Dinner, a show and reflection marks

Disclaimer: This is merely an exercise to improve my knowledge and gain a better understanding of dudes and dudettes, the English language and what Louis Armstrong was on (about) when he wrote, sang and maybe hummed "What a wonderful world".

Thought I'd reflect some more on online publishing. The following is also mainly based on the hard work of many craftspeople in the broadest possible sense, a lot of them ‘ordinary’ people working together, pushing the boundaries, not seldom accomplishing astonishing things. By reflecting upon a few examples of real life useful types of web pages or sets of web pages stringed together. Let’s not call those websites, because pages do not reside on one single location, much like in real life. A site is a specific location separated from other locations and that goes against the very concept of the world wide web.

Broader-ranging, less specific

I wonder if at the time of this little exercise (Stardate 2014-06-29) there are enough “hooks” in order to (modularly) split up the different components that make for a specific type of work without complication while maintaining the possibility to interchange or combine these differences to make derivatives.

The tag names, as conceived initially were/are kept short, probably to avoid tedious repetition. This in itself is of course not a shabby solution to this problem. However, the problem that arrises as a result of the abbreviating is that things start to become less obvious and actually complicate things in many ways.

I almost forgot to sneak in a bona fide "Have fun, kids" in this document. So there you go! And me too.

A few examples of types of literary works:

• fiction writing
• publication of research results
• poetry
• music authoring
• interviews
• essays
• manuals and user guides
• et cetera, baby!

In order to be able to push automation further I think we should be able to work modularly and actually think about a much broader spectrum. Just "a pinch of": Wasn't XML and by extention XHTML more or less heading in that very direction? Well... Guess some guys just like to know it all. It is no secret abstraction reduces complexity, but you damn well better make sure you don't compromise the underlying.

All you need is sense :)

1. a core set of elements that applies to every type of digital publication making use of a standard. Call it web standards, call it common, call it whatever you think know makes sense.
2. modules of specific labels (tags) to allocate specific information derived from any given publication

Yer average substantial publication

Assumption: Every publication is available for free. There are no boundaries to what it is you would want to write about, no other restrictions whatsoever. People are nice :)

Structural elements of a typical book

1. cover
2. cover 2 - usually blank
3. first page - in many cases at best a repetition of the title
4. next page - in many cases blank with at the bottom a string of characters just to mention the publisher’s name or website. There goes another forest.
5. next page - in many cases credits, copyright statements, ISBN # and (ha ha) different ISBN # for an “online” version in many cases a proprietary format such as epubs, pdfs, ebooks, etc.
6. the actual content
   • a chapter
7. maybe some kind of index
8. cover 3 - usually blank
9. backcover containing the obligatory praise, short contents and a barcode.

Transitioning from print to online publishing

Relevant elements most substantial publications have in common in the light of the transition from print to online publishing:

General Building blocks

• the/a cover of a(n existing) publication, probably very few use cases.
• publication title
• table of Contents (links? :)
• foreword, if you think it's of any value to the reader
• chapters
• index
• short contents or description

Utilitarian pieces - indicators for smaller types of specific information related to the publication

• edition (revisions / in case of a sequel / ...)
• other works by the same author
• credits