seeking

Hey folks– I’m seeking examples of two things: One: good info-diagrams that explain how a service or site […]

Hey folks– I’m seeking examples of two things:

One: good info-diagrams that explain how a service or site works. pay my bills used to have one, but they’ve gone text.

Two: good examples of category managers. I’d love to see good web-based GUI’s that allow users to put things in multiple categories, add categories, manage taxonomies, etc. any hints?

thanks!

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  1. 1
    Alex Shapiro

    Hi Christina,

    Well, as usual I am jumping the gun and promoting an unfinished product, but I just can’t resist the opportunity to plug my wares.

    Here are some examples of a java-based app I’ve been working on that seems to fit most of the criteria of point 2.

    http://www.touchgraph.com/browser/LinkBrowser.html
    Take a look at the edit feature, activatable by clicking the edit radio button. When in edit mode you can select a node, and then click and drag away from it to add new nodes. Further instructions are available from the link in the top frame.

    http://www.memes.net Takes a real long time to load, you might have to refresh your browser. When there click on the Launch TouchGraph Sitemap link in the top right hand corner and wait for the applet to load (this also takes a really long time) Afterwards though, you can see how you can use TG to browse really large databases. (Click nodes to browse)

    A prettier though less taxonomical demo is available off http://www.langreiter.com/space/TouchGraph Click the graph link at the top right hand corner to see. This requires the java 1.3.1 plugin which sometimes fails to install with I.E. , so for a screen you can just take a look at: http://www.touchgraph.com/Langreiter_TG.jpg Here the thing to do is double click + right click on nodes to get the full range of features.

    Hope that this wasn’t too far off from what you were looking for.

    –Alex

    PS: I just tried the spell checker, and it kicks ass (though this being the first time that I’ve used it I did feel pretty anxious about loosing my post)

  2. 2
    Jared Spool

    Check out XPlane, particularly their examples for Wired and Flonet. I’ve always been impressed with their info-diagrams. (I first saw their work in Business 2.0 magazine.)

    Also, I don’t know if you’d call it a good category editor, but you might want to check out eBay’s seller screens. (I may just not understand what you are looking for. If so, ignore my recommendations.)

    Jared

  3. 3
    christina

    Alex– if you use IE on a peecee, try doing a ctl-shift-a. You’ll get a popup that will write a link for you. ctl-shift i and b are also useful.

    Jared– you aren’t the only one who has suggested ebay. I’ll have to check it out.

    Keep ’em coming. I’ve got posts on CHI-WEB and SIGIA, so I’ll be posting a big summary when I’m done.

    I’m looking for tools that let you create categories, keywords and/or taxonomies, and put items in them (such as bookmarks, photos, etc)

  4. 4
    christina

    an email from madonna lisa gonzales chan (damn I love that girl’s name)

    Strangely enough…i found a ton of stuff…

    tip: many of the tools are marketed using “thesaurus” and not necessarily
    taxonomy

    as for Tools
    MultiTes(my group is using this)
    Synaptica(we are evaluating this currently….
    TermTree showed up in our evaluation list
    WebChoir(TermChoir) famous Jessica Milstead used this to craft the ASIST
    thesaurus…

    and then I came across the american society of indexers. they had a ton of
    thesaurus links.

    and my favorite site for reviewing tools for building and editing
    thesaurus(taxonomy)

    InfoVisualization tools to enhance display
    Inxight
    Web Brain
    Webmap
    Omen Inc
    Aureka Themescape
    antari.ca(visual net)
    thinkmap

    auto-class tools to build one over a large data set
    Knowledge Computing Corp
    Factiva
    Semio
    Kanisa
    Quiver
    Sageware
    Ejemoni(H5 Technologies)
    Metacode(Interwoven acquired)
    ActiveNavigation
    Purple Yogi
    Newedge

    Stuff on the topic:

    http://www.visualthesaurus.com/

    I think the subject you are interested is also called knowledge
    representation in the information retrieval world. Here is my annotated list
    of pointers to get you started. Am probably going to post this on
    http://iaslash.org as well. -Michael

    BOOKS AND PAPERS ON KNOWLEDGE REPRESENTATION

    Explorations in Indexing & Abstracting: Pointing, Virtue & Power. Brian
    O’Connor

    Abstract: Draws on intellectual resources from information theory to MTV to
    discuss challenges to the indexing and abstracting field posed by the
    information and technology explosion, and presents alternatives for
    abstracting and indexing information so that users can actually find it.
    Looks at the shortcomings of traditional systems, and uses exercises and
    case studies to demonstrate the elements of a patron- specific system.
    — This is an short, but excellent book discussing the intellectual work of
    representing knowledge, the core activitiy in indexing for information
    retrieval.

    Guidelines for Indexes and Related Information Retrieval Devices (NISO
    TR-02-1997). James D. Anderson

    Abstract: This new NISO Technical Report provides expert guidance on
    designing indexes for every kind of document. Coverage includes automatic
    indexing and indexing based on intellectual analysis and the use of
    controlled vocabularies. A comprehensive glossary of indexing terms is
    provided and recommended introductory text for print and back-of-the-book
    indexes, database indexes, computer produced indexes, and electronic search
    indexes are given.
    — The PDF is available for download. Jim is also working on a book at
    present on the topic of knowledge representation. I used a draft of his
    forthcoming book to prepare a paper on indexing art images. The NISO report
    was a precursor and the JASIS article below were precursors to the
    forthcoming book.

    Journal of the American Society for Information Science, Vol. 45 Number 8
    1994.
    — Special issue on indexing. Also search through JASIS for indexing
    articles in the journal and in conference proceedings if you have access on
    the ASIS site. Or go to
    your University Library to search journals.

    Most articles by Brian O’Connor, Jim Anderson, James Turner and Dagobert
    Soergel are relevant. Also, a great selection of books available from NISO
    http://www.techstreet.com/nisogate.html (search for “indexing”).

    RELATED WHITE PAPERS ON KNOWLEDGE REPRESENTATION

    NewsEdge white paper: Taxonomies: The Value of Organized Business Knowledge

    CISCO white paper: Building a Web Vocabulary

    ACIA white paper: Extracting Value from Automated Classification Tools

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