wwn,tyrf,gbg,zz,c.rel,spi: Modularities and overlaps more

[Ted Nelson <ted@xxxxxxxxxx>]

I'm writing a piece now that could be intermediate for
 explaining ZigZag.

Summary--
THE SOFTWARE EVERYONE ALWAYS NEEDED

Computer traditions have prevented tekkies from understanding
 what ordinary people need; and ordinary people have believed
 the tekkies when they said "it has to be this way".

The principal problem has been the tradition of lump files in fixed
 locations.  All developments have been assimilated to this model.

Actually, everyone lives in a cloud of Items-- a STORM of items--
 memoranda, names and addresses, appointments, obligations,
 things to do, things to buy, things to have fixed, payments to make,
 transactions, things to say to people, phrases to put into writings,
 etc.  These items are given to us, occur to us, or need notation,
 at random times and in random places-- meetings, trips, phone calls,
 waking up in the middle of the night, walking down the street.

Computer software has been build around aggregating these items
 into lump structures called "databases", "contact managers",
 "spreadsheets", 

An item which is needed in two places must be "copied" and "updated".

What most people have always needed is an operating system--
 that is, an environment with a unifying conceptual structure--
 among which these items may be poured freely.

I will tentatively call this an Item-Storm Operating system.
 ("Item-Based" would sound too much like IBM.)

The unit of storage in such a system should not be the File,
 but the item itself.

Rather than an "application" married to a file, we should have
 "applitudes", which use subsets of the item storm.  These
 subsets should be able to overlap freely-- visible item reusability.

- - - - Okay, now about ZigZag--

The ZigZag concept goes one level lower, positing a minimal
 data unit which we call a Cell, or zzcell.

User-significant units, or Items, are built up from zzcells.

In all other respects, the ZigZag model is intended as the nucleus
 of an ItemStorm operating system-- a fluid and visibly repusable
 structure for all computer operation.

Finally, the Floating World design is a shell over ZigZag
 which combines zigzag structure of Items, multidimeinsional
 visualization, and the Xanadu (xu88) fluid-media model--
in other words, an ItemStorm operating system for item
 reusability and deep connection, media reusability and deep
 connection, and multidimensional visualization.


_________________________________________
Theodor Holm Nelson              
Project Professor, Keio University SFC Campus, Fujisawa, Japan
Visiting Professor, University of Southampton, England
 ?  e-mail: ted@xxxxxxxxxx   ?  world-wide fax 1/415/332-0136
 ?  http://www.sfc.keio.ac.jp/~ted/    ?  http://www.xanadu.net
 ? Coordinates in USA      Tel. 415/ 331-4422
  Project Xanadu, 3020 Bridgeway #295, Sausalito CA 94965
_________________________________________