Re: [Fwd: Nodes and Arcs]

Sorry, I couldn't make any sense of this. What do you make of it?
Jonathan

On Thu, Mar 24, 2011 at 9:23 AM, Nathan <nathan@webr3.org> wrote:
> Sean B Palmer writes to www-archive:
>
> -------- Original Message --------
> Subject: Nodes and Arcs
> Resent-Date: Thu, 24 Mar 2011 13:04:04 +0000
> Resent-From: www-archive@w3.org
> Date: Thu, 24 Mar 2011 13:02:30 +0000
> From: Sean B. Palmer <sean@miscoranda.com>
> To: www-archive <www-archive@w3.org>
>
> Written 27 Dec 2009, 23:43.
>
> The web is made up of webpages which link to one another with hypertext
> links.
>
> [Lots of documents linked together.]
>
> As well as webpages you may also link to pictures, music files,
> videos, plain text, and so on.
>
> [Documents linked to other documents, including non-hypertext documents.]
>
> But it would also be possible to introduce new kinds of things for the web.
>
> Webpages can only link to other files. Those files could be other
> webpages, or they could be pictures, plain text, music files, and so
> on.
>
> What if we conceptually extend the web so that webpages can link to
> non-electronic things, such as people? Now we can say that some page
> was written by such and such a person, and that this person is the
> father of the person who wrote the other page here.
>
> So we did three things here:
>
> The web now includes things which aren't files. Let's call them nodes.
> We can link webpages, files, and nodes together without limit. Let's
> call these links arcs.
> We give arcs descriptions so that we know what they're for.
> In a webpage we'd normally put the description in the link text, but a
> node can be anything so it doesn't necessarily have any text in it.
>
> What might a node look like when you load it in your browser? Well, it
> could just show all of the arcs between itself and its neighbouring
> nodes. But that would be pretty boring.
>
> When the Safari browser saves a webpage, it gives you the option of
> saving the whole thing along with all the images and other things that
> it depends on. It saves this into an archive. You can imagine saving a
> whole load of browser tabs in this way, so that you'd end up with an
> archive which has lots of webpages and files in it which you could
> browse offline.
>
> Similarly, we could make a kind of archive which describes nodes and
> arcs. We'll call this a net, because it's storing a little network of
> information. You could put a kind of flag in the net to tell people
> where to start. If you made a small net out of a book, for example,
> you'd want people to start at the first chapter.
>
> Using nets is a bit like writing. When you write, you can say anything
> you want. With nets, you might make a net which says that Alice, a
> person node, hates Bob. Then somebody else might make one saying, on
> the other hand, that Alice loves Bob. You can link anything you want
> in any way.
>
> http://example.org/people-net (web document)
> http://example.org/people-net#Alice (person? bit of a web document?)
> person://example.org/Alice (person)
>
> nodes are modular!
>
> You might separate information out. So in one net you could give a
> list of some interesting webpages that Alice has written. In another
> net, you might give a list of her friends. Or you could include both
> of these nets in a kind of supernet. (But think of it more like
> repeating a tab in a browser.)
>
> --
> Sean B. Palmer, http://inamidst.com/sbp/
>
>
> The web is made up of webpages which link to one another with hypertext
> links.
>
> [Lots of documents linked together.]
>
> As well as webpages you may also link to pictures, music files, videos,
> plain text, and so on.
>
> [Documents linked to other documents, including non-hypertext documents.]
>
> But it would also be possible to introduce new kinds of things for the web.
>
> Webpages can only link to other files. Those files could be other webpages,
> or they could be pictures, plain text, music files, and so on.
>
> What if we conceptually extend the web so that webpages can link to
> non-electronic things, such as people? Now we can say that some page was
> written by such and such a person, and that this person is the father of the
> person who wrote the other page here.
>
> So we did three things here:
>
> The web now includes things which aren't files. Let's call them nodes.
> We can link webpages, files, and nodes together without limit. Let's call
> these links arcs.
> We give arcs descriptions so that we know what they're for.
>
> In a webpage we'd normally put the description in the link text, but a node
> can be anything so it doesn't necessarily have any text in it.
>
> What might a node look like when you load it in your browser? Well, it could
> just show all of the arcs between itself and its neighbouring nodes. But
> that would be pretty boring.
>
> When the Safari browser saves a webpage, it gives you the option of saving
> the whole thing along with all the images and other things that it depends
> on. It saves this into an archive. You can imagine saving a whole load of
> browser tabs in this way, so that you'd end up with an archive which has
> lots of webpages and files in it which you could browse offline.
>
> Similarly, we could make a kind of archive which describes nodes and arcs.
> We'll call this a net, because it's storing a little network of information.
> You could put a kind of flag in the net to tell people where to start. If
> you made a small net out of a book, for example, you'd want people to start
> at the first chapter.
>
> Using nets is a bit like writing. When you write, you can say anything you
> want. With nets, you might make a net which says that Alice, a person node,
> hates Bob. Then somebody else might make one saying, on the other hand, that
> Alice loves Bob. You can link anything you want in any way.
>
> http://example.org/people-net (web document)
> http://example.org/people-net#Alice (person? bit of a web document?)
> person://example.org/Alice (person)
>
> nodes are modular!
>
> You might separate information out. So in one net you could give a list of
> some interesting webpages that Alice has written. In another net, you might
> give a list of her friends. Or you could include both of these nets in a
> kind of supernet. (But think of it more like repeating a tab in a browser.)
>

Received on Thursday, 24 March 2011 16:41:35 UTC