2007FallQ5Response

5. There are many environments in which information is organized to facilitate access. To effectively organize information, we need principles, methods, and tools. Selecting an information environment,


 * Discuss why representation of information is important in this environment
 * Describe how information is represented in this environment
 * Give concrete examples of such representations and their specific purposes

Jody: Selecting the WWW: 1) Representation of information is necessary to enable the users to locate and access the materials. 2) Information is represented via hypertext, images (still and moving), audio, XML, and serial characters, (as well as by information packets over TCP/IP on another level). 3) The text value contained in a link tag (for example, "Response to Question 5, Fall 2007" in the following link tag: Response to Question 5, Fall 2007 is used to indicate to the user the contents of the page which he will open if he clicks this link. In addition, this value becomes the indexed value by Google, to identify the contents of the linked in page. Second example: the metadata hidden in the header of an html page is intended to provide better indexing and findability via search engine results. Third example: The XML in an ATOM or RSS feed is used to syndicate content to apprise users of the existence of new or changed material.

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