I would like to propose interpreting stages of understanding in
terms of user's knowledge of the virtues/vices of two
approaches to relating things in our search and re-search as we
stumble toward knowledge. The two approaches I have in mind are
formal (structured/classified) and informal
(unstructured/associative). Starting with informal approaches,
and moving in the formal direction, relevant behaviors include:
- naming documents, including
colon-type or slash-type naming conventions;
- putting documents in piles (e.g.,
documents on a desktop, or a
computer desktop) tagging objects;
- tagging a document (this used to be
possible in MS Word, but I
can't find it in my latest version.) grouping tags (by
association);
- tagging a group of documents with
the same tag;
- putting a group of documents into a
"folder" with a name;
- creating a group of tags (which are
associated with a disparate set
of documents);
- defining tags in terms of the kind
of document they are used to
identify (classificatory or associative)
- naming a group of tags;
- defining tag group names
(associative or classificatory)
- tagging words (relating words
semantically) .... this is the stage
I'm working on with the Wordsmyth personal thesaurus for
tagging associations among words that are part of someone's
personal background or personal interest.
- defining semantic relations among
word meanings (associative or
classificatory) And then ...
- finding things that are named by
related words
And finally ...
I think the best use case for Topic Maps would be to hide
most of these activities and wrap them into a smooth path from
naming documents to finding them by association among the words
used in the document title.