Wiki/Report of Meeting 2022-09-08

Report of Meeting 2022-09-01

Present: Art Anger, Raul Miller, Bob Therriault

1. The meeting opened with a discussion on what might be good targets for the fall wiki improvements. Bob talked about content based projects such as Essay categorization https://code2.jsoftware.com/wiki/Essays/Cat , structural changes such as the main pages https://code2.jsoftware.com/wiki/Main_Page or the add ons, and bot development in maintenance or search engines. Additionally, there could be an option to develop the Phrases area in a way that would bring it closer to the APLcart https://aplcart.info/ . Bob also mentioned the J Playground as an area that is wiki adjacent that has greatly expanded the potential of J. Targets for the fall could be higher profile, but that does not exclude foundational changes that are necessary to move forward.
2. The APLcart is an interesting project because the tags have already been developed and it would be a matter of writing a phrase that would be conventional J and possibly an option optimized for speed and one optimized for space. The classic J option might be best to give a sense of J style to newcomers and the other two might be better for production code. The question of tacit or explicit came up and it might be best to supply both because explicit can make it easier for many coders to understand.
3. Art wondered about the possibility of putting the add ons into a spreadsheet to enhance the search. Raul pointed out that spreadsheets allow the data to be accessed in a partial format rather than requiring all the information.
4. Bob mentioned that Rich Park had asked about Search Engine Optimization in Nuvoc after looking for Raze in the wiki and not finding much appropriate information. It may be a good idea to add tags into the Nuvoc pages that at least incorporate the name of the primitive into the SEO and maybe give priority to the tags as the J wiki search engine develops and may prioritize tagged pages so that Nuvoc pages are amongst the top hits in the search with additional hits placed lower in the list.
5. Art talked about his projects involved developing content for developers. His project might be to start developing spreadsheets that might make the categories more accessible to the users. If the users don't have a way to know the categories it becomes more difficult to make the search effective. Art also mentioned that it might be a good idea to have a site map. Bob wondered if there was a way to do that sort of thing in a way that was automated, something like Eric's webcrawler, https://code.jsoftware.com/wiki/Eric_Iverson/Site_Map but perhaps one that crawled with a navigation priority so that the bot crawls in a way that reflects the navigational structure of the wiki for the user. Art wondered if there were a way to identify the pages that have gone longest with out an update which might provide information that is useful.
6. Bob talked about working with the add ons to create a structure starting small and expanding in a way that reduces the complexity. Thinking more about a site map, Bob thought it might be an idea to have a site map that is curated to take you to the level of the navigation bars and let the navigation bars form the next level of navigation. The site map and the structure of the wiki would be meant to take the user to the level of a navigation bar which at that level the navigation bars could link to different areas of the wiki based on the user needs rather than the current structure of the wiki which is more organic and does not always reflect user needs. The navigation bar level of structure might also be candidates for tags so that those results are given higher priority in the search.
7. Bob reiterated that it would be good to have 2 or three projects that we aim to complete before Christmas as it would be good to start to show quantifiable results because that may energize participation in the community that would be necessary for larger wiki changes. Art said that he would explore the wiki table option, with the idea of using the ideas discovered in table generation across the greater wiki. Bob thought if he was working on two it would be the add on structure and APLcart. A third project would be to support the wiki development and these meetings and video updates. Going forward it would be a good idea to find areas that you would like to work on and I would welcome approaching targets as a group which could be supported by some of these Zoom sessions.

For access to previous meeting reports https://code.jsoftware.com/wiki/Wiki_Development

If you would like to participate in the development of the J wiki please contact us on the general forum and we will get you an invitation to the next J wiki meeting held on Thursdays at 23:00 (UTC) Next meeting is September 15th, 2022.