[IAEP] 2 design proposals: home view, discoverable shortcuts

[forster at ozonline.com.au]

thanks for the comments

> > Tagging is good, but best for information which is impractical to
> > structure.
> 
> 
> I doubt that there is consensus here on this question. Does anybody know of
> any relevant empirical data?

I don't have anything empirical, I hope someone does.
I suspect you can run that argument any way depending what learning theory you subscribe to:
Constructivism would support hierarchies
Connectivism would support tagging

> > the needs of more sophisticated users. It might be good if the saving
> > behaviour could be changed from the control panel, defaulting to saving
> > everything for beginners but able to be configured so that advanced users
> > had more control.
> 
> 
> What control would you recommend? Honestly, I have a hard time imagining a
> system which I'd want the kids in my classroom to use which was anything but
> "Autosave everything, smart and powerful tools with relatively-safe defaults
> for deleting the old stuff". For instance, I'd love a "delete everything
> over a month old without tags outside this set of useless tags, except the
> last instance of each activity and anything in the last month" broom tool.

You could keep the default autosave for your class, what I am asking for is choice. The Windows default of save or discard on exit suits some.

> Have you seen http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Journal%2C_reloaded ?

Thanks for the reminder. Its difficult to see exactly what is proposed. For me, an important feature is that it expose some of the underlying file system, the hidden stuff behind the curtain. 

For example, I have been frustrated trying to email myself an attachment and upload it to a blog (or maybe it was download a file and mail it) because the filename was changed. I would like a file manager that gave me the ability to control file names and extensions.

Another example, I could not use a set of web pages off line because the directory tree was flattened, all the links broke.