I think it's worthwhile to read these basic descriptions of TW, which I presume Jeremy wrote.
>From TiddlyWiki.com: The purpose of recording and organising information is so that it can be used again. The value of recorded information is directly proportional to the ease with which it can be re-used. The philosophy of tiddlers <http://tiddlywiki.com/#Tiddlers> is that we do this by slicing information up into the smallest semantically meaningful units with rich modelling of relationships between them<http://tiddlywiki.com/#Structuring%20TiddlyWiki>. Then we use aggregation and composition to weave the fragments together to present narrative stories. TiddlyWiki <http://tiddlywiki.com/#TiddlyWiki> aspires to provide an algebra for tiddlers, a concise way of expressing and exploring the relationships between items of information. TiddlyWiki <http://tiddlywiki.com/#TiddlyWiki> is designed to fit around your brain, helping you deal with the things that won't fit. The fundamental idea <http://tiddlywiki.com/#Philosophy%20of%20Tiddlers> is that information is more useful and reusable if we cut it up into the smallest semantically meaningful chunks – tiddlers <http://tiddlywiki.com/#Tiddlers> – and give them titles so that they can be structured<http://tiddlywiki.com/#Structuring%20TiddlyWiki> with links <http://tiddlywiki.com/#TiddlerLinks>, tags<http://tiddlywiki.com/#Tags> , lists <http://tiddlywiki.com/#ListField> and macros<http://tiddlywiki.com/#Macros>. Tiddlers use a WikiText <http://tiddlywiki.com/#WikiText> notation that concisely represents a wide range of text formatting and hypertext features. TiddlyWiki <http://tiddlywiki.com/#TiddlyWiki> aims to provide a fluid interface for working with tiddlers, allowing them to be aggregated and composed into longer narratives. People love using <http://tiddlywiki.com/#Raves> TiddlyWiki<http://tiddlywiki.com/#TiddlyWiki>. Because it can be used without any complicated server infrastructure, and because it is open source <http://tiddlywiki.com/#OpenSource>, it has bought unprecedented freedom to people to keep their precious information under their own control. TiddlyWiki <http://tiddlywiki.com/#TiddlyWiki> was originally created by JeremyRuston <http://tiddlywiki.com/#JeremyRuston> and is now a thriving open source <http://tiddlywiki.com/#OpenSource> project with a busy Community <http://tiddlywiki.com/#Community> of independent developers. TiddlyWiki is an opinionated tool, but *the opinions are in the domain of philosophy rather than of implementation, where it is infinitely customisable. * [emphasis mine] *From TWC:* A 'tiddler' is the name given to a unit of MicroContent in TiddlyWiki. Other systems have analogous concepts with more prosaic names: like "items", "entries", "entities". Even though "tiddler" is a vaguely preposterous name it at least has the virtue of being confusingly distinctive rather than confusingly generic. I love the last line ... "vaguely preposterous and confusingly distinctive." I often refer to tiddlers as stories, and I introduce our terminology to readers by saying "What I call stories or articles are known as "tiddlers" by users of TiddlyWiki." I think one of the best terms in the TW universe is the "story river." Water suggests a quality I think we want, hence the terms in our language and popular culture of *fluidity, stream* of consciousness, and maybe even the Buddhist concept of "entering the stream." Personally, I get his explanation, and I love the idea of an "algebra for ideas" (to swap that word out for "tiddlers.") That makes me think of *The Glass Bead Game* by Herman Hesse, which won the 1946 Nobel Prize for Literature. However, for the purposes of evangelizing TiddlyWiki to the masses (is that anyone's objective?), I don't know that describing our approach as algebra or rich data modeling is the first stamp which we want to put upon TiddlyWiki. I imagine that people could write literature in TiddlyWiki, and readers can revel in it like a good novel, poetry chapbook, or graphic novel (? ...think *infinite customization *as quoted above.) These readers may not care to know how or why the underlying technology works. I think TW could also serve as an interactive textbook or teaching tool. But those who are interested should be able to "peel back" a few layers and see the guts of the process, to whatever level their curiosity takes them. I do think we should promote the philosophy described above to the audience who appreciates it. I just hesitate quoting it directly or linking to it for an audience interested in the *content* I publish on TW. They just need to get around the wiki, and be able to search and explore easily. We should put some effort into writing for them. Maybe someone has already made such an attempt? Any thoughts? -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TiddlyWiki" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/tiddlywiki. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
