post a great deal about Tinderbox. There were a lot of references to my own stuff.

  2. Other people post about how great Tinderbox is, but they don’t post many details about how they use it. I really, really want to hear more about what other people are doing with this tool.

  3. Despite the fact that I and others have written a fair amount about the basics of Tinderbox, a lot of people post things like “Hmmm, sounds interesting. Wonder if it’s any good?” Again, I think more specific examples of how to use the software would be helpful.

  4. I don’t make nearly the use of Feedster I really should be. If I took the time to set up some search agents on more topics I’m interested in and grabbed the resulting RSS feeds, I could operate a lot more efficiently.

   

• Doug 12:25 am on December 27, 2003 | 0 | # |
  Tags: Space

  Yahoo! News - Beagle 2 Remains Silent as Mars Express Circles Red Planet: A super-sensitive British radio telescope failed to pick up a signal from the Beagle-2 Mars lander tonight, deepening fears that the robot designed to look for life may have surrendered its own before setting to work.

  Ground teams will make another attempt Friday at picking up Beagle-2 signals at 1:15 p.m. EST (1815 GMT) when NASA ’s Odyssey satellite orbiting Mars overflies what is thought to be Beagle-2’s landing zone.

  Bummer! It sounds like the ESA hasn’t thrown in the towel yet, but it certainly doesn’t sound good for Beagle-2. Another Mars lander dies an untimely death.

  Me, I think the savage green tribes of the dead-sea bottoms are shooting them down from the backs of their thoats, using radium rifles.

   

• Doug 1:55 am on December 26, 2003 | 0 | # |
  Tags: Family, Pictures, World

  Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to all! I’m over at my parents place in Ohio again, enjoying some family time. The new puppy is, as expected, a big hit with all concerned.

  Blogging will no doubt be light the next day or so during our visit, as will e-mail. I’m mindful that I’m distressingly late replying to a few important e-mails I’ve received in the last few days, and there are more than a couple of blog posts I’d like to comment on as well. Mea culpa, things have been busy. I hope to have some time over the next few days to get caught up.

  In the meantime, some Christmas morning snaps from the camera phone…

  Terri, my mother, and my grandmother:

  

  Mom and Dad:

  

  Rhiannon, Terri, and Rex:

  

  Rhiannon and Ian:

  

   

• Doug 1:47 am on December 26, 2003 | 0 | # |
  Tags: Apple, Politics, Tinderbox, World

  makeoutcity.com: Oliver Willis on gay marriages - I find it pretty disheartening that so many Americans appear to be intolerant on the idea of civil rights for gays. I don’t get it. As a heterosexual male, what does it matter to me if a gay couple is able to enjoy the same rights I would with my spouse? Why should I be entitled to some rights simply because the person I love is of the opposite sex, when gay couples are just as American and get second class treatment.

  There are some shallow minded folks out there who spout things like “gays have never had it better”, and while that’s true it sounds disturbingly like the sentiment among many who couldn’t understand what blacks were complaining about since they weren’t slaves any more.

  Damn straight. I have to admit a certain bafflement as to why this issue is an issue at all. I can’t see how homosexual unions impact or “cheapen” my union with my wife in any way - or, in fact, what possible business of mine it is. What I can see is that limiting any American’s civil rights lessens my own, and potentially endangers mine in the future.

  In terms of whether or not any particular religion determines to acknowledge the spiritual union of a homosexual couple, well, that seems to me to be an issue between that religion and it’s members, and has nothing to do with whether or not the U.S. government chooses to make such unions legal.

  Don’t people have more important stuff to worry about?

  http://www.doug-miller.net/blog/archive/applescriptforweblog.html
  Thu, 25 Dec 2003 20:48:30 -0500
  http://www.doug-miller.net/blog/archive/applescriptforweblog.html

  Apple

  Tinderbox

  demiller@gmail.com (Doug Miller)

  Decision Tools: Once upon a time there was Manila Express. It was the tool that drove my early weblogging experience. Once installed, you could highlight text on a web page and then right click (Windows) or click a bookmark (Mac) and have a formatted snippet that was perfect for posting.

  Decision Tools: Once upon a time there was Manila Express. It was the tool that drove my early weblogging experience. Once installed, you could highlight text on a web page and then right click (Windows) or click a bookmark (Mac) and have a formatted snippet that was perfect for posting.

  James Vornov sets out on a quest to replicate the functionality of Manila Express, and in a series of posts documents how he used Applescript to do so. The end result is a handy little tool that does a phenomenal job. I immediately adopted it. It’s a great little time saver.

   

• Doug 1:45 am on December 26, 2003 | 0 | # |
  Tags: Politics, World

  Boing Boing: The last twenty years were about technology. The next twenty years are about policy. It’s about realizing that all the really hard problems — free expression, copyright, due process, social networking — may have technical dimensions, but they aren’t technical problems. The next twenty years are about using our technology to affirm, deny and rewrite our social contracts: all the grandiose visions of e-democracy, universal access to human knowledge and (God help us all) the Semantic Web, are dependent on changes in the law, in the policy, in the sticky, non-quantifiable elements of the world. We can’t solve them with technology: the best we can hope for is to use technology to enable the human interaction that will solve them.

  An excellent rant from Cory Doctorow concerning our need to start applying as much brain power to how we use new technology as we do to developing that technology. Cory is addressing the macro-issue, but I’d suggest that a similar effort on the part of business IT people ought to become a priority as well. Part of the current business IT situation is due to the lack of planning and forethought IT managers, and staff put into system deployments and software development in the late ’90’s.

   

• Doug 2:04 am on December 24, 2003 | 0 | # |
  Tags: AI-IA, Tinderbox

  Jim McGee links to a post by Ed Taekema concerning his developing use of a Wiki for PIM tasks. Ed makes a particularly interesting observation concerning linking, templating, and the advantages of a free-form database structure:

  I am amazed at how useful the auto linking and document templating is for PIM type functions. It is really a snap to put some rudimentary organization on the material and then let it develop from there.

  I was initially worried that what I needed was more structured database style storage for contact information and such, but doing it freeform doesn’t seem to have any real disadvantages that I have found yet.

  Ed goes on to discuss search and navigation:

  MoinMoin has a pretty cool regex based query tool that lets you collect links to other pages. I have made good use of this to create a very low maintenance set of navigation pages so my info is only one to two clicks away. Very Handy.

  Finally he addresses his writing environment:

  Wikis really help me write … all the fuss about how it really is designed for writers not readers is apparently true, at least in my case. I find it easier to write in my wiki than in MS Word. Perhaps less clutter? More focus on the words?

  What I find interesting about this is how neatly it parallels my experience with Tinderbox and my experiments with using it as a PIM and KM tool. In an earlier post Ed writes:

  The weird thing was that without really consciously setting out to do it, I found it was a great way to manage my personal information. It just seemed such a natural way to organize information. I found myself quickly creating links to pages and then quickly adding the content… It was easy to link the information to multiple topics so that it was easy to find my stuff.

  For example, I have to keep track of client contact data, status reports, assorted documents and comments while I work at a client site. It was quick to setup a customer list page, create the customer page, add a link to an engagement list, status reports, etc. You can easily create page templates for creating more structured content like status reports etc.

  This parallels my experience. I’m beginning to wonder if we aren’t seeing something of a trend here. Tools have emerged and are powerful enough and cheap enough that we can finally manage our personal information more like how we think, rather than trying to shoehorn a subset of that information into a hierarchal system based on a single taxonomy.

  Ed seems to have hit on at least some of the critical factors that make these tools work: first, they are free form in how information is structured, second, they provide a means of creating templates at the item level for common sorts of entries so the user can focus on rapid input of information, third, they utilize minimalistic writing environments so that the tool stays out of the way of the writing process, fourth, they provide excellent mechanisms for navigation and for querying the database, so stuff is easy to find, and fifth, they allow linking, preferably auto-linking, to other information in the database to create a rich network of related information.

  I can’t think of a single commercial PIM package that meets all of these criteria. Some meet several or do one or two very well, but none do it all. On the other hand, I suspect wikis and tools like Tinderbox may be too daunting for the average user to adopt without a struggle. It’ll be interesting to see how far this trend develops, and how the tools evolve to accommodate the needs of the typical business user who resists making the investment in learning how to use a complex tool, but rather demands instant productivity.

   

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