Re: [ba-ohs-talk] LSA, clustering and spring-graphs and Nexist
At 11:58 AM 12/6/2002 -0800, you wrote:
>Jack,
>
>Knownspace sounds exciting, as related in your letter today and
>the attachment written by Gregory Rawlins.
>
>How does this fit the Nexist architecture? I tried a few months
>ago asking about a 3-layer design which you and Marry Keeler
>presented at SRI on 000518, but the issue got lost over concerns
>about linking. Does the Knownspace method solve past issues on
>metadata, linking and analysis that Murray Altheim discussed on
>020820, and John Maloney talked about on 020822 and on 020823?
>How does Knownspace compare with Groove and Sharepoint, which
>John indicated accomplish a lot of goals for OHS/DKR? (01)
A three-layer architecture, as posited mostly by Mary Keeler, articulates
her notion of a lens, one that a user places on some universe of discourse
(information space). I embellished it in a sense that turned out to be
greatly similar to the three bubbles of a diagram that Lee Iverson drew,
one where the three spaces are content, context, and knowledge. Whether you
like that choice of names or not, the concepts are these: a space where the
raw discourse is contained (content), a space where the user is satisfied
(context), and a space where knowledge structures (probably a poor choice
of words) exist. Knowledge structures refers to any variety of ways of
representing information in structures which can then be mapped to
presentations which aid the user in whatever task (search, discovery,
reading, etc) is being carried out. (02)
Candidate knowledge structures include semantic networks, bayesian
probabilistic data tables, conceptual graphs (Sowa), neural net
coefficients, and lots more. (03)
Where does KnownSpace fit into that?
Several candidate places, and maybe Chris will have more, or correct me
where I err. (04)
The big one, I think, is, oddly enough, the same place I think Lee's NODAL
fits: the backside, where you are managing things which need to be
persisted. It may even be that NODAL could serve as a backside for
KnownSpace which, in that scenario, places KnownSpace in the middle tier,
which, I think, is it's rightful place. There, it is a society of agents
tending to user requests, motoring about in information space building
knowledge structures and more. (05)
But, there are other parts of the KnownSpace project that could easily fit
into the context, or user space. They are developing some really cool user
interface stuff, including a refactored TouchGraph. (06)
Could SDS map into that universe? Yes. (07)
Will KnownSpace find its way into some future Nexist project? Yup. (08)
>On 011003 Eric Armstrong requested guidance on presenting new
>ideas in this forum. One approach suggested is to explain
>correlations between a new idea and ideas and methods previously
>considered and used. Eugene Kim's letter on 001126 is a good
>example, where he explained how to gain experience doing KM by
>using familiar information technology methods, like email, so
>people don't have to struggle learning something new. Your
>letter today and my response illustrate the idea.
>
>How does Knownspace correlate to methods discussed in this forum
>the past few years, e.g., Doug's OHS/DKR Launch Plan issued on
>001025, or Dave Snowden's explanation of "knowledge" in his
>article last May, reviewed on 020608? Does it move toward
>handling complex transactions governed by FAR and other
>requirements. Any support for intelligence and accountability
>that came to prominence a year ago with the Enron case? (09)
KnownSpace makes an ontological and implementation-level commitment to a
kind of knowledge representation scheme that, I think, is capable of
satisfying any larger picture, including conceptual graphs, topic maps,
semantic nets, and numeric representations (probabilistic, coefficient
tables, etc). For instance, Dave Snowden and his colleagues have created a
(patented) XML markup for stories. It would be no-brainer to run his
structures through a KnownSpace middle tier. (010)
I think that if you pay attention to Gregory Rawlins' comment that there
needs to be a uniform, easily understood, easily extended platform for the
development of anything, including story engines, email clients, SDS, OHS,
and the rest of alphabet soup, you realize that KnownSpace is just one
exploration of that space. I have a hunch you could begin the same
exploration on top of, say, Zope, or some other platform for
development. The ideas expressed in KnownSpace can, I think, easily be
mapped to other implementation environments. For me, it's fine as is. (011)
To ask about support for accountability presumes there to be some
technique, algorithm, process, whatever, for mining records for evidence of
accountability breaches. If those exist, they could be modeled with
KnownSpace Simpletons (agents). (012)
>Rod
>
>**************
>
>Jack Park wrote:
> >
> > Reference Website: http://helium.knownspace.org
> >
> > In direct and in indirect ways, several readers of ohs-talk are involved in
> > the KnownSpace project, a project conceived by Gregory Rawlins
> > http://www.cs.indiana.edu/~rawlins/ who is, I think, a brilliant, and
> > productive fellow. Below, I have included his recent (as recent as today)
> > justification for the project. First, let me give a bit of background from
> > my perspective.
> >
> > Why is KnownSpace important? I can think of lots of reasons, but largest
> > ones center on these key points:
> > KnownSpace is about secure transactions
> > KnownSpace is about lots of simple agents doing things
> > KnownSpace is about knowledge representation, manipulation, and
> > presentation
> >
> > In short, KnownSpace is clearly an engine that would support any proper OHS
> > project.
> > Readers of this list who are in direct or indirect ways coupled with
> > KnownSpace include:
> > Chris Dent, now very active in Gregory's class where Helium is
> > being developed
> > Alex Shapiro, who created TouchGraph, which, if I got it right, is
> > now part of the KnownSpace project
> > Jack Park (moi), who built a MySql backside for the earlier
> > Hydrogen KnownSpace and provoked a move to sourceforge (which, btw, is not
> > being used in any current implementation, but which probably will be used
> > in my own implementations)
> >
> > There may be others.
> >
> > KnownSpace is a Java, Apache license, society of agents, a communications
> > system for those agents, and a knowledge representation scheme based on
> > Entities and Attributes, as discussed in the paper "A New Data Model:
> > Persistent Attribute-Centric Objects" which is linked on Gregory's site.
> >
> > I can't begin to list all the things that Helium can do because that list
> > grows far too rapidly for me to keep track. I stopped downloading from the
> > CVS for a while; just too many new features, fixes, and so forth going on;
> > this is one of the most productive software class efforts I have
> > seen. But, a couple of things that I think are wildly important are email
> > processing, including text document clustering. We all need that, and soon!
> >
> > Following is Gregory's response to a comment on the email list in which he
> > articulates a point of view that I think is of value to all the software
> > projects that are now orbiting around the OHS attractor basin.
> >
> > Enjoy.
> > Jack
> >
> > >now we're getting into the question of what knownspace is for, or the
> issue
> > >of ultimate causes. originally i started on knownspace because i used to
> > >run machine learning classes (where we'd discuss and then implement
> > >learning algorithms to do various kinds of clustering/data mining/whatever
> > >using neural networks or genetic algorithms or classifier systems or
> > >discriminant analysis or whatever). each term i'd take the class from
> > >grunting savagery and utter ignorance to something approaching cognizance
> > >of what's out there and with enough tools to make a start on some problem.
> > >the best students would take that and run with it and produce
> > >implementations that, some of them, were worthwhile---at least in terms of
> > >idea application where most of the ideas were generated by other people.
> > >those implementations were all over the map---c, pascal, c++, visual
> basic,
> > >whatever, and on whatever machine they were most comfortable with or in
> > >whichever environement the thing they were mainly using/extending first
> > >used (not only solaris, but also linux, and of course windows and macs).
> > >this would happen each term. and each succeeding term i'd have to start
> > >over NOT ONLY with a new set of ignorant savages but also with the
> > >same scattered set of languages and platforms and environments, whatever
> > >they were most familiar with, whatever was most prevalent in the cs
> dept at
> > >the time, whatever was cheapest for home use, whatever. even when someone
> > >exceptional managed to grub a few steps up the mountainside of mud, next
> > >term it was as if it never had been (except that i remembered that it once
> > >existed) and the class as a whole had slid back to the start. term afte
> > >term, year after year. it was mindlessly stupid.
> > >
> > >take one particular example right here in bloomington. doug hofsteder's
> > >students over the years have worked in mostly one environment built, in
> > >some sense on melanie mitchell's copycat thesis (melanie was one of doug's
> > >first students). but anyone wishing to capitalize on all that work must
> > >first get that whole world of computation. all those thoughts each smart
> > >student thinks are mostly lost to anyone else. david leake's students
> > >mostly work on case-based reasoning, but each problem was distinct so
> > >cross-pollination was small. and new students could only start with a set
> > >of prior ideas, rarely, if ever, with a set of prior implementations.
> > >
> > >the only place we build on prior implementations is in the commercial
> > >world when one company manages to win massive market share for some
> > >implementation or physical machine, or in the academic marketplace of
> ideas
> > >where one free implementation is flexibile enough to win wide acceptance
> > >(unix mainly, now linux probably) so that current workers could build on
> > >past workers work. but those impleemntations are so far away in complexity
> > >form interesting rpoblems that building on them to get to doing something
> > >really interesting is just too damned hard for any one person or small
> > >group.
> > >
> > >this is a pattern replicated all over the world. ai, user interfaces,
> > >networking, user modelling, visualiztion, human-computer interfaces, over
> > >and over and on and on. lots of drek being done, but some of it good, but
> > >none of it replicable (aside from the cleverest ideas, but not the
> > >cleverest implementations).
> > >
> > >i thought about what science would be like if there were no replicability.
> > >what if each physicist had to start over from the beginning and become
> > >galileo and newton? what if there were no accepted standrad places to
> > >publish so that every other interested scientist could build the same
> > >equipment easily to repliacte work and maybe get a new idea that could
> then
> > >add to what was known, what could be done, what could be thought? that is
> > >what computer 'science' is now (minus the mathematical foundations, where
> > >we can exchange and build on ideas easily since they are pure ideas, and
> > >not implemention-dependent machines).
> > >
> > >i thought this was all very very stupid.
> > >
> > >what was needed was the first step. unfortunately it's a BIG step. a
> > >free and open computational environment robust enough and flexble enough,
> > >and understandable enough that nearly everyone could add to it, modify it,
> > >share their work over it. instead of working on toy problems because
> that's
> > >all you can reach starting from scratch each time, eventually the world as
> > >a whole could begin to work on something really hard---ideally, a problem
> > >that's in front of everyone all the time anyway, so i chose information
> > >management, a problem i've struggled with since the 80s. and still
> struggle
> > >with today.
> > > best,
> > > gregory.
> >
> > ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
> > XML Topic Maps: Creating and Using Topic Maps for the Web.
> > Addison-Wesley, ISBN 0-201-74960-2.
> >
> > http://www.nexist.org/wiki/User0Blog (013)
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XML Topic Maps: Creating and Using Topic Maps for the Web.
Addison-Wesley, ISBN 0-201-74960-2. (014)
http://www.nexist.org/wiki/User0Blog (015)