On Apr 13, 2014, at 22:54, Christiaan Hofman <cmhof...@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Apr 13, 2014, at 19:51, Colin A. Smith wrote: > >> The point of view is more clear you preserve the order of the elements in >> the search query and make a sentence by prepending "Show me articles": >> >> Show me articles CITED BY WOS:XXXXX >> Show me articles CITING WOS:XXXXX >> >> Perhaps there’s a way to preserve the order of the elements and make a >> sentence that implies the other point of view, but I don’t think that’s >> possible without adding intervening words. The equals sign does make things >> more ambiguous, because there aren’t nouns, like “PARENT” or “CHILD”, that >> describe relationships between papers without conjugation or prepositions. > > Auch, that sounds like AppleScript. And that's a horror, we should not come > close to this. The point is not to write sensible questions. the point is to > efficiently write search terms. This is something that you potential do a > lot. That's why being succinct is not just good, but really important. It's > exactly why the old form is so very bad. The other search terms are also not > like "AUTHOR=xxx", but "AU=xxx". It has to be unambiguous (in terms of the > definitions), not necessarily all sensible English. I totally agree that we should not be trying to be like AppleScript. I think AppleScript goes wrong because its syntax is too much like English sentence fragments and not nearly enough structured shorthand. I do however believe that most people codify their ideas in (in)complete sentences. "SO=Science" can easily be transcribed into “source equals Science”, which makes it mentally easier to go in the reverse direction. >>> I don't get this confusion when I think of it in terms of "references" and >>> "citations". And "ref" and "cit" are actually very common shorthands for >>> those terms. >> >> >> You might hate the idea, but one way to resolve this would be to have two >> terms for each operation, REF/CITEDBY for citedReferences and CIT/CITING for >> citingArticles. >> >> Cheers, >> >> Colin > > > I think that's unnecessary, it only confuses things. Why remember two things, > when one is sufficient? the thing I like about REF and CIT is not that they > so much that they are super clear, I think that's not so irrelevant, but > rather that they're distinct and succinct, so efficient. For instance I think > CITEDBY and CITING look too much alike, so they get more easily confused, and > that's bad for its purpose. In the end you just have to remember what the > term is anyway, so better have a clear difference. the actual meaning is not > so important, what is important is that you can attach some meaning to it, > just to remember it. Again, it would be very helpful if you could further explain the actual meaning that you are attaching to the terms REF (reference) and CIT (citation), because I don’t follow you there. Cheers, Colin ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Learn Graph Databases - Download FREE O'Reilly Book "Graph Databases" is the definitive new guide to graph databases and their applications. Written by three acclaimed leaders in the field, this first edition is now available. Download your free book today! http://p.sf.net/sfu/NeoTech _______________________________________________ Bibdesk-develop mailing list Bibdesk-develop@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/bibdesk-develop
