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ZigZag is a data model, invented by Ted Nelson, that deconstructs the spreadsheet to allow irregular relations, at the same time generalizing the idea to multiple dimensions.
The design is centered on an information structure called a zzstructure and its interactive visualizations. Instead of conventional linear text or tree structures, zzstructure is a multidimensional extension of a spreadsheet whose cells can contain various kinds of data.
Whereas conventional spreadsheet software requires a rectangle of equal-length rows, the ZigZag model holds arbitrary structures of cells—as long as they are orthogonally connected (left edge to right edge, top edge to bottom, and so on in as many dimensions as desired).
At any moment, the display shows any two dimensions in table form, but only existing cells are shown—what would be empty space on a spreadsheet simply does not exist. Users can pivot the display about any cell to efficiently "rotate" any unseen dimension in place of either visible one, allowing them to browse high dimensional grids in a zigzag manner.
Each cell may have at most one positive connection and one negative connection in any dimension. The user may step freely from a cell to any adjacent cell in a selected dimension. Each node exists on all dimensions, though it may or may not be connected to anything in that dimension.
Nelson calls this structure "hyperthogonal". He personally retains the ZigZag® trademark, the idea being that a user can zig and zag through structures in multiple dimensions.
Nelson tells the origin of the idea in his autobiography, POSSIPLEX. [1] The idea came to Nelson in 1981 in the following form: "Going rightward and downward might not necessarily get you to the same place as going downward and rightward." At that time Nelson was working at Datapoint in San Antonio, Texas. Since employees are generally required to report new software concepts to their employer, Nelson told his supervisor, Klavs Landberg. Landberg's reaction was "Get out of here with your crazy ideas." Nelson took this as permission to develop the idea independently.
The first prototype consisting of two character-graphical views was implemented as a Perl module by Andrew Pam in 1997.[ citation needed ] From 2000 to 2003, a free software project GZigZag (later Gzz) developed another prototype with more views and other conventions, [2] but Ted Nelson stopped supporting it. [3] The underlying zzStructure was a patented technology ( U.S. patent 6,262,736 ). The patent expired on May 5, 2019. The Gzz prototype is available at xanadu.com/zigzag.
Nelson's basic demo video [4] shows how a person may be given a name, title, date of birth, spouse and children. This generalizes to a family-tree view.
Adam Moore, while at the University of Nottingham, used the GzigZag prototype to demonstrate an animated demonstration of biochemistry in a video. [5]
Since hyperthogonal structure is abstract, it can in principle be used for anything—data, visualization, programing, animation.
- Data and visualization: The data structures in the standard demo (marriage and children) become a visualization (a family tree, explorable, from Queen Elizabeth II, up to Queen Victoria).
- programming: Various abstractions have been posited to use ZigZag as a programming system, some of which were in Andrew Pam's 1996 prototype.
- text editing: Text editing was in the Azz prototype and is also possible in the Gzz package, though it is not emphasized.
Hypertext is text displayed on a computer display or other electronic devices with references (hyperlinks) to other text that the reader can immediately access. Hypertext documents are interconnected by hyperlinks, which are typically activated by a mouse click, keypress set, or screen touch. Apart from text, the term "hypertext" is also sometimes used to describe tables, images, and other presentational content formats with integrated hyperlinks. Hypertext is one of the key underlying concepts of the World Wide Web, where Web pages are often written in the Hypertext Markup Language (HTML). As implemented on the Web, hypertext enables the easy-to-use publication of information over the Internet.
In computer science, transclusion is the inclusion of part or all of an electronic document into one or more other documents by reference via hypertext. Transclusion is usually performed when the referencing document is displayed, and is normally automatic and transparent to the end user. The result of transclusion is a single integrated document made of parts assembled dynamically from separate sources, possibly stored on different computers in disparate places.
A spreadsheet is a computer application for computation, organization, analysis and storage of data in tabular form. Spreadsheets were developed as computerized analogs of paper accounting worksheets. The program operates on data entered in cells of a table. Each cell may contain either numeric or text data, or the results of formulas that automatically calculate and display a value based on the contents of other cells. The term spreadsheet may also refer to one such electronic document.
Theodor Holm Nelson is an American pioneer of information technology, philosopher, and sociologist. He coined the terms hypertext and hypermedia in 1963 and published them in 1965. According to a 1997 Forbes profile, Nelson "sees himself as a literary romantic, like a Cyrano de Bergerac, or 'the Orson Welles of software'."
In computing, a hyperlink, or simply a link, is a digital reference to data that the user can follow or be guided to by clicking or tapping. A hyperlink points to a whole document or to a specific element within a document. Hypertext is text with hyperlinks. The text that is linked from is known as anchor text. A software system that is used for viewing and creating hypertext is a hypertext system, and to create a hyperlink is to hyperlink. A user following hyperlinks is said to navigate or browse the hypertext.
Lotus Improv is a discontinued spreadsheet program from Lotus Development released in 1991 for the NeXTSTEP platform and then for Windows 3.1 in 1993. Development was put on hiatus in 1994 after slow sales on the Windows platform, and officially ended in April 1996 after Lotus was purchased by IBM.
Project Xanadu was the first hypertext project, founded in 1960 by Ted Nelson. Administrators of Project Xanadu have declared it superior to the World Wide Web, with the mission statement: "Today's popular software simulates paper. The World Wide Web trivialises our original hypertext model with one-way ever-breaking links and no management of version or contents."
Hypermedia, an extension of the term hypertext, is a nonlinear medium of information that includes graphics, audio, video, plain text and hyperlinks. This designation contrasts with the broader term multimedia, which may include non-interactive linear presentations as well as hypermedia. It is also related to the field of electronic literature. The term was first used in a 1965 article written by Ted Nelson.
A table is an arrangement of information or data, typically in rows and columns, or possibly in a more complex structure. Tables are widely used in communication, research, and data analysis. Tables appear in print media, handwritten notes, computer software, architectural ornamentation, traffic signs, and many other places. The precise conventions and terminology for describing tables vary depending on the context. Further, tables differ significantly in variety, structure, flexibility, notation, representation and use. Information or data conveyed in table form is said to be in tabular format. In books and technical articles, tables are typically presented apart from the main text in numbered and captioned floating blocks.
Solid modeling is a consistent set of principles for mathematical and computer modeling of three-dimensional shapes (solids). Solid modeling is distinguished within the broader related areas of geometric modeling and computer graphics, such as 3D modeling, by its emphasis on physical fidelity. Together, the principles of geometric and solid modeling form the foundation of 3D-computer-aided design and in general support the creation, exchange, visualization, animation, interrogation, and annotation of digital models of physical objects.
In mathematics, a regular polytope is a polytope whose symmetry group acts transitively on its flags, thus giving it the highest degree of symmetry. In particular, all its elements or j-faces — cells, faces and so on — are also transitive on the symmetries of the polytope, and are themselves regular polytopes of dimension j≤ n.
Essbase is a multidimensional database management system (MDBMS) that provides a platform upon which to build analytic applications. Essbase began as a product from Arbor Software, which merged with Hyperion Software in 1998. Oracle Corporation acquired Hyperion Solutions Corporation in 2007. Until late 2005 IBM also marketed an OEM version of Essbase as DB2 OLAP Server.
In computer programming contexts, a data cube is a multi-dimensional ("n-D") array of values. Typically, the term data cube is applied in contexts where these arrays are massively larger than the hosting computer's main memory; examples include multi-terabyte/petabyte data warehouses and time series of image data.
Zigzag is a jagged, regular pattern.
A split-rail fence, log fence, or buck-and-rail fence is a type of fence constructed in the United States and Canada, and is made out of timber logs, usually split lengthwise into rails and typically used for agricultural or decorative fencing. Such fences require much more timber than other types of fences, and so are generally only common in areas where wood is abundant.
Roger Everett Gregory is a US computer programmer, technologist, and scientist. Gregory's work in project Xanadu made him one of the earliest pioneers of hypertext technology, which helped lay the foundations for the hyperlink technology that underlies the World Wide Web. Gregory attended the University of Michigan as a mathematics major. In the 1970s, he founded the Ann Arbor Computer Club, similar to the West Coast's Home Brew Computer Club.
Hyperland is a 50-minute-long documentary film about hypertext and surrounding technologies. It was written by Douglas Adams and produced and directed by Max Whitby for BBC Two in 1990. It stars Douglas Adams as a computer user and Tom Baker, with whom Adams had already worked on Doctor Who, as a personification of a software agent.
In geometry, a skew polygon is a polygon whose vertices are not all coplanar. Skew polygons must have at least four vertices. The interior surface of such a polygon is not uniquely defined.
Enfilades are a class of tree data structures invented by computer scientist Ted Nelson and used in Project Xanadu "Green" designs of the 1970s and 1980s. Enfilades allow quick editing, versioning, retrieval and inter-comparison operations in a large, cross-linked hypertext database. The Xanadu "Gold" design starting in the 1990s used a related data structure called the Ent.
Hypertext is text displayed on a computer or other electronic device with references (hyperlinks) to other text that the reader can immediately access, usually by a mouse click or keypress sequence. Early conceptions of hypertext defined it as text that could be connected by a linking system to a range of other documents that were stored outside that text. In 1934 Belgian bibliographer, Paul Otlet, developed a blueprint for links that telescoped out from hypertext electrically to allow readers to access documents, books, photographs, and so on, stored anywhere in the world.
Theodor Holm Nelson, POSSIPLEX. Mindful Press, 2010.
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