[pmwiki-users] "Paths are formulas" v.s. hiearchical groups etc

christian.ridderstrom at gmail.com christian.ridderstrom at gmail.com
Mon Sep 11 12:53:15 CDT 2006


Here's an interesting text I picked up while reading about FUSE 
(filesystem in userspace). It is similar to some ideas I've had about how 
the "path" to a wiki page maybe should be something else, something more 
like a search query. 

At http://fuse.sourceforge.net/wiki/index.php/LfsDetails you'll find this 
text about something they call the "Logic File System":

  Information systems give means for organising, retrieving and 
  manipulating information. ... To search for files, traditional 
  information systems like file systems, and the web with its search 
  engines provide either navigation or query but do not allow to combine 
  them. On the one hand navigation is intuitive and progressive but it 
  implies a rigid and single classification of data. On the other hand 
  query brings flexibility and expressivity but lacks the advantages of 
  navigation. To make it easy to manipulate the contents of those files, 
  those systems come with separate tools which suffer too from the same 
  limitation. We propose a new paradigm for information system: "Logic 
  File System" (LFS), that offers expressive organisation, retrieval 
  combining both query and navigation, and ease of manipulation of both 
  files and contents of files in an integrated way at the file system 
  level.

  To achieve this integration, this paradigm associates logical properties 
  to files and parts of file, and logical deduction serves as a basis for 
  navigation and querying. "Paths are formulas", directories represent 
  queries and determine set of files and parts of file whose description 
  satisfies the formula. The root directory represents the formula "true", 
  and sub-directories of a directory are determined by the most general 
  properties refining the query, hence combining navigation and query. 
  File contents are determined by those parts of the original file that 
  satisfy the formula. This permits simultaneous read and write accesses 
  to different "views" on a file, in order to help in separating a user's 
  concerns. Properties can be attached to information manually by the user 
  and automatically via programs called "transducers", and can be ordered 
  manually by the user to form taxonomies or automatically via logic 
  deduction engines. Users can dynamically extend the system by providing 
  their own logic deduction engines and transducers.

I'm just hoping this will bring inspiration to others on this list. As for 
the LFS discussed above, I have no idea about its actual status and if it 
is really usable in practice... Anyway, by posting it to the list I'll 
know where to find this information if I need it again :-)

/Christian

-- 
Christian Ridderström, +46-8-768 39 44               http://www.md.kth.se/~chr


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