Thoughts About Relationships In General (Some Practical Stuff Too?)
There are two kinds of links -- explicit and implicit.
To illustrate the difference, we'll use two imaginary pages -- MythologicalCreatures (page A) and GiantCentaurs (page B).
Here is the content of both pages
Page A: MythologicalCreatures There are many kinds of mythological creatures. They have been discussed in many stories. You may catch them in your dreams sometimes...
Page B: GiantCentaurs This is one class of many MythologicalCreatures. They have the upper-body of a man, but their legs have been replaced with a horse's body!
Page A does not contain a reference to Page B. At this point, there are no links whatsoever.
However, when Page B is created, an explicit link is formed between Page B and A. There is no question that the author intends to link directly to the page about MythologicalCreatures.
What about the flipside, though? What kind of link is established from Page A to Page B?
Despite Page B's existence, Page A still doesn't make an explicit reference to it. In this instance, Page A has an implicit link to Page B, since Page B is linking to Page A explicitly.
However, what if the author of Page B decided to remove the reference to Page A?
Page B: GiantCentaurs Centaurs have the upper-body of a man, but their legs have been replaced with a horse's body!
The explicit link from Page B to Page A has been removed, so the implicit link from Page A to Page B is also broken.
What if both pages mention each other? Like this...
Page A: MythologicalCreatures There are many kinds of mythological creatures. They have been discussed in many stories. You may catch them in your dreams sometimes. For instance, you might encounter the GiantCentaurs.
Page B: GiantCentaurs This is one class of many MythologicalCreatures. They have the upper-body of a man, but their legs have been replaced with a horse's body!
Now it appears we have two explicit links. Page A links to Page B explicitly and vice versa. But are there still implicit links? Yes! There are still implicit links.
Even if Page A removed the direct reference to Page B, thus breaking the explicit link to Page B, it would still be linked implicitly, since Page B still has an explicit link to Page A.
This may seem mildly confusing and not very useful, but it does come in handy when we're trying to manage a bunch of links. After all, how can we manage a process if we don't understand how it works?
That is an important point to consider -- link management is an on-going, never-ending process. It's not a one-time only job.
Why is this? Information that relates to existing information is always being produced. It may be the case that the newly-produced information breaks some old way of thinking or establishes a need for a new type of vocabulary. So if the classification system doesn't allow for rapid expansion and redefinition, the system as a whole will eventually die out.
Theory: Information must eat relationships in order to produce offspring. If it doesn't have a steady supply of nutritious food, it either wastes away or goes looking in the nearest trash can.
Some people say that there is no such thing as a hierarchy in true hypertext systems, but how can that be when the very root of language is a hierarchical structure?
What is a letter without a word, a word without a sentence, a sentence without a paragraph, and a paragraph without a page?
Both parent and child are found within the bounds of a word. This brings to mind a passage from the book of John -- "I and my Father are one." (John 10:30)
DennyShimkoski
