Ubiquitous Metainformation and the WYWWYWI Principle

Computer systems should provide what you want, when you want it (the WYWWYWI Principle, pronounced “why why why”), but they frequently do not. Our research encourages a new philosophy of design based on the WYWWYWI principle, and the tools for authors to provide this easily. Comprehensive metainformation embodies the WYWWYWI principle. Metainformation includes the structural relationships, content-based relationships, user-declared link-based relationships, and metadata around an element of interest. Combined, the metainformation goes a long way towards establishing the full semantics for (the meaning of and context around) a system’s elements. We take a three-pronged approach to providing metainformation on a grand scale. First, we provide a systematic methodology for systems analysts to determine the relationships around elements of interest in their information domains—Relationship Analysis. Relationship Analysis will result in a comprehensive set of a domain’s structural relationships. Second, we provide a Metainformation Engine, which automatically generates sets of structural and content-based relationships around elements of interest as links, as well as metadata within static and virtual documents. Third, we provide an infrastructure for widespread link-based services within both static and virtual documents. This approach provides the inspiration as well as a sound foundation for a ubiquitous embracing of the WYWWYWI principle in the everyday systems people use, both on the Web and beyond. 1. MOTIVATION: WHAT YOU WANT, WHEN YOU WANT IT How often have you wanted to point to something and say “tell me more about this.” People naturally want information on-demand. Computer systems should provide what you want, when you want it (the WYWWYWI Principle, pronounced “why why why” [Bhargava et al. 1988]). But they often do not. In on-line fiction this is not necessarily bad, but provides artistic tension. In adaptive tutoring systems the authors may feel the user is not ready for exposure to advanced information yet. With national security or competitive business sites, compelling reasons may