ZigZag is Ted Nelson's trademark on a data model he has designed for computer interaction, both for users and between programs. The design is centered around an information structure called a zzstructure and its interactive visualizations. Nelson's stated goal is on one hand a platform for the Project Xanadu hypertext and on the other a complete computing system built on new conventions. Instead of the conventional textual formats and tree structures, zzstructure is a multidimensional extension of a spreadsheet whose cells can contain various kinds of data.
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History
Ted Nelson designed a data structure in 1965 and later generalized and applied it in ZigZag. The first prototype consisting of two character-graphical views was implemented by Andrew Pam in 1997. From 2000 to 2003, a free software project GZigZag (later Gzz) developed another prototype with more views and other conventions. The underlying zzStructure is a patented technology. After 2003, prototype development has continued in various other projects.
See also
- For contrast, the current World Wide Web and its standards:
- HTML - hypertext
- XML - data model
- RDF - metadata structure
- Semantic Web - "a better World Wide Web"
References
- Theodor Holm Nelson. A Cosmology for a Different Computer Universe: Data Model, Mechanisms, Virtual Machine and Visualization Infrastructure. Journal of Digital Information, Volume 5 Issue 1. Article No. 298, 2004-07-16.
- Michael J. McGuffin, m. c. schraefel. A Comparison of Hyperstructures: Zzstructures, mSpaces, and Polyarchies. Proceedings of 15th ACM Conference on Hypertext and Hypermedia (HT) 2004.
