Linkage Objects

On Linkages, not just Links ThinkingOutLoud.DonaldNoyes.200903272038

While ThinkingVisually?, one may see the possibility of LinkageObjects. It is easy enough to visualize a linking mechanism that connects a page to another page, but extend that vision to an object that links to a whole series of pages, organized around a schema. An obvious candidate which appears in almost all wikis is LinkageObjects of the wiki that presents what we call BackLinks.

BackLinks is usually formed to present an Unordered Linkage of Objects. The common characteristic being that each item in the list points to a referenced page.

Visualize with me another type which lists other relationships to a referenced page which are PatternLinks?. Let us take for example a pattern of linkage which we will call "LocaleLinks?". It might be represented in a Visual LinkageObject? I term a LinkageChain?. It uses what appears as a series of links in a visually connected string of links which are distinguished by using placement around a center, such that one can "visualize" and associate it because of its appearance.

My first idea along this line was presented yesterday as the SpecialLinkingPresentationFormat. It uses the visual mechanism of subscripts and superscripts positioned about the central object (page). The surrounding sub and superscripts all represent associative links to the central object. The relationship can be visualized easily, especially if their link names have been well-chosen.

While the example given uses HyperLinkWords? as the link, there is no reason that appropriate images, icons, well or standardized placements of linking objects could not be used as LinkageObjects. (as on this page the PageName at upper left corner demonstrates. (it causes the WikiEngine to initiate a search and then presents the BackLinks for this page in a clickable list. Or another where clicking on the date at the bottom of this page performs another action (that of showing the changes made in the current version of the page by the last modifier.)