Date: Fri, 01 Oct 2004 11:34:33 +0200
To: Francis Heylighen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
From: tanguy coenen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Ecco site & DB
Hi,
This is my reply to your conversation on the ecco db and site.
First, I strongly believe content management systems, with different permission levels and a publishing workflow, are the answer to creating community spaces that allow co�peration. Many such systems have been developed in open-source GPL :
http://www.mamboserver.com
http://www.typo3.org
http://www.plone.org
I've used mambo for the ESP site and MOSI site. U can use this as an example of a document management feature as you'll find them as a plugin to other platforms, although some functionality may be different.
However, this is just a sollution to posting documents online and making them available. As there is a lot of dynamisms in the communities surrounding these products, a plugin for library management may already be available. Otherwise, it may be interesting to develop one in GPL.
As they are open-source, custom algorithms for recommender functionality can be added. If you choose to do so, I would suggest you go for Plone. This platform is based on Zope, which is written in Python. It is also the platform used by the people of OSC to build the "portfolioproject for students", so there could be some reuse of expertise. Also, Python is supposed to be faster than the other platforms, which use php/mysql. This may be an important advantage when doing lots of calculations in the application.
For matching text to documents, you might consider the Galilei software of the ULB. It's still largely untested in real environments (although it worked well in their simulations), so I think they may be willing to cooperate.
For organizing group cognition, and I think this might be what you're aiming for, I have a project in mind with a friend of mine, which would extend Plone and would be based on Topic Maps, which use the concept of semantic networks to organize information.
As with all these projects, the issue is always to find someone to do the programming. Although it could be an interesting project, I don't think I'll have the time, as I'm in the last year of my phd. However, it might be possible to motivate some assistants who just started of at our department (MOSI). Furthermore, I believe that, if we propose a common project to R&D, they may be willing to support it.
Tanguy
--
Francis Heylighen
Center "Leo Apostel"
Free University of Brussels
http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/HEYL.html
Francis Heylighen
Center "Leo Apostel"
Free University of Brussels
http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/HEYL.html
