February 17, 2006
Purple.pm
Last week Eugene swung by after RecentChangesCamp and we took a day to do something we've been talking about for years: We finally made a separate module for handling the PurpleNumber creation and index management that is used in PurpleWiki. (PYC)
The code is still coming together. Thus far there's a subversion repository with working code at: (PYD)
The basic functions of the tool are pretty straightforward: (PYF)
- Give a URL, get a PurpleNumber NID (PYG)
- Give a NID, get back the URL where the identified node can be found (PYH)
NIDs are stored in SQLite. The code is written with something akin to a factory class so other data storage implementations will be easy to create. (PYI)
Accessing the data store can be done through direct use of the Perl library, or through a RESTful server subclassed from HTTP-Server-Simple (thanks to Jesse for releasing a new version patched to support PUT and DELETE). (PYJ)
Using a central nid index for multiple wikis or other tools that use PurpleNumbers enables TransClusion between those multiple tools. (PYK)
It's nice to get this going. (PYL)
Update: There's been a fair amount of updates recently. The commit messages have more info. (PYZ)
August 08, 2005
Microcontent and Purple
I originally wrote this as a comment at a Microcontent Musings post on PurpleNumbers but thought it should go here too (with some slight edits). I felt perhaps the point of purple numbers hadn't quite hit home. (PU7)
PurpleNumbers provide granular addressability to pieces of content smaller than a document. Originally the idea was to be able to create references into a page so the pointing one does when making reference to something is more complete. For example I can say "Yeah, take a look at the third item on that list after the third header on this page" or I can say "Look here" (unfortunately there a bit of an error in my css that scrolls that chunk up under the header instead of putting it in view, I should fix that). That's perhaps a micro optimization, but it is one that adds up immensely over the history of one's browsing by reducing ambiguity. (PU8)
More interestingly, though, is that once we got PurpleNumbers working, we saw that they could be used to give the chunks identifiers that raised them to the level of first class elements on the web: they could have their own URI and the purple numbered content could therefore be dynamically transcluded into other documents or used to compose new documents. For a pretty old example see TransClusion. (PU9)
Arnaud says: (PUA)
Each paragraph, each item in a list, might thus have it's own permalink. The only purpose that I can think of, is when you want to quote some text from someone else. But the question is whether the quoter and quotee have the same idea of quotable pieces. I doubt that. (PUB)
Indeed there is a big difference between what the quoter and quotee might think of as a quotable (or referenceable or transcludable) piece. PurpleNumbers currently take the political stance that the quoter should be able to quote whatever they want: every chunk gets a purple number. Some similar tools let the author decide what chunks get numbers. Purple numbers choose the more anti-authority approach. They also try to avoid being ridiculous. (PUC)
Where the chunks gain meaning is in the way they can be reused in other documents. Knowledge creation is a dialectic of sorts. Reusing existing content to create new content springboards new understandings without reinventing the wheel. (PUD)
Microcontent Musings
I've started reading Arnaud Leene's Microcontent Musings. An entry there provides a list of attributes that could lead to a definition of microcontent: (PTY)
- small - read micro. This is still a troublesome attribute, as MicroContent? items seems to grow and grow and can become pretty large. But it is good to focus on smallness. MicroContent? can be small and that is worth to note in itself; (PTZ)
- self-contained - this attribute I like much better. It means that MicroContent? can live on its own. It does not need to have context. I am not sure whether I exclude an MicroContent? types by this, such as Discussion Forum Items. In a Discussion Forum has a strong thread between each Item in a discussion; (PU0)
- addressable - I think that this one is important. This is Marc Canter's demand. Each piece of MicroContent? must have a unique permaUri. That allows for syndication in all kind of forms. This implies that MicroContent? can be autonomous; (PU1)
- structured - MicroContent? should have structure. This can be extremely minimal (title, permaUri, description), but ideally more fields are defined; (PU2)
- flexibility - MicroContent? should not be rigid in it's structure. The user should be able to add fields at will, or fallback to a minimal set. Flexibility also implies that there shouldn't be any rigid schema's underlying any MicroContent? type. It should be like OPML, but with a good reference to a dictionary; (PU3)
- single - this attribute I am not sure about. I believe that each MicroContent? item should have it's own file (or resource). There seems to be a trend to embed multiple MicroContent? items in a single piece of MacroContent?. If you see the number of different MicroContent? items (and types) people add to their blog-page, it has become a petri-dish for all kinds of MicroContent?. It will become harder and harder to extract the MicroContent? item you want. I am afraid this will hamper the creation of the MicroWeb?; (PU4)
- computer data - I reference this in my definition, so I should include it here as well: we talk about computer readable data; (PU5)
The long term vision for PurpleNumbers is for them to be the identifiers for addressable, self-contained, small, flexible, single chunks of computer data that are usable alone or can be composed into more complex structures (documents). (PU6)
rubead
OSCON 2005, especially the lucky stiff, inspired me to start working on a project in Ruby. The project is not exactly a surprise. (PTU)
rubead is a start at implementing a nodal style data store for a PurpleWiki style wiki. This is a lot like NodaryPublic. In rubead every block (bead) gets a PurpleNumber and sub-documents can be composed from any position in the parse tree allowing more complex and effective TransClusion than implemented in Purplewiki and Kwiki-Purple. Should end up with something that's a bridge between a standard document oriented wiki and TiddlyWiki. (PTV)
Not much done thus far, but Ruby has made it pretty easy so far. Next step: throw in some WEBrick for display and improve the parse tree creation. (PTW)
Code soon. (PTX)
May 26, 2005
Long Live(d) Purple Numbers
Phil responds to Eugene's participation in the recent chatter about purple numbers, returning to the issue of numbers versus names. Some late night thoughts in response: (PNG)
Phil says numbers make sense in a blog, because you're already there when you decide to make reference, whereas in a wiki you're not. He says: (PNH)
My initial discussion with Chris, was, in contrast, about purple-numbers in wiki, which is what E.E.C. and Blue Oxen have always appeared to me to stand for. (PNI)
I'm sorry I helped to extend that impression. Purple numbers have never been thought of as a thing that just live in wikis or for that matter just in any environment. They facilitate cross medium reference and reuse. Purple numbers may be optimized for synthesis, but they are predicated on ethic (or at least goal) of interoperability. Where they show their most value is content reuse between blogs and wikis and email archives. (PNJ)
Phil suggests a sort of "purple names": (PNK)
But we could imagine markers that weren't meaningless. For example, if I could make a link which simply included the first X letters of a paragraph to be matched. If I could link to the previous paragraph in this post by making a link like this : (PNL)
[[PostName#OK?. But]] (PNM)
What, I ask, happens when that paragraph has its first six characters change? Or it moves to another page? The link breaks. (PNN)
This transclusion uses just the purple number: (PNO)
a high degree of flexibility in referencing content from anywhere, even content that will change its location on the network T (PNP)
If the content at PM3 is moved from my blog into my wiki, and I were running the latest PurpleWiki code, the transclusion would continue to work. If I changed the text from "a high degree" to "a significant degree", the transclusion would continue to work. (PNQ)
Yes, right now it has a horrible, nasty, unfortunate interface, but that interface is helping to flesh out an infrastructure that will support some stuff with nice interfaces down the road. In the meantime it does some cool stuff that takes a short while to get used to but provides huge benefits if you're willing to pay the price. (PNR)
May 24, 2005
Reading To Write
Phil Jones and I continue our conversation about purple numbers: (PMY)
Essentially Chris casts the issue as a trade off between reading and writing. (PMZ)
That's a pretty good characterization of what I was saying, and Phil makes some excellent points. His comments inspire a thought that illuminates a thing I forgot to emphasize in my earlier comments: (PN0)
Yes, purple numbers do try to favor the reader and the act of reading, but not just for reading. They favor the reader so the reader may more easily do more writing. The whole point is for purple numbers and tools like it to be a generative force in the synthesis of new understandings. (PN1)
Phil can write all he wants, and I can read all I want, but until I write down something that builds on what Phil says, while making chains of reference back through the many layers of context, there's been no synthesis, at least not any that is available outside the confines of my own mind. (PN2)
So purple numbers aren't anything new: They are yet another in a long history of techniques that help people generate a little understanding with a little authority. The purple numbers twist is that you can point and grab with finer detail and in real time. (PN3)
Update: Eugene joins in with some interesting additions. (PN4)
May 11, 2005
Purple Identification
In a fine bit of conversation, Phil Jones has responded to my response to Adina Levin responding to my response to Jason Kottke talking about the fundamental units of content on the web. (PLT)
Phil asserts that I'm hostile to the semantics of labels being bound by everyday behavior. This is not at all the case. Phil uses WikiWords as a good example. My hostility to free linking should indicate the depth of my love for WikiWords. I also love tags, but as Bill Seitz points out, tags don't point to a single resource, they point to a collection. (PLU)
Tags and WikiWords don't serve the same purpose as purple numbers. (PLV)
Tags and WikiWords are names people can use to label something or some things. They grant a certain power to authors: "I am calling this thing I am writing or this thing I am pointing to FOO". There is an expectation or hope of collision. (PLW)
Purple numbers are identifiers that grant power to readers, reviewers, annotators and commentators to indicate a specific piece of any content anywhere and make reference to or, more importantly, reuse it. If pieces of content had meaningful labels, imagine the difficulty of adding labels to every piece of content? (PLX)
For perspective: Tim Bray took a step down the slippery slope away from the shimmering shiny idealism of allowing the reader access to everything by implementing his (reference only, no support for transclusion) purple numbers in way that grants the author control over what chunks get the numbers. That's like letting a politician say "off the record..." (PLY)
By the way, a closer look at my gripe with URIs (PLZ)
Current implementations of purple numbers expose the identifiers (in both the numbers on the screen and numbers at all senses) but this does not need to be the case. Because they are unique (for now in a given suite of tools, but long term globally), persistent and stable they can have labels associated with them that resolve to the stable identifiers (Purple:DistributedPurpleNumbers for some references). The labels could be names like "mom's address" or sequences like those found in legal documents. All this is very much like the concept of a URI except that URIs, because they contain information about what they identify, fail to be persistent or stable and thus are not identifiers at all but labels posing (miserably) as identifiers. T (PM0)
shows that I'm okay with labels (which is what WikiWords and tags are) in general. I agree that presenting purple numbers onscreen as the numbers, and requiring users to manipulate the numbers is problematic. (PM1)
However given the goals (PM2)
- a high degree of flexibility in referencing content from anywhere, even content that will change its location on the network (PM3)
- referential control in the hands of the reader (PM4)
- versioned nodes (PM5)
there need to be persistent, unique, stable identifiers underneath whatever helpful interfaces will eventually exist between the user and the guts of the system. In simple wiki systems, the page name which people use to gain access to the resource which is the manifestation of that page on that particular system resolves to a unique identifier (inode) on the (extremely local) filesystem. In modern operating systems, you don't personally use inodes to get at stuff, but they are a crucial piece of the pie. Purple numbers, someday, can be thought of as inodes for individual chunks of content that transcend filesystems and local networks and can move around. (PM6)
Someday, perhaps, there will be nice libraries for them. In the meantime we have to come up with what those libraries will need to do by messing with some ick. (PM7)
May 10, 2005
Purple response
Responding to my Fundamentally Purple posting, Adina asks some good questions about purple numbers summed with: (PKN)
In practice, are purple numbers stable enough to be useful? Or are there certain cases where they are more useful than others? ps (PKO)
Adina's concerned that during the editing process the numbers will migrate around too much as paragraphs split and sentences move from one paragraph to another. (PKP)
That's a valid concern, and it does happen, but experience with Purplewiki and the collaborative environments at Blue Oxen and other places lucky enough to have a full suite of purple stuff have shown that it's not too much of a big deal: people adapt well. (PKQ)
(If you are short of time you may find it useful to skip to the end of this meandering think.) (PKR)
People's writing habits change a bit: (PKS)
- a little more effort is made to break thoughts up into chunks (paragraphs or list items) so that references are easier to make and are more stable (PKT)
- there's a bit more atomism (Wikipedia's description of transclusion has a bit on this) (PKU)
- when editing a wiki page, people choose to maintain the purple number on a chunk or remove it as fits the degree of change made to the chunk (PKV)
- references to information that adds context to the current content increase (PKW)
Purplewiki's implementation of purple numbers is far from done or perfect (it's a sweet little hack that happens to enable all kinds of helpful behaviors): it provides a platform for exploring the concepts and issues with systems that allow granular addressability and transclusion but imposes some burdens on the user. The flaws present now are pointers to things to fix or research as we learn how to create systems that support the basic (and flawless in the abstract sense) concept at the core of purple numbers: If you put handles on things that both computers and people can manipulate, you increase opportunities for use and manipulation. (PKX)
(Lee Iverson's Nodal project presents a more formal model for node-based document systems.) (PKY)
Adina lists three points: (PKZ)
- purple references to an early draft will be very different from their referents in a later draft. (PL0)
- the sequence will be garbled (PL1)
- some references will be missing ps (PL2)
The first and third can be at least somewhat addressed by one of largest missing pieces in current purple implementations: node versioning. With proper versioning, references will never die, they just fade out of the foreground. A cool system of doing versioning will allow a referenced node to present itself from any point on its history, while giving indicators of its forward and backward life. (PL3)
In very recent versions of PurpleWiki, purple numbered nodes (the chunks of content) can move easily from page to page in the wiki and amongst associated blogs, document repositories and email archives. Experimental code exists which allows nodes to move between a designated set of servers. Long term nodes could move anywhere on the public internet. (PL4)
The second point is not so much a problem as a misunderstanding. Despite the fact that some purpled documents appear to show a sequence (such as PK1, PK2, PK3, etc.) this is coincidental: the system that generates the numbers happens to be predictable, but is not reliably so. The purple numbers are meant to be entirely meaningless identifiers (not labels or names) and therefore not present any information about the content they identify (no sense of time of creation or of sequence). This makes them portable and stable in the extreme. That they sometimes do show up in sequence is essentially a misfeature resulting from laziness. (PL5)
Current implementations of purple numbers expose the identifiers (in both the numbers on the screen and numbers at all senses) but this does not need to be the case. Because they are unique (for now in a given suite of tools, but long term globally), persistent and stable they can have labels associated with them that resolve to the stable identifiers (Purple:DistributedPurpleNumbers for some references). The labels could be names like "mom's address" or sequences like those found in legal documents. All this is very much like the concept of a URI except that URIs, because they contain information about what they identify, fail to be persistent or stable and thus are not identifiers at all but labels posing (miserably) as identifiers. (PL6)
In advanced tools using purple numbers, they never need be seen. Fancy gestural interfaces could include "reference this" or "transclude this" for content that is, behind the scenes, purple numbered. (PL7)
And lest we forget, purple numbers are just one implementation of a concept, granular addressability, that could be done in many ways. (PL8)
In purple number tools of today, when one right clicks on a purple number you get the full url of the page being clicked plus the purple number. Something like this: (PL9)
http://www.example.com/purple/thing.html#nidA9E (PLB)
Better would be something like one of these: (PLD)
http://purpleresolver.net/A9E {nid PLF} purple:A9E (PLG)
(The answer to the question "Why?" left as an exercise for the reader. I'll make some Church of Purple t-shirts on Cafe Press and give one to the author of the best answer.) (PLI)
Update: (PM8)
paulv: is the "why" question "why is http://purpleresolver.net/A9E better than http://www.example.com/purple/thing.html#nidA9E"? cdent: yes (PM9)
So, are purple numbers stable enough to be useful? For everyone and every case? No. But for quite a number of people in quite a number of situations they have been very useful. The primary use has been with smallish groups of people who need to create and use a large amount of information that is both stock and flow that is as valuable the second and later uses as the first. (PLJ)
See the WateringHole at Blue Oxen for a place to experiment. (PLK)
Clearly I am in far too deep with purple stuff: I need a translator. The above can be so much meaningless noise and I find little time to make things cogent. (PLL)
Here's a different angle: I've been using purple numbers on this blog for two and a half years and using them in wikis and mailing list archives for more than three. In collaborative settings where I've had purple numbers my ability to recall, use, synthesize and act on information has been exponentially augmented. So much so that in environments where I do not have them I feel radically hobbled. (PLM)
The present day technical and usability issues with purple numbers (or better systems that might replace it) are temporary, interesting problems to solve, and a small price to pay for being less dumb. (PLN)
May 07, 2005
Fundamentally Purple
Much like the shift from molecules to atoms to subatomic particles (protons, neutrons, etc.) to quarks to (potentially) tiny vibrating strings as the most fundamental unit of physical matter that we can find, the fundamental unit for content on the web has been getting smaller as well ps (PKC)
He then lists the sequence: site, pages, post/permalink combo and now, with bookmark managers and tagging systems, the phrase or word. (PKD)
Left out is the more useful (for reuse and reference) paragraph or block unit, as done in purple numbers and other fragment identification systems, which make every "paragraph a first-class Web citizen". (PKE)
Reference at the level of a paragraph enables valuable granular referencing and reuse while staying just on the safe side of the boundary between respecting context and being ridiculous. (PKF)
May 03, 2005
Apple Amplifier
Meet Automator by Matt Neuburg at TidBITS opens with: (PK4)
The history of the Mac is paved with Apple's attempts to enable ordinary users to tap the programmable power of their own computers. (PK5)
They've done this by giving users more granular access to the operations of the tools and applications on the system. Applescript and Automator let people manipulate and assemble simple data and actions in ways that create complex systems. (PK6)
It's like lego. If you have lots of little pieces of lego you can build all kinds of fancy things that are less limited than what you can build with the bigger blocks of Duplo. (PK7)
This is the argument that's often been used to explain the superiority of Un*x over Windows; the lack of flexibility and real assistance provided by wizards and Clippy; the value of nanotechnology; and, near and dear, the importance of purple numbers and similar systems. (PK8)
Apple's use of this model may explain why I've never felt particularly insulted by the company. Granting people usable handles to actions and information is a generous and trusting gesture that hopes and assumes the receiving end is a creative and intelligent person that wants to use their tools in a less dumb fashion. There's extra power here if you want it. Headroom. (PK9)
April 04, 2005
Purple Numbers for Attention Management
Raymond M. Kristiansen is thinking about attention: (PGZ)
Wouldn't it be great if we could somehow fuse our different infoclouds? To let the information stream seamlessly between our mail accounts, our own computers and the internet (p2p style, where I define my open folders) and between our own blogs and the blogs of others (includeing our comments on other people's blogs). PS (PH0)
This nicely describes the long term goal of the Purple suite of tools and ideas (PurpleNumbers, GranularAddressability, TransClusion, PurpleNet, PurpleNetwork and friends). In a fully fleshed out purple universe, all chunks of content are individually addressable and reusable (as micro content, if that's your preferred term) throughout the network, with flexible access control. (PH1)
All your stuff exists in your pool. All my stuff exists in my pool. Anything that I say you can reuse is accessible by you with a straightforward identifier that points not to a particular page, but to the individual paragraphs, headers or list items within. This same model could be extended to audio and video as well. (PH2)
The identifiers will be unique across the entire system, making them resilient in the face of edits, even edits that move the content across domains. (PH3)
In the present day, purple numbers remain limited to single server implementations (there is experimental support for multiple server using tools). The Blue Oxen Collaboratories have a fairly integrated set of tools that use purple numbers, and the Indiana University Knowledge Base developers and editors use purple numbers extensively in their daily work through a network of mailing list archives, rt, blogs, irc tools, wikis and document repositories that use purple numbers and transclusion. (PH4)
The systems provide what amounts to a shared infocloud for the participants where there attention and cognition is supported by an available but not in their face network of addressable information. (PH5)
I'll try to flesh out some more details in a later entry. (PH6)
Update: I've pointed to the quotation with PurpleSlurple, I'm ashamed I forgot. (PHC)
More about purple: (PH7)
- An Introduction to Purple from E.E. Kim (PH8)
- Purple Numbers Coolness Draft (PH9)
- Purple Number Identity (PHA)
- Purple Number Signs from Tim Bray (PHB)
March 21, 2005
Why Wiki?
A regular unanswered question (for myself and others) of "what do you do?", some conversations with Lee LeFever about social design and community, and recent updates at work have given me a chance to think a bit about the question and stir some ideas. (PG6)
At work I'm primarily a developer, but I tend to think of my vocation as a builder of augmenting, computer-based tools for personal and collaborative work. I go to the trouble of making that mouthful of a statement to distinguish between types of activities that computers do and types of activities that people do. (PG7)
Computers have two types of applications, those that automate and those that augment (21Q, 22J). An augmenting application assists a person in performing some activity which cannot or is not automated. Only activities which can be formally described in theory can be automated. As such there are many tasks, especially those related to human discourse, which cannot be automated; they can, however, be augmented. (PG8)
At a fundamental level computers are tools for creating representations (22L). An augmenting application supporting discourse is engaged in representing and transmitting information. The application is used as tool to evaluate, craft and remodel information (22K). (PG9)
Most of my development effort in the last few years has been with wikis (first PurpleWiki, and now Kwiki and Socialtext) and purple numbers. Purple numbers may eventually change the universe of information handling, but that's a discussion for another day. (PGB)
Wikis are a type of augmenting discourse tool optimized for a particular set of behaviors. Under ideal(tm) conditions they provide an easy path to participation in evolving communication. They do this by being straightforward to learn, quick to respond, and accessible in a distributed fashion. They support changing content and provide an easy way to create and explore connections between things. How something fits in to the larger picture is a large part of how we infer meaning. (PGC)
I think there are three primary audiences for wikis: the individual who hopes to use the wiki as an outboard brain or memory; the nascent group that hopes to discover and solidify the community that lies as potential in their loose connections; and the existing community that hopes to support a shared goal or perform some action. (PGD)
Those three categories could be used to describe any set of people, but a wiki is not the perfect tool for every task. There are multiple types of discourse and multiple tools to support them. Some are better at certain aspects than others, none are really good enough (we have a long long way to go, but each day and in every way we are becoming better and better). (PGE)
Blogs have become a central tool in the distribution of narrative discourse. With a blog there is usually a single author or small group expressing outwardly in a gesture that leads, over time, to the distribution of language and understanding outside the immediate clan. Very often the initial discourse is not fully refined but is rather some author's speculation: a seed that may lead to more knowledge later, as a separate piece of content. As has been said many times, the connections in the network of blogs is often loose and distributed. (PGF)
Email continues to be a primary tool for discussion within a clan. The members of an email group have already discovered some bit of shared language or understanding that has brought them together. Email discussion can reinforce and solidify language, providing stability from which action can be performed. (PGG)
With both blogs and email, content tends to be relatively static. Typos may be corrected in a blog entry and email threads may carry on forever but there is little in the way of refinement of the content. This is where wikis step in: they are good tools for summarizing, annotating and connecting information. These are the actions of a knowledge enhancement system. (PGH)
Wikis do not match all the requirements for a knowledge enhancement system, but experience has demonstrated that this is good. Wikis are here now, today, helping people to do good work generating and supporting communities, developing and creating shared language, and refining information into new knowledge. Their simplicity makes them available. (PGI)
When I chose to join up with Socialtext back in September, it was an attractive choice because the people there believe in two things: people matter more than tools; and tools should help people do what they want to do, not get in the way. (PGK)
Socialtext, in its various incarnations, is based on wiki but integrates concepts from email and blogs to allow the action and narration those systems support. The latest release is a fine improvement: it enhances email integration, adds support for backlinks (placing information in context, leading to deeper understanding) and for PC Forum 2005 we've created a special prototype of Eventspace, running under mod perl for improved response time. (PGL)
Architecting these sorts of tools may not solve poverty and hunger, or alleviate suffering in the aftermath of a ? disaster, but the tools can augment people actively doing that work. I happen to be good at making the tools go, so that's where I look to fit myself into the puzzle. (PGM)
Related writings: (PGN)
February 28, 2005
Kwiki::Purple on CPAN
I've finally put Kwiki::Purple on CPAN, along with a few other new or refreshed Kwiki Plugins. (PF0)
Kwiki-Purple is not yet done, but is far enough along where other people could play with it. If you want to give it a go have a look at (PF1)
http://www.burningchrome.com/pwiki/index.cgi?KwikiPurpleInstall (PF2)
To help with Kwiki-Purple development, I put together a Kwiki-Test module. Traditionally Kwiki Plugins are rather lacking in tests, I hope Kwiki-Test helps change that. tdd++ (PF3)
February 16, 2005
At Least Two Pieces of Good News about Views: Mountains and Purple
Two nice things have happened today: (PEG)
On the walk back from the grocery I found a good place from which to get my eyes on Mt. Rainier. This has been a long running problem for me. First the weather is usually cloudy, so none of the mountains (Cascades or Olympics) are in view. Second, in the neighborhood, views to the east are fairly plentiful, but narrow. Rainier is to the Southeast, usually outside the angle of view while tromping around the streets. (PEH)
Today things are different. Very clear day. And I found a good spot for a view. Somewhere I walk past often, but usually with my back facing the view. At the northwest corner of a nearby playfield if I site across the center line of the soccer field and look a bit right there's the mountain. And when I say there, I mean THERE. On a day like today it is stunningly huge. Nails me to the spot in some kind of religious ecstasy. (PEI)
Meanwhile, back inside, where my view is the brick wall of next door, I've finally cut a usable version of Kwiki::Purple with support for good linking and internal to the wiki TransClusion. See it: http://www.burningchrome.com/pwiki/ (PEJ)
This is the culmination of a huge amount of work and experimentation, and I'm sure there will be much more to come. Thanks again to Brian Ingerson, Matthew O'Connor and Eugene Eric Kim. (PEK)
I hope to get it to CPAN asap. (PEL)
December 02, 2004
PurpleWiki 0.95 test
PurpleWiki 0.95 is nearly out. I discovered a couple of bugs that may delay things briefly. If you are eager go to http://www.blueoxen.org/tools/purplewiki/ (OV8)
The combination of working on SocialText, where [Kwiki] plays a major role, and working on PurpleWiki is going to make my head explode, in the good way. (OV9)
I've been slacking on the latter because of the former. (OVA)
Oh to have many heads, so they could all do stuff, and explode as required. (OVB)
August 11, 2004
PurpleWiki 0.94
I've just announced PurpleWiki version 0.94 with the announcement included below. This new version is way fancy and flexible. I've been playing on my PersonalWiki. (ND2)
We're proud to announce not one, but two new releases of PurpleWiki. (NCH)
The newest release, 0.94, is a quick bug fix to 0.93 which provides a large number of new and useful features that vastly improve the appearance and usability of PurpleWiki: (NCI)
We're proud to announce not one, but two new releases of PurpleWiki. (NCJ)
The newest release, 0.94, is a quick bug fix to 0.93 which provides a large number of new and useful features that vastly improve the appearance and usability of PurpleWiki: (NCK)
- Support for a customized look and feel using: ** Templates and TemplateToolkit? ** XHTML 1.1 strict compliance with better CSS handling ** An improved default stylesheet ** CreateLinkBefore? and CreateLinkText? configuration settings that allow customized link styles for undefined wiki words (NCL)
- Refactored user and session management that provides support for: ** Visited links breadcrumbs for easier navigation ** Basic access control, including a LoginToEdit? configuration item (NCM)
- Support for Identity Commons i-names. (NCN)
- Support for converting MoinMoin? page databases to PurpleWiki. (NCP)
- Support for built-in RSS syndication (action=rss), removing the need for external cron scripts. (NCQ)
- Major bug fixes with the handling of old revisions and saving new versions. Viewing and reusing old versions of pages now works. (NCR)
Please read the UPGRADE file included in the distribution for detailed instructions on the steps required to upgrade an existing wiki. (NCS)
The latest version can be retrieved from the PurpleWiki distribution page (NCT)
http://www.blueoxen.org/tools/purplewiki/ (NCU)
and will be available via CPAN sometime today (August 11th). There is also a Freshmeat entry at (NCV)
http://freshmeat.net/projects/purplewiki/ (NCW)
To see the new version in action, visit the PurpleWiki Wiki: (NCX)
http://purplewiki.blueoxen.net/ (NCY)
If you have questions or comments about PurpleWiki, please subscribe to one of the mailing lists described at (NCZ)
http://purplewiki.blueoxen.net/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?MailingLists (ND0)
and post there or comment on the PurpleWiki Wiki. (ND1)
August 09, 2004
PurpleWiki 0.93
PurpleWiki version 0.93 is nearly ready to go. This is a test post to make sure it still works with the MovableType plugin. (AAK)
New features include: (AAL)
- Templating support so the look of the wiki can be dramatically altered. (AAM)
- Sessions for users, allowing fun things like: (AAN)
- Better XHTML and CSS support (AAQ)
etc etc. It's a rather dramatic set of changes. The full list will be published here and a few other places when the release happens (tonight or tomorrow). This is just a test post. So here's some tests: (AAR)
I am a header (AAS)
With some indented text below. (AAT)
Update: My primary wiki is now running the new code with some diddling done to the default css and templates. The purplewiki wiki is running the same code, with the default templates. (ABH)
June 09, 2004
A Web for Augmentation, not Automation
Earl Mardle comments on Russell Beale's How the Web is Changing: (8QZ)
It fits with my contention that the net is a tool, not a medium. The whole net is an information tool that does a whole lot of interesting things, most importantly, distributing information power; that is the power to produce and disseminate your own information and access, critique and publicise the critique of other people's information, but it also acts as a validator of information and perspective by community, however small or isolated. ps (8R0)
I was going to write this as a comment on his blog and then decided to move it here. (8R1)
In his posting and some others from around the same time, Earl seems to be bouncing around the difference between tools that augment and tools that automate. (8R2)
Tools that augment extend a human's ability while still leaving the human in control. They are often small things (like purple number stuff) that provide a way to grab or manipulate stuff of all sorts. (8R3)
Tools that automate "do it for you", often operate in large swaths, and are based on performing tasks that can be formally described. (8R4)
There's an ethical or world view difference between the two. Some people prefer the latter, some people the former. I'm deep in the augmentation style, I hope. The Semantic Web, as imagined by the W3C, strikes me as in alignment with the latter. (8R5)
Being in one camp or the other doesn't make someone wrong, but it does make conversation across the boundaries of the camps a little confusing and disorienting. (8R6)
I first came upon the augmentation/automation split while writing my Computer as Tool paper: (8R7)
Landauer distinguishes between two phases of computer applications. Phase one applications automate tasks "replacing humans" for the performance of "almost any process that science, engineering, and statistics have captured in their theories". Phase two applications, on the other hand, are applications that assist humans in tasks for which there is no established theory of action. Phase two applications include the very large body of office productivity applications, web browsers, and desktop operating systems; anything where the human uses the computer throughout the process. They are the applications we use to process information in flexible and potentially undefined ways. T (8R8)
Landauer's book: (8R9)
is a good read. (8RB)
June 02, 2004
Transclusion v Blockquote
In a comment responding to Purple Placement Michael Day asks: (862)
Would you agree that for quoting across different web sites, transclusion cannot replace blockquote? T (863)
That link is to a blog entry that addresses his thoughts more completely. Read that first if you want this to make any sense. (864)
First, to correct a misconception in Michael's blog entry: PurpleNumbers were not originally created for assisting with TransClusion. That was something figured out later during the development of PurpleWiki 0.9. Their initial purpose was to provide an address for a paragraph or li