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commit d3afdec093f60ee881c5fd871c0764380909f7e2b5d81a811b331db40be24497
Author: yihanwu1024 <yihanwu1024>
Date: Sat Jun 25 00:00:00 2022 +0000
create article about the central role of ontology in information systems
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+<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
+<article xmlns="http://docbook.org/ns/docbook" xml:id="2d69104010e43f15e72dd618a14af6d56cdac94587db74b98cc18517e1c9e650">
+<title>Ontology Is Essential</title>
+<para>At certain times I notice that, although our thinking process is quite arbitrary, there is definitely an overall tendency to form structures, which then play an essential role in thinking.
+Here is one simple example for people who have experienced programming.</para>
+<para>Any advanced algorithm would involve data structures.
+But prior to thinking about an algorithm problem, one obviously cannot know what data structure to use.
+Thinking about the problem would gradually reveal the structure, and after that, any algorithms immediately become apparent or at least more organized by the structure.
+The 5th rule in <link xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink" xlink:href="https://users.ece.utexas.edu/~adnan/pike.html">Rob Pike's 5 Rules of Programming</link> says:</para>
+<blockquote>
+<para>Data dominates.
+If you've chosen the right data structures and organized things well, the algorithms will almost always be self-evident.
+Data structures, not algorithms, are central to programming.</para>
+</blockquote>
+<para>Let me generalize this to:</para>
+<blockquote>
+<para>Ontology/concept/structure dominates.
+If you've chosen the right ontology and organized things well, the actions will almost always be self-evident.
+Ontologies, not actions, are central to thinking.</para>
+</blockquote>
+<para>As this applies to human thinking in general, it of course applies to user experience (design).</para>
+<para>The technology industry has been trying really hard to create a so-called better experience by hiding what designers deem as unnecessary, technical, or boring details.
+While this claim does not appear to be a problem, the actual practice has a giant one.
+What designers are trying to do is removing every piece of structured conceptual element, or ontology, so that users can accomplish tasks just by thinking with verbs, like “call mom”.</para>
+<para>The removal of associated ontologies will, as shown in the programming analogy above, degrade user understanding.
+If users try to understand with their own sense, they will also be frustrated by the fact that the design does not expose those ontologies as if they were not important.
+In fact, most phrases we encounter in user experience design are specific and complex enough to be only understandable with hints of ontology.
+Deciding to hide them in this case is simply unwise and results in both designers and users not knowing what they are doing.</para>
+<para>Unfortunately and dangerously, by encouraging users to think with simple verbs, like “call mom”, technology almost treats them as if they are unable to think.
+This precisely extends to a very bad future universally recognized by thinkers.
+The next decade of user experience design should bring a new level of integration with ontology.
+Fortunately, when ontologies are thoughtfully expressed, they can be very easily understood, as certain pieces of graphical interaction design have demonstrated.</para>
+<para>We also need to reorganize our existing system.
+For example, “deleting” should rather be “moving to trash” because it eliminates one specific name of an action that naturally follows its related ontology.</para>
+</article>