A System Design for the Dynamic Cognitive Mapping of Wiki Articles By Daniel Pettus A MASTER OF ENGINEERING REPORT Submitted to the College of Engineering at Texas Tech University in Partial Fulfillment of The Requirements for the Degree of MASTER OF ENGINEERING Approved ______________________________________ Dr. A. Ertas (Chair) ______________________________________ Dr. T. Maxwell (member) ___________________________________ Dr. M. Tanik (member) ______________________________________ Dr. J. Woldstad (COE Representative) October 25, 2008 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to thank Dr. Atila Ertas, the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Texas Tech University, the entire Texas Tech staff, and guest speakers for their role in organizing the Master of Engineering program for Raytheon employees. I would like to thank my fellow students in the Master of Engineering program for their support in helping me accomplish my goals. I would like to thank my coworkers and management for accommodating a class schedule and deadlines that often did not synch well up with the schedule and deadlines of my professional career. I would like to thank my family and loved ones for offering their support, understanding, enthusiasm, and sacrifice during this time. Most of all, I would like to thank Minh “Michele” Luong, who encouraged me to join this program and who provided me with her confidence and support throughout. I would not have accomplished so much without her. 1 TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ......................................................................................................... 1 DISCLAIMER............................................................................................................................... 5 ABSTRACT ................................................................................................................................... 6 LIST OF FIGURES ...................................................................................................................... 7 LIST OF TABLES ........................................................................................................................ 9 CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION....................................................................................................................... 10 CHAPTER II BACKGROUND ......................................................................................................................... 13 2.1 The Background of Wikis 13 2.2 The Background of Cognitive Mapping 14 2.2.1 Concept Mapping 14 2.2.2 Mind Mapping 15 2.2.3 Dialogue Mapping 18 CHAPTER III ANALYSIS OF TOOLS ............................................................................................................. 19 3.1 Cognitive Mapping Tools 19 3.1.1 Concept Mapping 19 3.1.1.1 CmapTools 19 3.1.2 Dialogue Mapping 19 3.1.2.1 Compendium 19 3.1.3 Mind Mapping 20 3.1.3.1 MindManager 20 3.1.3.2 FreeMind 20 3.1.3.2.1 FreeMind Flash Browser 20 3.1.4 Cognitive Mapping Conclusion 21 3.2 Wikis 21 3.2.1 Platypus Wiki 21 3.2.2 MediaWiki 22 3.2.2.1 Semantic MediaWiki 22 3.2.3 Wiki Conclusion 22 3.3 Source Parsing Tools 23 3.3.1 Natural Language Processing 23 3.3.2 Structure Parsing 23 3.3.3 Source Parsing Conclusion 23 CHAPTER IV WIKI-POWERED CONCEPT MAP DESIGN ....................................................................... 24 4.1 Scope 24 4.2 Design Process 24 4.2.1 Requirements 24 4.2.2 System Architecture 25 2 4.2.2.1 Contextual 25 4.2.2.1.1 Interrogative Data 26 4.2.2.1.1.1 Why does the work need to be done? (Goals) 26 4.2.2.1.1.2 Who are the participants? (Stakeholders) 26 4.2.2.1.1.3 What information and entities are used? (Data / Entities) 26 4.2.2.1.1.4 How do they operate? (Processes) 26 4.2.2.1.1.5 Where do they operate? (Geography) 27 4.2.2.1.1.6 When are the various actions taken? (Timeline) 27 4.2.2.1.1.7 Relationship Matrix (Why vs. Who) 27 4.2.2.1.2 Context Diagram 28 4.2.2.1.3 Scope and Boundaries 28 4.2.2.1.3.1 Deliverables 28 4.2.2.1.3.1.1 External 29 4.2.2.1.3.1.2 Functionality 29 4.2.2.1.3.1.3 Data 30 4.2.2.1.3.1.4 Technical Structure 30 4.2.2.1.4 Quality Attributes 30 4.2.2.2 Operational 32 4.2.2.2.1 Operational Concept 32 4.2.2.2.2 Key Scenarios 33 4.2.2.2.3 Actors 33 4.2.2.2.4 Use Cases 33 4.2.2.2.5 Activity Diagram 37 4.2.2.3 Logical 37 4.2.2.3.1 Functional Decomposition 38 4.2.2.3.2 Logical Solution 38 4.2.2.3.3 Logical Block Diagram 39 4.2.2.3.4 Data Flow Diagram 39 4.2.2.3.5 Sequence Diagrams 40 4.2.2.3.5.1 Search and View Wiki Mind-map 40 4.2.2.3.5.2 Browse Wiki Mind-map 40 4.2.2.3.5.3 View Wiki Mind-map Source 41 4.2.2.3.6 Evaluation 41 4.2.2.4 Physical 41 4.2.2.4.1 Physical Components 42 4.2.2.4.1.1 Hardware 42 4.2.2.4.1.2 Software 42 4.2.2.4.1.3 Data 42 4.2.2.4.1.4 Interface 42 4.2.2.4.2 Physical Approach 43 4.2.2.4.3 Static View of Physical System 43 4.2.2.4.4 Trade of approaches to quality attributes 43 4.2.2.4.4.1 Usability 43 4.2.2.4.4.2 Robust 44 4.2.2.4.4.3 Reliability 44 3 CHAPTER V SYSTEM MOCKUP ................................................................................................................... 46 5.1 Search and View Wiki Mind-map 46 5.1.1 Opening Page 46 5.1.2 Search and View Results 47 5.1.3 Search the Contents of the Map 48 5.2 Browse Wiki Mind-map 49 5.2.1 Expand the Nodes 49 5.3 View Wiki Mind-map Source 51 5.3.1 View Main Topic 51 5.3.2 View Categories 53 5.3.3 View Linked Topic 55 5.3.4 View External Page 57 CHAPTER VI SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS ......................................................................................... 59 REFERENCES ............................................................................................................................ 60 APPENDIX A ACRONYM LIST ....................................................................................................................... 61 APPENDIX B RESOURCE LIST ...................................................................................................................... 62 4 DISCLAIMER The opinions expressed in this report are strictly those of the author and are not necessarily those of Raytheon, Texas Tech University, nor any U.S. Government agency. 5 ABSTRACT In recent times wikis have become an important tool for online collaboration and information dissemination in both the public, academic, and enterprise arenas. “A wiki is a collection of web pages designed to enable anyone who accesses it to contribute or modify content, using a simplified markup language. Wikis are often used to create collaborative websites and to power community websites. For example, the collaborative encyclopedia Wikipedia is one of the best-known wikis. Wikis are used in businesses to provide affordable and effective intranets and for Knowledge Management.” [Wikipedia/Wiki, 2008] Any user can very easily add content to a wiki by means of their markup languages. The underlying hypertext, like HTML, is loosely structured. This allows for each author or authors to individually or collectively determine how to organize, display, and reference content. Because of this loose structure, wikis run the risk of disorientation. Structure and style may be inconsistent and a reader may not understand the relevance of the material within the overall context. Cognitive mapping can be a solution to this issue. Cognitive mapping considers thinking as a self-organizing information system, i.e. a cognitive map will maintain the relevance of information regardless if new information is added or existing information is modified or removed. Cognitive maps are graphical representations of the structure of this information. They can give the necessary structure to a wiki in order to aid in understanding. The human brain typically identifies visual patterns more easily than non-visual. Visualization tools such as cognitive maps are also less restricted to barriers such as language. Using techniques to visualize information helps to communicate and clarify ideas, reveal hidden patterns and relationships, and gain insight to new ideas. In this paper, we shall discuss some of the issues with wikis and describe a system that uses cognitive mapping to visualize the structure of information within wiki articles in an attempt to address these issues, and to utilize the brain’s ability to comprehend through visualization. 6 LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1 The Problem with Wikipedia 11 Figure 2 Sample Concept Map 15 Figure 3 Sample Mind Map 17 Figure 4 Sample Dialogue Map 18 Figure 5 Context Diagram 28 Figure 6 Activity Diagram 37 Figure 7 Functional Decomposition Breakdown 38 Figure 8 Logical Block Diagram 39 Figure 9 Data Flow Diagram 39 Figure 10 Sequence Diagram - Search and View Wiki Mind-Map 40 Figure 11 Sequence Diagram - Browse Wiki Mind-Map 40 Figure 12 Sequence Diagram - View Wiki Mind-Map Source 41 Figure 13 Physical System 43 Figure 14 Mockup Opening Page 46 Figure 15 Mockup Search and View Results 47 Figure 16 Mockup Search the Contents of the Map 48 Figure 17 Mockup Expand the First Level Node 49 Figure 18 Mockup Expand Second Level Node 50 Figure 19 Mockup Select Main Topic 51 Figure 20 Mockup View Main Topic 52 Figure 21 Mockup Select Category 53 Figure 22 Mockup View Category 54 Figure 23 Mockup Select Linked Topic 55 Figure 24 Mockup View Linked Topic 56 7 Figure 25 Mockup Select External Page 57 Figure 26 Mockup View External Page 58 8 LIST OF TABLES Table 1 System Requirements 24 Table 2 Relationship Matrix 27 Table 3 External Deliverables 29 Table 4 Functionality Deliverables 29 Table 5 Data Deliverables 30 Table 6 Technical Deliverables 30 Table 7 Quality Pugh Chart 31 Table 8 Use Case - Search for wiki articles 33 Table 9 Use Case - Render mind-map of wiki article 34 Table 10 Use Case - Browse linked wiki articles 35 Table 11 Use Case - View original wiki article 35 9 CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION Bo Leuf and Ward Cunningham, developers of the first wiki, asked the following question, “What is the main limit of current network-based collaboration models?” [Leuf and Cunningham, 2001] They were not satisfied by the current models of the day, i.e.