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Dabble appears to read the RDF (Resource Description Framework). We copied an RDF link off of the W3C website and imported it into Dabble. Notice how the extension states (RDF).
In this video, which describes the Science Commons Scolar’s Copyright Project.
(the video is located here) http://sciencecommons.org/projects/publishing/
We quote.
“…modern technologies give us a way to go forward….this is the type of sentence you see in the life sciences. Its very complex and its very detailed.
What you will notice is that it does not have links….here is what happens if you add links to it.
What you see is it would be very powerful if we could add links. it would be good to link to other papers, or even better to link to the underlying databases. Unfortunately the copyright software makes it illegal to do this.
…are we going watch literature like TV, passively, human readable, or whether we are going to do something meaningful with the literature. Whether we are going to index it in some way, take it out of the paper containers and all computers to help us answer questions.” – Science Commons
Our Interpretation
This brings up an excellent point about how being able to manipulate data allows original thinking and analysis to take place, rather than simply having all the analysis distilled for us by “experts.” Having raw data in simple formats like CSV actually available is one of the areas that needs improvement as too much data is locked up, even public record data. Secondly, the analytical tools need to be there. Tools like DabbleDB, which allow for the importation of CSV files as well as the active receipt of RSS feeds are an important part of this capability. Excel is great for analysis, however, it is not integrated with the web, and is not sufficiently automated. (Furthermore, keeping tabular data in Excel format is a dead end, lets not confuse the data with the temporary technology.) We need automated data management systems (both personal, government and corporate) that can apply computer power not just in storing, organizing and formating, but also in automated receiving, querying and distributing raw data.
You can either display a table in a page, create a form to allow users to enter data, or data or both. However, to simplify lets just differentiate between showing tabular data in a page and showing a form.
Creating a Form
In order to create a form you must first select “Pages” underneath sharing.
Next you want to navigate to the right.
Then you need to select a page to create a form from. Select the category you want to form to be based upon.
Now you can go and create your form.
Both Tabular and Form
In order to show tabular data you don’t have to do anything special. However, to show a form to allow the user to add or make changes to data, you must select this checkbox in configuration.
Pages are the GUI which represents the data in DabbleDB categories. One page can direct to another page after it has been viewed or actioned by the user. The configuration for this is here.
In this way, one page can lead to the next, essentiall creating an application workflow.
Navigation
However, in addition to a specified workflow, navigation options can be added to any page. This means that a series of options can be listed to the right in a menu. This is configured here.
This is the output, it will show all pages that are created for that application, unless otherwise limited.
This workflow combined with this navigation and multi-pages could really create an mini application. We will be further investigating these features.
PDF is great, we love Adobe Acrobat. However, somewhere along the way someone got the impression that PDF is a good format for including tabular data. This is a problem because it locks up data. PDF is for creating documents that show the same on any computer and in any browser. They are not useful for and are in fact counterproductive for representing data. Also, it is unnecessary to actually embedd data into PDF documents as Adobe Professional has the abiliy to add attachments. This was you can bundle up both the text and the data all in one file.
What to Attach?
Excel is considered the standard file type. CSV is smaller and brings less baggage, but then only the raw data persists. However generally, the issue with attaching a file is it becomes out of date. If a link is included, if new data comes to light it can be added to the hosted file.
Google Docs or DabbleDB?
If the spreadsheet is not too complex, you can add a link to Google Spreadsheets. However, a link to a DabbleDB form or view is also an option. A final option is to add a link to an RSS feed, which can also be pushed out by DabbleDB.
What is interesting is that DabbleDB has the concept of a single field belonging to multiple categories. This is different than a primary key relationship. We quote from DabbldDB help.
“default view for one category that also filters for the additional category or categories. Entries created from such a view will always be in both (or all) categories that are specified as filters.” - http://www.dabbledb.com/help/index/multiple_categories
Now this is the tricky part, createing a default view for one category that also filters for the aditional category or categories.
On the help on making filters we find the following:
“Multiple categories, you will have the option to add additional category filters. (The option will appear below the existing filters.) This will restrict the view to entries belonging only to both or all of the categories.”
We are stuck on this one.
Something very interesting is that any feed can be scheduled to be updated into the DabbleDB application. We start off by selecting the Import button.
Now we select the make schedule button and then select how often we want the feed updated.
Something quite interesting is that any dataset or category in DabbleDB can be setup as an RSS feed. This means it can be imported into blogs, web pages, etc.. However, What would be interesting is if there was a front end web based GUI that could be fed these RSS feeds. This would allow for a very rich application cto be created on the internet. Adobe Flex is designed to accept feeds or “web services” into a GUI. We are currently investigating Flex and will write more on the topic. However, our previous experience with Adobe products is that they have a difficult learning curve (a la Dreamweaver, although that was developed by MacroMedia), we don’t want to have the UI development consume all of our time and that is a concern with using Adobe Flex.
Background
DabbleDB used to support the Javascript API for connecting to a GUI. However, they changed their emphasis. See the exerpt below from the DabbleDB JavaScript API guide.
http://dabbledb.com/help/guides/jsapi/
“Important note: The Javascript API for submitting data to your database is currently disabled on most databases. (It remains enabled for reading data.) We no longer recommend using the API for submitting data. Instead, please try using the Pages feature, which allows you to build forms without any coding. Pages forms can also be used to submit data programattically. For additional information, visit the User’s forum or contact us.”
The export feature of DabbleDB really shows its commitment to the semantic web (a framework that allows data to be shared and reused across applications, enterprise and community boundaries – W3C) These links allow the same data to be viewed a number of different ways. The RSS link is an interesting one. Although RSS is used primarily for news feeds, there is nothing to stop RSS from being used to transmit large datasets. We have been investigating this site to understand how it supports RSS management http://www.rssbus.com)
You can see how several of these look by selecting the links below.
http://symmetricalcontent.dabbledb.com/publish/symmetricalcontent/bbe5613e-c97c-43c7-8be7-713e6c1ed3b0/calendarview.txt
feed://symmetricalcontent.dabbledb.com/publish/symmetricalcontent/bbe5613e-c97c-43c7-8be7-713e6c1ed3b0/calendarview.rss
The entire database in DabbleDB is saved as a series of CSV files (one per category). Creating, downloading and viewing the backup can be understood from viewing the screenshots below.
