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Re: [ba-unrev-talk] Icons for IBIS


On Wed, 10 Apr 2002, Peter  Jones wrote:    (01)

> This question is addressed to those folks out there implementing GUIs
> for IBIS.
> If I have a particular node in a discussion that is marked as a
> positive,
> and I then transclude that node into another discussion where I
> want it to play the part of a negative, how do I do that given that
> I want to maintain the identity of the node across the two discussions?
> Are the icons independent of node identity?    (02)

In QuestMap, you can't change the type of a transcluded node.  In Mifflin, 
you can't change the type of a node, period.  So this scenario would never 
come up in either of these tools.    (03)

This scenario is possible with Argument nodes in QuestMap.  You can create 
an Argument node, link it to two different Idea nodes, and set the type of 
one link to "Supports" and the other to "Objects To."  This results in a 
"+/-" icon, with a green arrow pointing to the idea it supports, and a red 
arrow pointing to the idea to which it objects.    (04)

(Technical side note: Although QuestMap claims to support "Pro" and "Con" 
nodes, it seems to store these nodes internally as "Argument" nodes.  It 
displays a "+", "-", or "+/-" icon based on the link types, not the node 
types.)    (05)

Mifflin, on the other hand, only has one link type, and controls 
everything as a node type.  You can create an Argument node (I believe -- 
I'd have to double check), but there's no way of knowing whether it 
supports or objects to a particular idea.    (06)

(Another technical side note: Mifflin actually supports link types, and 
will use them when importing QuestMap files.  It does not allow users to 
set them however.  I've been talk to Al to find out why this is the case, 
but haven't gotten around to it; perhaps he can answer on this list.)    (07)

-Eugene    (08)

-- 
+=== Eugene Eric Kim ===== eekim@eekim.com ===== http://www.eekim.com/ ===+
|       "Writer's block is a fancy term made up by whiners so they        |
+=====  can have an excuse to drink alcohol."  --Steve Martin  ===========+    (09)