We do understand that people won't have the same jargon we have, particularly with respect to "facet", so I agree with your concerns. We won't have a "turn tag into facet" menu item or if so we will not name it that :) I don't yet know exactly how we'll describe these affordances but there's a lot of possibilities.
The discussion about how a tag is a facet is for technical purposes and to explain the design to contributors and interested parties at this point.
lisa
On Sep 26, 2005, at 7:47 AM, Passin, Tom wrote:
<x-tad-bigger>If it is hard to understand the difference between a Tag and a Facet, then it seems likely that most users won’t ever get to that point. Either they will ignore the one, or treat it like the other, or get confused and annoyed, and then go on as before.</x-tad-bigger>
<x-tad-bigger> </x-tad-bigger>
<x-tad-bigger>So it’s hard or me to see how these concepts are going to work in a practical UI. If I were to guess, I’d say that most people will find the term “Tag” more familiar to begin with. Also, it can be read as a verb, as in “I will tag this item”, whereas you can’t say “I will facet this item”. Thus, “Tag” will associate with action - perhaps as an invitation to perform an action - whereas “Facet will not”. That would make “Tag” a much more active term in its effect on many users.</x-tad-bigger>
<x-tad-bigger> </x-tad-bigger>
<x-tad-bigger>Well, that’s speculation, but the likely confusion between the terms is more than mere speculation - I’m sure we have all seen this kind of confusion between similar concepts before. As long as users can think of a Tag as a kind of keyword, fine, in fact, they will probably recognize and accept that latter term without trouble. It’s bringing in “Facet” that seems likely to cause trouble, it seems to me. Mimi’s explanation of a Tag as just another Facet will be important to convey - without any need for explanation! - in a UI.</x-tad-bigger>
<x-tad-bigger> </x-tad-bigger>
<x-tad-bigger>Thomas Passin</x-tad-bigger>
<x-tad-bigger>Principal Systems Engineer</x-tad-bigger>
<x-tad-bigger>Mitretek Systems</x-tad-bigger>
<x-tad-bigger> </x-tad-bigger>
<x-tad-bigger>From:</x-tad-bigger><x-tad-bigger> [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] </x-tad-bigger><x-tad-bigger>On Behalf Of </x-tad-bigger><x-tad-bigger>Mimi Yin</x-tad-bigger>
Hi Davor,
I just saw your question about facets on the ChandlerInFifteenMinutes wiki page. The relationship between Tags and Facets is subtle and hard to explain and even harder to understand, so I'm glad you brought it up.
In a way, you can think of Tags as an example of a Facet: The Tag Facet. So when you look at an individual item, you see a list of Attributes like this:
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Open Source Applications Foundation "Design" mailing list
http://lists.osafoundation.org/mailman/listinfo/design
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Open Source Applications Foundation "Dev" mailing list http://lists.osafoundation.org/mailman/listinfo/dev
