Using the
HyperTextBook
Database
The HyperTextBook database
uses a simple yet flexible database engine called
(for that reason) flexdb, which was written
over a period of years by Paul Kienzle and several others.
It has its limitations, as do most things, but it works for us.
If you would like your own copy to play with, just ask.
For the purposes of this site, here is what you need to know:
Before you click on
"FIND" in the ButtonBar or
"SEARCH" in the LinkFinder form
to initiate a search,
be aware of what will happen next:
the left frame will be loaded with a list of
links decribed by their titles [see below]
which you can click on to visit.
To go back to the search engine,
just hit the LinkFinder button
that will appear at the top of the lefthand frame.
The searchable fields in the present (htb) database file are:
- URL = Universal Resource Locator (the actual Web page)
for the "nugget" of information
(which we call, somewhat trendily, a "learning quantum")
referenced by the database entry.
This may be here on our site or it may be elsewhere;
in the latter case the "URL:" button won't work for some reason.
- view = author viewpoint (selected from a fixed menu).
The idea is that each URL was prepared by someone
with some particular discipline's viewpoint.
You might get a different story about the same subject if
you choose a different author viewpoint.
Click here for a list of
viewpoints.
- title = short Title of the entry.
Authors please try to be informative but succinct.
- keyw = keywords etc.
This allows you to search for specific topics;
of course, it is limited by the care with which
people fill out the keyword list when they submit new
"learning quanta"
- and by the degree to which your notion of appropriate keywords
matches theirs! Not much we can do about that.
- auth = author(s) of the URL.
Authors may wish to include a
<A HREF="mailto:...">name</A>
tag, or at least a mailing address.
- terse =
0 for "gory details", 1 for "outline" or
2 for "table of contents"
- hard = difficulty rating: 0 for "easy",
1 for "intermediate", 2 for "challenging" or
3 for "advanced"
- good = quality rating by users (to be implemented)
The Other Condition(s) field can be arbitrarily
intricate, in principle.
For example, you might
wish to apply the condition
view=biol hard=0
in all your searches to get only easy material
written from a Biologist's viewpoint.
Asterisks are "wildcards" - any field containing the specified
character string will be matched.
Thus a blank entry matches everything, so beware of laziness.
One caveat regarding the search engine:
for some reason embedded blanks are not being
handled properly, with the result that if you enter
"quantum mechanics" (or any other string
with an embedded blank) you will match the entire database.
Sorry. Use single words only until we cure this bug.
It may work to just type in the entire phrase with
all the blanks omitted.
Ready to try it out?
Jess H. Brewer
Last modified: Thu Aug 19 17:04:07 PDT 1999