Archive for June, 2002
June 30, 2002
Newfound Blogs
Found a couple of interesting, new-to-me, weblogs this morning:
Column Two by James Robertson. The blog is primarily about KM and Content Management. Australia seems to be a real hotbed for this kind of stuff.
Bloug by Lou Rosenfeld of Information Architecture for the World Wide Web fame. He writes about IA, oddly enough. He also flags any narcissisitic posts with a hot dog.
Speaking of narcissism, I found Column Two by following a referral link back to his site. I’m addicted to parsing my referral logs. C2 then led me to Bloug.
Permanent Link | Subscribe via RSS | Subscribe via Email | Comment
June 30, 2002
Content Inventory Article and Spreadsheet
This essay by Jeff Veen (found via Column Two) provides a method with which to catalogue the static html files of a site in preparation for converting to a content management system. The article also includes a download of the spreadsheet, which is handy.
Here is an important bit to read to yourself several times before embarking on this kind of project:
After you’ve filled in a couple hundred lines of the spreadsheet, you’ll inevitably start to wonder if there is something - anything! - that can speed this process up. Surely technology can come to the rescue. Sorry. The best we’ve been able to do is enlist the help of a programmer to write us a script that will crawl a Web site and spit out the URLs it finds. And that merely ensures that we don’t miss any pages. Even with this head start, we always go through the pages by hand. A content inventory is a decidedly human task. In fact, we find that the process can often be as valuable as the final spreadsheet. If you invest the time in scouring your Web site and deconstructing every page (or at least a good selection of pages), you will end up as the uncontested expert in how it all goes together. And that’s invaluable knowledge to possess when redesigning your site.
That matches our experience when we went through this process during our conversion from static files to a database-driven CMS. It was long and tedious but you really know your content afterwards.
The spreadsheet we developed for our project also included some rows that we used for mapping the existing content to a new location since we had redesigned our overall site structure during the conversion.
Permanent Link | Subscribe via RSS | Subscribe via Email | Comment
June 29, 2002
Hyperreferencing
Found this link (via a Wired article on NPR’s linking policy) to some writing Tim Berners-Lee did about the nature of links:
Normal hypertext links do not of themselves imply that the document linked to is part of, is endorsed by, or endorses, or has related ownership or distribution terms as the document linked from.
So why call it a link? I wonder if this tendancy for the unclued to imply copyright violation or some other tangible impact by hyperlinking comes from the very word itself. To link, in the traditional sense, implies some physical connection or tie. From my copy of Websters:
link vt: To couple or connect by or as if by a link.
If hyperlinks had been called hyperreferences (which is what they are) from the start perhaps the widespread misunderstanding about the nature of linking would be a little less pervasive.
Permanent Link | Subscribe via RSS | Subscribe via Email | Comment
June 29, 2002
Down the Klog Rabbit Hole
From Paul Holbrook’s Radio Weblog:
Down the rabbit hole of blogging …
Sometimes following other people’s blogs is like talking to someone who won’t shut up: you ask one question, and you’re in for a 15 minute answer. Well, it’s a little like that, except it’s not: it’s a lot more interesting. Case in point: I pulled a little piece out of my news aggregator this morning on a k-log pilot experiment, and many hours later, I’m left with a pile on interesting pages scattered around my screen that I’m trying to make sense of. (I can’t even remember where I found the reference to the k-log item; it’s already gone from my aggregator.)
I got turned on to the whole weblog/klog thing after a few experiences like the above. Knowing that I helped someone else tumble down a rabbit hole is very gratifying.
Alice down the rabbit-hole is a great analogy for a multi-hour klog clicking session:
In another moment down went Alice after it, never once considering how in the world she was to get out again.
The rabbit-hole went straight on like a tunnel for some way, and then dipped suddenly down, so suddenly that Alice had not a moment to think about stopping herself before she found herself falling down a very deep well.
Either the well was very deep, or she fell very slowly, for she had plenty of time as she went down to look about her and to wonder what was going to happen next. First, she tried to look down and make out what she was coming to, but it was too dark to see anything; then she looked at the sides of the well, and noticed that they were filled with cupboards and book-shelves; here and there she saw maps and pictures hung upon pegs. She took down a jar from one of the shelves as she passed; it was labelled `ORANGE MARMALADE’, but to her great disappointment it was empty: she did not like to drop the jar for fear of killing somebody, so managed to put it into one of the cupboards as she fell past it.
Permanent Link | Subscribe via RSS | Subscribe via Email | Comment
June 28, 2002
Testing a Self Ping
High Context. Does it show up in the TrackBack list?
Permanent Link | Subscribe via RSS | Subscribe via Email | One Comment
June 28, 2002
TrackBacking? TrackingBack?
Testing out a ping on TrackBack Development: Example of TrackBack threading.
Permanent Link | Subscribe via RSS | Subscribe via Email | 2 Comments
June 28, 2002
More Trackback
Trackback does enable category-based auto pings according to the documentation:
You can use TrackBack for more than just communication on particular entries, however. You can also associate TrackBack pings URLs with categories in your blog. Whenever you post an entry to that category, the URLs you have associated will automatically be notified of your post. This allows remote sites to keep a repository of references to posts all around the web.
Excellent.
Permanent Link | Subscribe via RSS | Subscribe via Email | Comment
June 28, 2002
Using MT TrackBack for Cross-functional Team Blogs
Just yesterday Glen and I were talking about what balance to strike between multi-author weblogs and individual weblogs on our intranet. I think that eventually we would evolve our blogs on the intranet to single-author but enable some way to port or otherwise indicate certain of their posts for diffferent teams the writer might be on. We use MovableType and had not yet come up with an elegant way to do this that still met our needs (it is partially a taxonomy challenge, of course!).
The new MT TrackBack might fit the bill:
Multiple “authors” without author accounts
Say you want to have your readers contribute to your blog, but do not want to add them as an author; either because you want to limit the number of authors or you don’t want the work of having to add new people each time someone wants to post something interesting. Or, you may not want their posts to “weigh” as much as your official set of multiple authors.
With TrackBack, you can set up a section of your site to receive pings.
Kristine, one of our beta-testers, used her site, The Red Kitchen, as an example:
“If I had a category named ‘Red Kitchen Guests’ and allowed pings to it… then anyone with an MT blog could post a recipe on their page and ping my guest category. Then it could automatically list a ping link and excerpt on the Guest category page.”
With this we could set up team weblogs that just gather TalkBack pings from team members who are writing klog entries. Ideally I would like for individual writers to set one or more of their categories to auto-ping relevant team klogs when a new entry of that category is posted. I’m not sure that TalkBack supports category auto-pinging right now but maybe we could do it somehow via category templates.
I’m looking forward to experimenting with this.
Permanent Link | Subscribe via RSS | Subscribe via Email | Comment
June 28, 2002
Congrats to Our Team
The ASHA web site was given 4 awards last night at the Society of National Association Publications Excel Awards program.
We received a silver for our members-only area and 3 bronzes for online house advertising, editorial content, and overall design excellence.
Congratulations and thank you to Amy, Glen, Margaret, Nancy and Tule!
Permanent Link | Subscribe via RSS | Subscribe via Email | Comment
June 27, 2002
Phil Wolff: Klogging vs. the 11 Deadly KM Sins
Klogging vs. the 11 Deadly KM Sins.How does klogging avoid the quagmire?
1. Not developing a working definition of knowledge
The best exercise is the one you do. The same is true for KM tools and practices.
People klog.
It’s easier to edit than write. The best way to define knowledge is to start from experience; klogging gives you that experience. More data points loosely scattered.
2. Emphasizing knowledge stock to the detriment of knowledge flow
Klogging is all about flow.
Freshness, updates, syndication, aggregation, linking. Part and parcel.
3. Viewing knowledge as existing predominantly outside the heads of individuals
Klogging is conversational. Content-rich klogs help you find the right people to chime in on a question.
4. Not understanding that a fundamental intermediate purpose of managing knowledge is to create shared context
Klogging illuminates context.
Context of time.
Of geography.
Of social connection.
Of topic.
By reading your colleague’s klogs, you crawl inside a little of their day.
Almost as fun as being John Malkovich
5. Paying little heed to the role and importance of tacit knowledge
Klogging creates a tacit source.
I may not be conscious of documenting my knowledge. I may just be telling the story of an encounter with a customer, a staff meeting, a thorny problem.
It is there, or clues to it, just the same.
6. Disentangling knowledge from its uses
Klogging puts knowledge in context. Expose the experience of applying knowledge by klogging your After Action Reviews.
7. Downplaying thinking and reasoning
Klogs’ conversational nature encourages people to share their train of thought and explain their conclusions.
8. Focusing on the past and the present and not on the future
Klogging won’t help, yet. Unless you klog your plans, visions, scenarios, coming events, trends…
9. Failing to recognize the importance of experimentation
Can’t help you there. You either reward the effort so people try new things, or you don’t.
10. Substituting technological contact for human interface
Klogging complements face time. That which can be electronically mediated, is. That which needs real space (decisions, brainstorming, bonding) gets it.
If you are a virtual team, widely dispersed, klogs augment conference calls and email.
11. Seeking to develop direct measures of knowledge
Nike: “Just Do It.”
The U.S.M.M.A motto: “Acta non verba” (action, not talk)
Forest Gump: “Knowledge is as Knowledge does.”
You can measure klogging. Operational health, user activity. Hits, posts, by user, by category.
But klogging is not about chunking knowledge (although “the post” is almost an atomic expression of an idea).
Real knowledge is created by multiple authors, in multiple posts, over time. Klogging tools help you uncover the threads that tie them together.
The indirect measures are most important: Improvement in sales, cost containment, employee satisfaction, customer satisfaction, speed, quality.
Permanent Link | Subscribe via RSS | Subscribe via Email | Comment
Copyright © 2008 High Context Consulting
Privacy Policy: HCC will never share your information with anyone without your permission.