> [...]
>
> The commonality here is that some documents should only appear in
> dialog boxes (when the browser supports it) as opposed to appearing
> and being dealt with as full-fledged regular documents.
The NeXTStep browser gets a similar look progressively, by
resizing the window to exactly surround the document if it will fit on a
screen, and then by eliminating both the scroll bar and the "resive bar'
(NeXTStep window decoration) if the document is also not editable.
> The advantages in implementing this kind of thing are (1) WWW becomes
> a little more like some other current systems (notably Intermedia,
> with the effectively one-to-many links), boosting its ability to take
> over the functions that other systems have provided up until now, and
> (2) navigational disorientation is lessened when minor references
> (e.g., to glossary entries or menus of anchors) are instantiated
> onscreen as minor GUI elements.
Another possibility is to allow for a 'collection" object which is separate
from a document and more constrained, would have a simple on-screen
representation, would map to gopher menus, newsgroups, lists, etc.
> So how about allowing a tag (say, <transient>) to be included in the
> header of an HTML document to specify this property?
>
> Marc
I worry that you will find that there is a continuous gradient between the
transient and the non-transient, with many stages in between.
> ps Specifically for the glossary system, I'm thinking of having a
> regular glossary document with all the entries in a list and then
> having a special server shell script strip (say that three times fast)
> out a given entry when it's needed, adding the <transient> flag while
> constructing a document for the entry on the fly.
>
this is what Mike Sendall's STING gloassary is. (See link from CERN page).
Tim