June 18, 2003
Analogical Reasoning
I need to read the paper from John Sowa and Arun Majumdar on Analogical Reasoning pointed out by DannyAyers in a thread on Cyc, analogical reasoning, and intelligence in machines over at the BlueOxen collaboratory. (00018C)
I'm tossing off in my usual uninformed fashion about computers being unable to do real analogy. I need to get myself educated in these areas as analogy underlies my entire attitude toward having a ConceptualNetwork, why reference and acess is more important than machine readable representation in knowledge enhancement, and my general bad attitude toward AI. (00018D)
Update; JackPark recommends The Muse in the Machine by David Gelerenter as relevant. (00018E)
June 15, 2003
Glacial Erratics
At least some of the time this blog sits at the top of a google query for 'glacial erratics'. People come here looking for information on those things, search around for 'erratics' in the search box and go away frustrated. So... (00017Z)
What's a Glacial Erratic? (000180)
A glacial erratic is a sort of giant pebble that doesn't seem to fit in with the local geography. This is because it has been transported to its current location from parts elsewhere by the forces of glaciation: carried along in ice or pushed around at the front of a glacier. (000181)
Glacial erratics are often rounded, sort of worn down, in much the same way as pebbles in a creek. Same idea, but the water is frozen and everything--the forces, the sizes--is on a different scale. (000182)
The Illinois State Geological Survey has some good information. (000183)
Why call a blog Glacial Erratics? (000184)
- My edges have been rounded off by forces beyond my understanding. (000185)
- I often feel like I've been transported from distant lands to a place where I don't seem to fit. (000186)
- Glaciers are cold. (000187)
- Glaciers are a powerful but subtle force that act over long time periods and bring about immense changes to the environment. People can be like that too. (000188)
- Glacial erratics can be good for bouldering. I don't get around to doing that enough. (000189)
So the name is part description, part wish. (00018A)
August 19, 2001: Junction City, Kansas
Realization last night: I don't go on wilderness vacations all that often because the return hurts. The wander back into congestion and hurry, even after only six days burns my eyes, breaks my heart and leaves me in disarray. Sitting on the mountain I was arrayed. Now in Denny's, where management can't spell on their instructional signs, I'm scared. Tight breath, etc. Didn't really want to come in here but knew I needed to eat. (00017X)
I hope to breeze the rest of the way home. (00017Y)
August 15, 2001: The Badlands
These are the badlands. Giant piles of desolate mud. Eroded sedimentary goo. Knife edges. Wrinkles. Desolation. (00017R)
I'm in the notch, leads to the wall. The land drops away from here to the prairie below. The prairie goes on forever. Nothing out there but green grass and bad land edges in colors that I don't know. (00017S)
I can see last night's campsite from here. Arriving at night provides a morning surprise. I drove in a hurry to beat a lightning storm that never broke to rain. A clear sky was revealed, more stars than any view but Joshua Tree. No wind. Cows lowing on a ranch nearby. (00017T)
Woke to stiff winds trying to move the tent. Woke prior to the sun, eventually rising with it. The sun burnt off a mist and now we have a breezy day with a hot sun. In the sun, out of the wind, it is hot. When the wind blows I want my long sleeve shirt. (00017U)
A few hundred feet down the hill there's another trail, of the boardwalk variety. Stairs climb to a platform where people stop to rest, see me and wonder how I got here. That is the Cedar Shelf trail. I am above the shelf, in the notch, looking out from the wall. (00017V)
A man with two children has passed through. They made it to the end of the trail, where I am, expressed disappointment that it wasn't a loop and went back the way they came. I wonder if they noticed the view. I have. I am here for the duration. (00017W)
PurpleWiki/PurplePlugin pre-release
After far longer than expected, version 0.2 of PurpleWiki, including a PurplePlugin for MovableType is available for pre-official-release download. (00017E)
This version adds support for: (00017F)
- Document independent node identifiers (NIDs) (00017G)
- A more modular architecture for future improvements (00017H)
- A more flexible configuration sytem (00017I)
- Improved packaging and testing (00017J)
- A PurplePlugin for MovableType (that's what makes this blog go, see BlogTweaks) (00017K)
- Rudimentary TransClusion support (00017L)
- Document authoring features (00017M)
Be warned: this release is not yet well tested and not all the features have been fully documented. This pre-release is being made to seek feedback to clean things up for the official release. There will be changes between this release and the official release. That said, I'm currently using this version here, and on a test WikiBlog. (00017N)
If you would like to try it out, read PurpleWikiInstructions and PurplePluginInstructions. The download link is there, along with step by step installation instructions. (00017O)
If you have any questions feel free to contact me, leave a comment here, or leave comments in the wiki. (00017P)
June 14, 2003
Purple Plugin Closer
Nearly there. (00014I)
What's left: (00014J)
- Some unitialized value warnings when entering new posts or new comments (testing for those is the real reason for this post). (00014K)
- Three remaining global variables that ought to be killed. (00014L)
- Installation docs. (00014M)
- Use docs. (00014N)
- Test cases for the database classes. (00014O)
See PurplePlugin for more. (00014P)
Being Curious
George Por states some good reasons for thinking out loud and collaborating when he asks Are we curious enough? (00014C)
See Collab:ThinkOutLoud for another way of saying a similar thing. (00014D)
It's odd, sometimes, how we often restate things throughout history, over and over again, with new words, with perhaps slightly different connotations. Thinking out loud is like a friendly (but not necessarily friendly) Hegelian dialectic. So is exploration with persistance. (00014E)
To persistance we must add persistence. George worries of things that do not "leave any trace in the collective consciousness". If we record our ruminations, they are available in our personal and shared ConceptualNetwork. Once recorded, if they are accessible for easy reference they are then available to an ongoing process of evolution. (00014F)
June 11, 2003
Purple Number Paradigms
Tom Coates comments on how the small revolution of permalinks brought about a paradigm shift in personal publishing. He makes several points on the value of a permalink that map directly onto the value of a PurpleNumber: (000137)
- Both a PermaLink and a PurpleNumber "make it possible for people to link to something with a higher level of granularity than just the page". (000138)
- Both inflict "more clutter on the weblog-page" that people get used to and provide what amounts to a nice cognitive handle. (000139)
- Clicking on both doesn't "take you anywhere" but allows you to make a reference. (00013A)
- Both provide a method for making a highly specific gesture, potentially encouraging discussion. (00013B)
- Both provide a method for building bridges between content. (00013C)
The value of the increased granularity of access provided by permalinks suggests, but does not guarantee, that the even greater level of granularity provided by PurpleNumbers will be valuable as well. It certainly has been for me. (00013D)
(The PurplePlugin should be ready for testing by stalwarts sometime this week, a solution to the config problem is in the works. If you want to help with the testing, have a MovableType blog of the 2.6 or greater variety, and can install Perl modules, let me know.) (00013E)
June 10, 2003
Tool Literacy
This is the tale of a wiki, some mailing lists, purple numbers, a microwave, DougEngelbart and a whale. Unfinished. (00012L)
The online side of the PlaNetwork Conference involved a wiki and some mailing lists. They both had PurpleNumbers, in part to help link resources from different media. Both the lists and the wiki got a lot of use, but there was not a lot of literate interlinking, either between the lists and the wiki nor between wiki page. In fact, in some cases entire mail messages were copied into wiki pages. (00012M)
The conference included a group of rotating volunteers called the Assembler Team. These people were responsible for expediting the distribution and refactoring of knowledge learned throughout the various conference sessions. At one, someone said: (00012N)
Nothing has been said here that helps me think about what I might do next. (00012O)
The someone might have been Doug Engelbart, but it is hard to tell because the person who was transcribing into the wiki page was not used to the environment. (00012P)
That statement is classic Doug: Where's the stuff that helps me move forward, that provides the structure and the direction to get me to whatever is next? What is it that is out there in the process and the communication in the environment that is augmenting my thinking? (00012Q)
Over the weekend I helped my sister and her family move into a new house. On the way out to dinner my brother-in-law, girlfriend and nephew stood around the new (to us) microwave. Jeff had it in his head that he wanted to set the timer for the night light. We couldn't figure out how. I suggested the Help button (RtFm). Sabrina suggested a thing like a microwave shouldn't need a manual. (00012R)
We figured it out. The help-speak required a little interpretation. All together now, we got it. (00012S)
What's the common thread? New stuff requires learning and learning can take time (obvious, no?). People like me, with my BlueOxen hat on, can't expect to drop a new thing like PurpleNumbers or Wikis on folk and have it work. Something in the environment, in the process and the communication that surrounds the use, must provide the structure and direction to get things started. ContextIsEverything. (00012T)
Even when a tool is very simple, its use is never quiet clear without an available task. Do we know what a screwdriver is for without a screw and a place to screw it? Do we know without looking at it? At what's nearby? (00012U)
The literacy part is left as an exercise for the reader, because this is very good and I'm distracted. (00012V)
Happy Happy, Joy Joy. (00012W)
PlaNetwork People
Browsing through various blog posts about the PlaNetwork Conference I'm amused to find lots of different people. Compare these. (000121)
First, from Jay Fienberg, in his wrap up of the conference: (000122)
Do you know the Myers Briggs test? I think this conference has a lot of N's attending. I am an N too, so this is cool with me. But, I think I am a little in shock at being around so many intuitive, forward thinking people. I tend to expect being around people who possibly think you're a freak if your intuitive rather than people who are intuitive themselves, so this was great for me ;-) (000123)
Second, from mistaking paradise, with a brief comment about the first day: (000124)
today i went to day one of the plaNetwork conference at the presidio in san francisco. the attendees were a mix of hard core global social change activists, technology visionaries (including both brittle partisans and gregarious alpha geeks) and a broad base of left-leaning non-profit idealists. this is a soft money crowd, short on business logic, where capitalism is mistrusted and conservatives are considered an appalling subspecies. obviously by themselves this group is not on a fast evolutionary track to wide social collaboration as long as so many partisans wallow in simple closed minded arrogance. (000125)
We are the world... (000126)
What are you: (000127)
June 06, 2003
PlaNetwork Blogging
Jay Fienberg is doing a fine job of blogging parts of the PlaNetwork Conference on his blog. See, for example, his comments on the blogging session. (000120)
Purple Number Placement
Mike asked some questions in the comments to Purple Number Identity that boil down to why put the link at the end of the paragraph: (00011I)
1. if the purple number functions as an inline anchor, shoudn't they precede rather than follow the graf to which they cling, so that the physical placement of the link is transparent to the location of the target? Perhaps not, but I'm asking. T (00011J)
There are a few different reasons why the purple number follows its graf, none of which are conclusive, but frequent use seems to like them there: (00011K)
- I find them less visually jarring at the end of the paragraph where they don't interrupt the flow of the reading quite as much. PurpleSlurple has used links at the start of lines, so there is a good place to look for comparison. (00011L)
- I find them more useful at the end because that is when I want them. Imagine the flow of action when reading: I'm reading along and read a paragraph to which I'd like to make a reference. I don't know this until I've read the paragraph and lo, there at the end is my tool for helping with that reference. (00011M)
- Having the anchor at the start of the paragraph and the link at the end makes parsing for TransClusion a good deal easier than it would be otherwise. (00011N)
2. if the visible link preceded the graf, you might have the opportunity to use a traditional typographic sigil, such as a paragraph marker (¶), or section marker (§), or even combinations thereof based on CSS/XML T (00011O)
Part of the reason the purple numbers are done in their tasteful lavender style is to minimize their intrusion in the content. (00011P)
Using section or graf markers might make sense in combination with hiearchical or section IDs but not as much with NIDs. (00011Q)
Hiearchical IDs are designed to label ordered sections of a document. The second header is always the second header because it is second. NIDs indicate the content not the order. If you change around the order of the text, the NID goes with its original text. (00011R)
Consider a non-NID example with poetry. I've written some poetry that for reasons beyond my understanding you like so you've made a reference to it. You read the first version: (00011S)
Lo, I was dead, speared by truth (01) Spread fast among the yearning (02) (00011T)
You wonder what that second line means so you send me some email referencing purple number 02. Later I change my mind a bit and reorder: (00011U)
Spread fast among the yearning (01) I was dead, speared by truth (02) (00011V)
When you wrote your email your HID pointed to "Spread fast among the yearning". When I read the email it pointed to "I was dead, speared by truth". (00011W)
Using NIDs would have the second version like this: (00011X)
Spread fast among the yearning (02) I was dead, speared by truth (01) (00011Y)
There is discussion of implementing both HIDs and NIDs in future versions of PurpleWiki. If we do, it is possible that HIDs would go at the start of the line. HIDs are very handy for printed documents, or other sitations where a human readable and speakable identifier is valuable, even if it might change between revisions. (00011Z)
June 05, 2003
PlaNetwork Conference Ready To Start
Final preparations for the PlaNetwork: Networking a Sustainable Future conference are underway. The conference, starting tomorrow in San Francisco, will make progress answering the following questions: (000115)
- How can the Internet be used to mobilize global citizenry around other critical issues affecting our future: ecological destruction, resource depletion, human rights and economic justice? (000116)
- How might we use the financial resources of a newly networked global citizenry to implement system-wide transformation? (000117)
- How can the Internet allow us to see ourselves, and our collective aspirations, even more directly and productively? What role does geographic imaging play in the ability to think and act more systemically? (000118)
- What communications strategies would best enable us to mobilize networks, draw attention to specific issues, envision alternative solutions, and bring about change? (000119)
The conference is surrounded by a variety of online collaborative tools, in part facilitated by BlueOxen. (00011A)
There is a Plone/Zwiki site acting as a home for content and discussion. There is an RSS feed reporting changes for the Wiki there. Each page is also set up to do TrackBackAutoDiscovery, pointing TrackBack pings from bloggers to the planetwork conference channel at the InternetTopicExchange (this is part of the blogging strategy mentioned earlier on this blog). (00011B)
A major feature of the conference is discussion of the recent Link Tank report, The Augmented Social Network. Discussion is occurring on the Plone site, in a mailing list, and in a Link Tank ASN channel at the InternetTopicExchange. (00011C)
Meanwhile some of the volunteers have gathered on the #planetwork IRC channel at irc.freenode.net to discuss much needed last minute tweaks. That channel is being logged with PurpleNumbers. (00011D)
Purple Number Identity
I sat down tonight to write something about PurpleNumbers, as I have several things I need to write for the 0.2 release of PurpleWiki. This is what came out. It fills a different, but similar, purpose to the coolness draft. (000103)
What is a purple number? (000104)
A purple number is an identifier unique to a document or set of documents used to indicate and provide direct access to segments of content in a document. (000105)
In practice a purple number identifies structural elements in a document such as headers, list items and paragraphs. When a new document is created or content is added to an existing document, the document is parsed to add identifiers where they are not already present. When a document is processed for presentation (usually, but not always, to HTML) these identifiers are used to create anchors and links in the document that can be used for later reference. (000106)
Purple number identifiers are known, for reasons of history, as node identifiers, or 'NIDs' for short. (000107)
In simple implementations NIDs are unique per document and may be generated per page, perhaps as a series of integers. More complex implementations create NIDs that are unique across a domain of documents. These NIDs are generated from a central sequencing source or service that provides the next available NID. If NIDs are paired with document identifiers (usually URLs) to create an index, references may be made by NID alone (some uses for this are described below). (000108)
When a document that has been processed to add NIDs is presented as HTML, the NIDs are shown as links (<a href>) to named anchors (<a name>) within a stable URL for the current document. In some current implementations these links are shown in a purple color (thus the name). (000109)
If the identifiers used are human readable (short, sensible), there are benefits to displaying the identifier as the text of the link: reference can be made to the identified segment of content in speech. When the identifiers are more complex a single character, such as the '#' popularized as a permanent link in some weblogs, has proven to work well. (00010A)
Current purple number implementations process text, wiki formatted text, or HTML to either specially formatted wiki text or HTML. The resulting wiki text or HTML embeds text containing the NIDs for each segment of the document. When HTML or wiki text that contains NIDs is reprocessed that text which has already been assigned a NID keeps it's existing NID and that text which is new gets the next NIDs provided by the sequencing service. If content is deleted, NIDs must not be reused as references to NIDs must be allowed to go stale when content is removed. (00010B)
HTML presentations of content with purple numbers adjusts the content in two ways to provide two different functions: the href provides the text of the URL that can be copied to make reference from other environments; the named anchor provides the location to which that reference points. The value of the name attribute of the anchor is the NID. (00010C)
When NIDs for a set of documents are created from the same central source and the NIDs are paired with the URLs of the document in which they are to be presented the resulting index can be used to remotely make reference to content by NID alone. This has several benefits: (00010D)
- Simplified URLs can be used to refer to content. (00010E)
- By updating the index, content addressed by NID can remain addressable even when moved to a new URL. (00010F)
- Content can be referenced and retrieved by NID and then easily parsed out of its context by NID. This allows for transclusion (include by reference rather than copy) of content from one document in another. (00010G)
There are several existing implementations of purple numbers. Some examples are: (00010H)
- PurpleWiki (00010I)
- A descendant of UseModWiki that supports purple numbers. Version 0.1 with support for document based NIDs has been released. Version 0.2 with multi-document NIDs, document authoring features (metadata management), more modular code and transclusion support is being developed. Update 2003/06/02: PurpleWiki 0.9.2, faster, better stronger, has been released to CPAN. (00010J)
- PurplePlugin (00010K)
- A MovableType plugin that uses PurpleWiki 0.2 to format entries with purple numbers, to support transclusions and to provide WikiBlog functionality to MovableType. (00010L)
- Mhonarc purple plugin (00010M)
- An addition to the mhonarc mail archiving system that provides purple numbers on mail messages. source, demo. (00010N)
- Purple ZWiki (00010O)
- Modifications to ZWiki to support purple numbers. demo. (00010P)
- PurpleSlurple (000111)
- A proxy system that adds purple numbers to existing HTML documents anywhere on the net. (000112)
- Purple (000113)
- A processing system for creating documents with purple numbers. source (000114)
See also: PurpleNumbers, PurpleWiki, PurplePlugin, TransClusion and the rest of the geek-glaxon category. (00010Q)
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Identity and Trust
Eric has some things to say about identity and trust in You are number 6. (0000ZU)
Eric finds reason to disagree with the assertion "that the name is the identifier": (0000ZV)
By which I mean to say, a name is only an introduction, identity - and how 'informed entities' online identify other informed entities is through everything that comes behind the name. So we have a name and a key - a small, almost insignificant bit of data that informs the name - providing just enough identity for a computer to authenticate or authorise us. Or we have a more significant bit of information, a physical key and a PIN to identify us in more important realms. (0000ZW)
And when I see someone's writing or actions online, that provides yet more information for me - an aggregating and informed entity - to actually identify them by much more than their name. (0000ZX)
That's what identity is, not just the name. (0000ZY)
In a comment someone says: (0000ZZ)
I just wanted to say that when one encounters another's writings on line, it only represents that part of the online persona which the writer has chosen to share. Of course, that SHOULD raise a question of "trust"... (000100)
To which I want to say this: (000101)
Why do people get so uptight about on line identities and trust? Sure when you encounter somone's writings on line, it is only a part of a whole. This is also true in other settings. When you encounter someone at work you are encountering their work persona. When you read something in an academic journal you are reading someone's academic persona. Trust develops in these settings without the addition of complicated automated authentication systems despite the fact that there is just as much chance the co-worker or the academic have unknown habits like the bloggger who unbeknownst to his adoring readers goes home at night and eats babies. (000102)
Second Person
More from old journals: (0000ZM)
There's been a bit too much writing about PurpleNumbers on this blog lately. That's part of why I made it, but I'd also like it to be something else. T (0000ZN)
This is from the same notebook, a few pages later. I write about myself, in second person: (0000ZO)
You are 16 years old and you discover the size of the universe. On your back, staring at the stars, your focus receeds to infinite and suddenly, in comparison, you don't exist. You don't matter. Nothing you say, do, feel or be is more than a mote of dust. (0000ZP)
You are 20 years old and you've discovered for the second time in a year that someone is pregnant and you did it. And this is for keeps. Nothing you say, do, feel or be is going to change that. (0000ZQ)
You are 29 years old and the object of your affection, the stars in your sky, your single goal, dream and aspiration leaves without warning. You, mote of dust, can't say, do, feel or be. (0000ZR)
I went into a different journal to find a date for this (sometime in 1999, when I was 29) because the age doesn't correspond with the event, and got lost there. Metaphors used then still exist now, but the meanings have all changed. The primary character is now me when it used to be others. (0000ZS)
That is good. I can say, do, feel and be. (0000ZT)
June 04, 2003
Everywhere, Nearly
A former employer, Kiva Networking, is offering free wireless in various areas of downtown Bloomington for the summer. (0000ZB)
The picture was taken five minutes ago, I'm still on the square, writing this entry and enjoying the weather. (0000ZC)
When this is really everywhere, we'll be somewhere. (0000ZD)
June 03, 2003
Metadoor
There's been a bit too much writing about PurpleNumbers on this blog lately. That's part of why I made it, but I'd also like it to be something else. (0000Z0)
I've started digging in old papers, notebooks, files. In them I find bits of writing from times unknown that I'd like to save. Here's one. I think it is from sometime between 1997 and 1999. I had a notebook in which I would record thoughts. (0000Z1)
There are metaphors in lives. I see people everywhere, I see myself, believing that they are on the near side of a doorway into the good life. Noone knows what the good life really is, but the present is not it and god or whatever willing life will progress towards and through the door and then we can all kick back. (0000Z2)
I see this door. I get near to this door. And when I'm near to this door I see a great, gaping impassable abyss before it. And when I'm in love the abyss fills. (0000Z3)
(At this point you might be thiking some kind of "How romantic" thought. Let's hope not because you would be off base and I would have written the previous paragraph with the wrong tone.) (0000Z4)
Now, a few years later, I know some other things. I still think the abyss filling because of someone else is not right. If the abyss fills, what is there to cross? If there is nothing to cross, why go through the door? But if you stay there, are you going anywhere? (0000Z5)
I once imagined the place beyond the door as a separate place. Go there and there's no going back, everyone else is lost and only people through the door are with you now. But everyone has their own door, and once through they are still in the same place but themselves changed. (0000Z6)
So now, the abyss is there, even with love, and I stare at it and it stares back, and I look for bridges. (0000Z7)
Automation, Augmentation and Discipline
StuartHenshall and I have been talking in email about PurpleNumbers in relation to collaborative intelligence building, wikis and blogs. Parts of a recent email I want in my PurpleNet for later reference so I'm sticking it in here, with some edits because I'm an undisciplined writer. (0000YI)
Stuart had asked for some thoughts on the differences and similarities between NexistWiki and PurpleWiki: (0000YJ)
Jack and I have been talking about NexistWiki since he brought it online. The original version of NexistWiki was more like PurpleWiki than the current incarnation. The new version removes support for automatic parsing of WikiWords in favor a more intentional and formal linking mechanism. For certain applications, especially where the users are disciplined and motivated, this might be a good thing, but generally speaking I think the more casual linking provided by WikiWords is more encouraging of emergent understanding. (0000YK)
The original purpose of PurpleWiki was to take the highly dynamic and easy-to-refactor nature of a wiki and make it more valuable as a reference tool by providing granular addressability with the PurpleNumbers. As such it still assumes that the linking and refactoring behaviors are going to primarily be the responsibility of human authors. Given the nature of the content in a general use Wiki I think this is good: human writing does not have high semantic content for machines without a great deal of metadata management. That metadata management cuts back on the casual and dynamic ease of use that a Wiki provides. (0000YL)
My interpretation of NexistWiki is that it wants to be an augmenting tool but with some added automation. To achieve that it has to add some semantics to the data. Jack does this by having named links between the AIRs. I think this is a fine way to go, but I've never found myself actually using NexistWiki because I find using it contrary to my style. (0000YM)
I feel there are several dimensions in understanding processes of knowledge management (if you want to call it that) and tool development is both a reaction to choices about where on the dimensional scales you want to be and an enforcer of certain choices. One of those scales could be called LocusOfDiscipline. (0000YN)
If I recall correctly, NexistWiki assumes, to a minor but greater than PurpleWiki extent, that disciplined behavior is available at the time of writing. That discipline is used to name links and divided content up into AIRs. That's perfectly acceptable behavior for tool users that work that way, especially in situations where later reuse, refactoring and network creation is going to be done, at least in part, by automatic processes. (0000YO)
PurpleWiki, on the other hand, assumes that discipline, to a certain extent, comes after the initial writing. The Wiki provides the dumping ground onto which ideas can be deposited lest they escape. PurpleNumbers then provide the handles which allow the reuse, refactoring and network creation (by people) that bring about (emerge) greater understandings. TransClusion takes this a step further. (0000YP)
In either case, Nexist or Purple, some form of granular addressability, whether PurpleNumbers or something else, is helpful. They provide handles for getting at information in a more precise form. (0000YQ)
