Shalom, Since this is my first post to this list I will introduce myself.
My name is Hanan Cohen and I am the new Webmaster of the Bloomfield Science Museum Jerusalem, Israel. http://www.mada.org.il/en/ . I am "new" in the sense that I have been a short time on this job and also in the sense that I am new to museums as a professional. One of the issues I have been thinking about since starting here is how to connect the physical world to the web. We know there is a problem of directing people from paper to web and also from speech to web. At the most, we direct people to a top directory and they somehow manage from there. The Bloomfield Science Museum strives to be an educational resource for its visitors - the general public and the formal education system. Writing long URL's on paper in order to propose content on our site to our audience is a problem. Then I had an idea. Every page on our site has a unique, short ID. I have created a new box that is displayed on every page. The box says "go to page number:", has an input line and below that "current page number: wxyz" When I want to direct someone to a page, all I have to do is see in what page number I am at and write or say a short number. The recipient just has to type a short number and go directly to the intended page. No need to type a long URL or click through menus. Now, we at the museum, will have to learn how to use this feature in our publications, displays and daily use of the website. It's a whole new way of thinking which we will have to develop. I hope the new feature will really solve the problem it tackles. I would be grateful for any feedback on this solution and its implementation. Currently, there isn't much English content on the site. To get a better experience of the page number idea, I suggest visiting the "Exhibitions" section. Thanks, Hanan Cohen - Webmaster Bloomfield Science Museum Jerusalem http://www.mada.org.il