'''Motivation''' On Category''''''Category one can see that there are not only top-level categories, but also SubCategories. If you want to navigate from a category to the pages which are linked to it, you should also have a possibility to navigate to the pages which are linked to the subcategories of the category at which you started. '''Example''' (Doesn't work anymore now, but still could help to illustrate the problem.) Suppose I am on a page which is linked to the Category''''''Wiki. I want to see more pages in the same category, so I open Category''''''Wiki and click on the title, so that the list of pages in this category is displayed. Now the following problem arises: There is no obvious way to navigate to (or even get to know about) pages which are (only) in Category''''''Wiki''''''Navigation, although this is a subcategory to Category''''''Wiki. '''What are possible solutions?''' * One could add a link to Category''''''Wiki on all pages in Category''''''Wiki''''''Navigation. : This would make the list of pages in the Category''''''Wiki unnecessarily longer and would make information about the structure (which page is directly in Category''''''Wiki and which is in a subcategory) invisible for people looking at this list. * One could add links to Category''''''Wiki on all subcategories (like Category''''''Wiki''''''Navigation), so that the subcategories (themselves, not the pages linked to them) are contained in the list of pages belonging to Category''''''Wiki. : ''This is what I want to suggest.'' * One could add links to all subcategories on Category''''''Wiki. : It seems to me that this is not in the spirit of the way how categories are working so far. Categories are not a kind of registry, but a convention on tagging and querying. * On some pages for categories with subcategories (e.g. Category''''''Operating''''''Systems, Category''''''Language) there are lists of links to related pages (these lists are RoadMaps, aren't they?), where these lists do not contain links to the subcategories, but there are pages listed which are linked to subcategories (e.g. LinuxOperatingSystem is listed on Category''''''Operating''''''Systems and is linked to Category''''''Linux). : This seems to me to be a very indirect and not obvious enough way to navigate to pages in subcategories and not a solution to the above mentioned problem. * any more? : -- HelmutEnckRadana ---- I think I see what you mean. I've just tried doing this with what Category''''''Category lists as the subcategories of Category''''''Wiki. (I didn't bother to remove links to Category''''''Wiki from pages in its subcategories, as it doesn't seem that this would ever make searching for things easier). This seems like quite a reasonable thing to do--it adds information, without being especially hard to maintain. -- MossCollum ---- I had a structure similar to that of a UNIX filesystem in mind, where a directory can contain files as well as subdirectories and one file or directory can be contained in more than one parent directory. '''Category''''''Category and Root Super-Category''' I thought of Category''''''Category more as being a meta-category than a root category. Compared to an object-system with meta-classes: the class Class, not the class Object. Compared to a filesystem: the file type 'directory', not the root directory. I'm not sure whether this is absolutely needed, but it is useful to have the possibility to see a flat alphabetically sorted list of all available categories. I forgot to think about a root category until you mentioned it, but of course you are right - this is the place from where one would want to start navigating when browsing the category hierarchy. I think Category''''''Category wouldn't be an apt name for a root category - more suitable could be simply RootCategory or something like CategoryTop or CategoryAny (personally I'd prefer the last one). -- HelmutEnckRadana ---- '''Possible Heuristics''' Helmut, I like the directory/subdirectory approach - a parent category can have subcategories and regular pages. To change the viewpoint a little - does the following set of rules result in a structure similar to the one you are proposing? 1. Keep everything as it is now, plus 1. At the bottom of category pages, in addition to Category''''''Category, put zero, one or more references to Category''''''My''''''Parent''''''Category 1. Keep Category''''''Category at the bottom of all category pages, both parent categories and subcategories. 1. Eventually delete references to both a category and its parent category on regular pages. Then when you press the title page of a category, you get a list of the regular pages, plus the subcategories. I think this is what Moss did with Category''''''Wiki, except he didn't do #4. -- StanSilver ---- This is exactly what I had in mind when I started this page, but since thinking about the root super-category you mentioned, I'm convinced that this is also needed. The aim would be a well designed hierarchy of categories which can be used to: * navigate from the root/top/any category along successive specializations to the content of interest * find related topics by navigating along generalizations To achieve this, categories which are meant for navigating to (categories which are standing for) topics probably shouldn't include more than 10 to 20 subcategories and not more than 20 to 40 regular pages (which are directly linked to the category - there could be more, which are indirectly linked to it through other regular pages). Large categories should be split into subcategories. May be the category groups on the Category''''''Category page can be a model for high-level categories. The only criterion for deciding whether to link a page (regular or subcategory) to a specific category, should be whether its information would be searched for in that category. I could imagine cases where a page could be added to a subcategory as well as to its parent-category. May be the page should be split in such cases. -- HelmutEnckRadana ---- I'm very much interested in comments from those who are using (or want to use) categories to navigate through the Wiki. What do you think should be tried, what should not be tried, and even what is indifferent to you? -- HelmutEnckRadana ---- A quick way to get one linkage list related to CategoryWiki is to use it in the FindPage link at the bottom of every page. It yields the following: CategoryWiki CategoryWikiCollaboration CategoryWikiEditing CategoryWikiEngineReview CategoryWikiFavorites CategoryWikiForum CategoryWikiHistory CategoryWikiImplementation CategoryWikiMaintenance CategoryWikiMetadata CategoryWikiNavigation CategoryWikiStructure CategoryWikiTag CategoryWikiTopics To find even more associations, use the Like''''''Pages at the bottom of the page CategoryWiki and you will find almost 600 referenced pages. With one Click! ---- CategoryWikiNavigation CategoryWikiMaintenance