Tired of Hierarchies
Aryeh M. Friedman
aryeh.friedman at gmail.com
Mon May 5 00:42:45 UTC 2008
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Andrew Pantyukhin wrote:
| On Sat, May 03, 2008 at 03:02:15PM -0700, Jason C. Wells wrote:
|> When will we be able to access our computerized data on the
|> desktop with out complete dependence on the hierarchy? Has
|> anyone in the FOSS community tackled this problem? What
|> software is used?
|
| You know the language is hierarchical, don't you?
|
| w->(wh->when,what),will,we;b->be;a->able,access;...
|
| I understand your feelings, but like with so many other technical
| problems, the roots of this one grow out of a user's head.
| That's where it should be fixed, IMHO.
The last sentence is just insulting. The reason being is while yes
there are somethings that a natural hieractical it does not mean that
there are some other things that should not be.
Yes I admit that (at least traditionally) information is naturally
hieractical in that you can split it into categories, with the two most
important ones in the pre-computer world being library cataloging
systems and specializing knowledge by profession.
That being said there is a point at which the catagories become so
specialized that to even understand what they are requires you to be an
expert in the field. For example the difference between algorithms and
data structures is only understandable to a programmer (yes
non-programmers can get a idea but not all the implications). When
applied to hiearictical files systems for example unless you really
understand the ins and outs of the unix philosophy it makes very little
sense why /bin, /usr/bin and /usr/local/bin are separate dirs (after
using unix for 20+ years I still don't understand the diff between /bin
and /usr/bin).
Requiring stuff be kept in some preset heirachy has among other problems
the following problems that come to mind for me:
~ 1. It is hard to make connections between different pieces of
knowledge because the hierarchy forces you to think in it's terms not
more natural terms
~ 2. Successful use requires you to get inside the head of the
person(s) who created the hierarchy and if you think differently then
they do oh well
~ 3. Unless your an expert in the system it is often harder to find
things then if the system was not used
~ 4. Stuff can easily get lost because it gets mis-cataloged
~ 5. If the system didn't plan for some major catagory it will be
crunched into a sub catagory(s) that do not make very much sense for
example under Library of Congress computer science is under math
(QA76.XXXX) but electronics is under TK510[456].XXXX
~ 6. If viewing the information under a different heiarchical system
makes it easier to understand for some applications then very
complicated mappings need to be made for example there are whole
reference books that do nothing but show side by side the Library of
Congress and Duey Decimal call numbers side by side so a reference
librarian can use either one when doing interlibrary loan
A very good example all the items above is the current ports system.
In short the more finally cut we make our categories the harder it is
guess/generate the "search key" (either a real key or metaphorically a
mental picture of one). For all the above reasons I would argue for
flatter hieracies with metahierachies overlayed for different purposes
then one typically sees today.
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