What a very interesting response. Let me see if I have this straight: You can't think of any good reason why someone would want to do something, and when someone says they want to, your reaction is to attack their choice of organizing their data? I think the problem may be that you are still thinking wiki, whereas I'm using MediaWiki as a platform for developing a data management system.
So, what is the actual place where I'm trying to do this? I created a Form to help edit Category pages. On the form, I put a dropdown which lists all of the Structured Documents defined in the system. If the user selects a structured document, then the template looks up everything it needs to know from the Structured Document definition page. Likewise, there is a dropdown that lists all of the forms in the system, so you can select the form to use to edit pages in that category (if you didn't select a structured document). The purpose of all of this is to make it easier for non-technical users to define/edit categories. But the query for forms returns everything looking like: [[:Form:xyz|Form:xyz]], which means that is what shows up in the dropdown. What SHOULD show up in the dropdown is "xyz", as that is all the user needs to see. But in general, I can think of a million reasons why you would need to populate a dropdown with something other than raw page names. 1. A list of users, displayed as Last Name, First 2. A list of open defects, showing defect ID number followed by the summary 3. All open/active User Stories, listing the user story text 4. A list of teams, taken from their team pages Bottom-line: There is a very real need to do this kind of thing. Which means that being "out of luck" means that Semantic MediaWiki is not really ready for prime-time. Is that really the message you want to send to the world? On Mon, Aug 16, 2010 at 8:05 PM, Yaron Koren <yaro...@gmail.com> wrote: > Hi, > > No, you can't do any of these things, so I guess you're out of luck. > > Personally, I think the fact that you're asking about these might indicate > a non-ideal data structure, which is why I was asking about data structure > before; but that's a matter of opinion. > > -Yaron > > > On Mon, Aug 16, 2010 at 6:30 PM, John Arrowwood <j...@irie-inc.com> wrote: > >> The data structure is not important. What is important is that I want to >> return something other than a page name. The current method of using a >> concept as inputs to a dropdown does not accept anything other than a page >> name. Only the page names are used to populate the dropdown, as best as I >> can tell... >> >> Imagine it like this: Suppose you had a collection of pages, all in the >> same category. Suppose you wanted to have a dropdown where the values are >> the page names, but converted to upper case. How would you do that? >> >> How about if you had a collection of pages and sub-pages, and you wanted >> to return only the sub-page name, without the base page? How would you do >> that? So if you had "foo/bar" and "foo/blip" and "foo/goo", and you wanted >> the dropdown to include the values "bar" and "blip" and "goo". How would >> you do that? >> >> Or if you had a collection of pages in a particular namespace (other than >> the main namespace), and because it is redundant to show the namespace name >> over and over again, you want to show the page name without the namespace. >> Again, the contents of the dropdown should be populated from a query, but >> the actual appearance of each item should be something other than the actual >> page names. It might be, for example, an attribute on the page, or a >> function executed against the page name. >> >> That is the root of the problem. I tried everything I could find to be >> able to make that happen. The closest thing I could come up with was >> putting a query on the property page that used a template to control the >> allowed values. But as you yourself said, then it doesn't update the values >> unless you 'edit' the property page. That is not a viable alternative. >> Neither is having to 'purge' the property page. >> >> So, how does one put user-friendly values in dropdowns that are the result >> of a query? Or can you? >> >> On Mon, Aug 16, 2010 at 5:34 PM, Yaron Koren <yaro...@gmail.com> wrote: >> >>> Hi Alex, >>> >>> John - in a sense, this extension might be helpful for you as well; >>> though I'm always sure there's a better way for you to do whatever it is >>> you're trying to do; though, not knowing your data structure, I don't know >>> what that is. >>> >>> -Yaron >>> >>> On Mon, Aug 16, 2010 at 1:14 PM, Alex Kozak >>> <ako...@creativecommons.org>wrote: >>> >>>> Has there been any discussion about ways around the data update issue? >>>> Maybe there could be a way for SMW to run the data repair/upgrade in the >>>> background? I've run into this annoyance countless times. It would be nice >>>> not to have to turn off page caching for the whole wiki. >>>> >>>> AK >>>> >>>> >>>> On Mon, Aug 16, 2010 at 10:05 AM, Yaron Koren <yaro...@gmail.com>wrote: >>>> >>>>> Hi John, >>>>> >>>>> That doesn't sound like a defect - regardless of what you see on the >>>>> property page, the actual semantic data (allowed values, in this case) >>>>> doesn't get updated until there's some sort of update action taken, >>>>> like a >>>>> page save. >>>>> >>>>> In any case, that's not the ideal way to do it - you should instead >>>>> define >>>>> an SMW "concept" that holds that query, and then use either "values >>>>> from >>>>> concept" or "autocomplete on concept" in the form input (probably the >>>>> former). >>>>> >>>>> -Yaron >>>>> >>>>> On Mon, Aug 16, 2010 at 12:50 PM, John Arrowwood <j...@irie-inc.com> >>>>> wrote: >>>>> >>>>> > I have a sequence of pages that all have a common base page, >>>>> "Structured >>>>> > Documents". So, for example, I have Structured Documents/Term for >>>>> the page >>>>> > that has the definition of a glossary Term. >>>>> > >>>>> > I created a property. The definition of that property includes a >>>>> query >>>>> > that >>>>> > returns all of those structured documents, listing only their name >>>>> without >>>>> > the Structured Documents prefix. The idea was that the property will >>>>> be a >>>>> > dropdown on the appropriate form which shows a cleaned-up version of >>>>> the >>>>> > page names. >>>>> > >>>>> > The intention is that as soon as I added a new Structured Document, >>>>> the >>>>> > property would update its 'allowed' list, and the new document would >>>>> appear >>>>> > in the dropdown. >>>>> > >>>>> > In reality, I have to go to the page for that property, make a >>>>> meaningless >>>>> > change, then click Save in order for the change to be picked up. >>>>> Even >>>>> > though I can go to the page, click Purge, and see the new item in the >>>>> list, >>>>> > that alone is not enough. I have to edit and save before the new >>>>> item(s) >>>>> > appear in the dropdown of a form. >>>>> > >>>>> > So the defect is that even though you view the property page and see >>>>> the >>>>> > list of allowed values, the form is not picking up the new list of >>>>> allowed >>>>> > values. >>>>> > >>>>> > However, the real NEED here is a way of associating a form on a page >>>>> with a >>>>> > queried list of values. Unfortunately, I have tried in vain to do >>>>> that. >>>>> > If >>>>> > I put a template call in the default= part of the field definition, >>>>> it >>>>> > isn't >>>>> > treated as a template, and so the user sees it as a template, not as >>>>> a list >>>>> > of values. >>>>> > >>>>> > What is the proper way of accomplishing this goal? >>>>> > >>>>> > -- >>>>> > John Arrowwood >>>>> > John (at) Irie (dash) Inc (dot) com >>>>> > John (at) Arrowwood Photography (dot) com >>>>> > John (at) Hanlons Razor (dot) com >>>>> > -- >>>>> > http://www.irie-inc.com/ >>>>> > http://arrowwood.blogspot.com/ >>>>> > >>>>> > >>>>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ >>>>> > This SF.net email is sponsored by >>>>> > >>>>> > Make an app they can't live without >>>>> > Enter the BlackBerry Developer Challenge >>>>> > http://p.sf.net/sfu/RIM-dev2dev >>>>> > _______________________________________________ >>>>> > Semediawiki-user mailing list >>>>> > semediawiki-u...@lists.sourceforge.net >>>>> > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/semediawiki-user >>>>> > >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> -- >>>>> WikiWorks · MediaWiki Consulting · http://wikiworks.com >>>>> >>>>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ >>>>> This SF.net email is sponsored by >>>>> >>>>> Make an app they can't live without >>>>> Enter the BlackBerry Developer Challenge >>>>> http://p.sf.net/sfu/RIM-dev2dev >>>>> _______________________________________________ >>>>> Semediawiki-user mailing list >>>>> semediawiki-u...@lists.sourceforge.net >>>>> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/semediawiki-user >>>>> >>>> >>>> >>>> >>>> -- >>>> Alex Kozak >>>> Program Assistant >>>> Creative Commons >>>> >>> >>> >>> >>> -- >>> WikiWorks · MediaWiki Consulting · http://wikiworks.com >>> >> >> >> >> -- >> John Arrowwood >> John (at) Irie (dash) Inc (dot) com >> John (at) Arrowwood Photography (dot) com >> John (at) Hanlons Razor (dot) com >> -- >> http://www.irie-inc.com/ >> http://arrowwood.blogspot.com/ >> > > > > -- > WikiWorks · MediaWiki Consulting · http://wikiworks.com > > -- > John Arrowwood > John (at) Irie (dash) Inc (dot) com > John (at) Arrowwood Photography (dot) com > John (at) Hanlons Razor (dot) com > -- > http://www.irie-inc.com/ > http://arrowwood.blogspot.com/ > <http://wikiworks.com> >
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