[seek-dev] Domain maps, thinkmap (r) and thoughts on open source

[Ferdinando Villa]

Hi SEEKers,

I've been doing some research for tools to navigate knowledge for my own
projects - something Seek will also need as we all know. Thinkmap by
Plumb Design (which was mentioned by Matt: have a look at
www.visualthesaurus.com) looks great, except it's commercial and they
haven't answered my inquiry on academic licensing options (and subtle
menace that the alternative for me was to clone it as open source). I'll
probably be evaluating the development of something like it in the near
future. Two questions for Seek:

1) is there enough interest in such a tool that could justify a joint
open-source effort within Seek to develop an interactive knowledge
navigation tool - I'm thinking about coordination and joining of design
and development forces rather than having my small non-Seek workforce
dig in right away; and

2) related to this, it may be worthwile to identify and separate
relatively small and well-identified components of the SEEK deliverables
that, like this one, are useful beyond SEEK, and try to catalize open
source development efforts from other communities as well. I don't know
if such an effort has been done.

Any thoughts?
Ciao
ferdinando

-- 
ferdinando villa, ph.d.                    associate professor
gund institute for ecological economics, university of vermont
590 main street, burlington, vt 05405    phone: (802) 656-2972