Extension talk:Semantic Forms/Example

I'd like to know your opinions on how to name properties:

 * For Authors, why not call the property "Author" instead of "Was written by"?
 * For Genres, why not call the property "Genre" instead of "Has genre"?

Are there guidelines on how to name semantic properties?


 * Well, I like to name properties as prepositions (a) so it makes sense in a sentence, (b) so it's obvious what the relationship is, and (c) to differentiate them from template fields, which are probably called "Author", etc. There are no guidelines, but if you want to, you can think of that as a guideline. Yaron Koren 16:02, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

Great example -- next to do, a demo
Great example -- and tool. Can't wait to use it. Would be nice to have a 'demo' as well. Furthermore, would be nice to see how others are able to leverage these concepts at various other wikis. Rauterkus 12:27, 21 November 2008 (UTC)


 * Hi, did you see this section? Also, there are various links in the documentation to discoursedb.org, which currently serves as the main demo wiki. Yaron Koren 15:03, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

AddData
Hi, I made my first experiences with semantic mediawiki with this example - everything works fine except if I add data. If I add a book page I have a red link to its author - yes, but it doesn't point to the "Author" form - refresh page doesn't help. If I create a new page with Author form it's ok. Next problem is, that I don't see a list of the books from the author, but if i query the author via wiki-browser I get the list of books. My Wikiversion is 1.13. What could I have made wrong?? - --Ulli 757 10:27, 17 January 2009 (UTC)
 * if I make a new save from the author's page it works - but that's not what I want - --Ulli 757 10:20, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

Did you follow all the instructions exactly? Unfortunately, without access to your wiki, there's not much I can do to diagnose the problem. You could always create a public wiki on Referata, and try to duplicate the problem there. Yaron Koren 17:12, 18 January 2009 (UTC)
 * I tried to reproduce my bug on referata.com (once with "Bücher" and once with "Books" - probably I do something wrong but I don't know what. My book is "Lockruf der Wildnis" from Jack London, Jack London has a red Link on my books and if I click to Jack London I expect that the new page should open with the authors form, but the new page is empty - --Ulli 757 20:01, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

Hi - you need to add the "Has default form" call to the "Was written by" property. Was that part confusing in the instructions? Yaron Koren 01:07, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
 * Hi, It works fine now - have a lot of thanks - It was my mistake, I didn't recognize that I have to add the link manually; in the section "Enable links to form" I just read "nothing to change with MediaWiki 1.13" and didn't read the rest. (next time I will print english text instead of reading on monitor...) - thank you and best regards --Ulli 757 06:23, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Okay, cool. I can see how that text would be confusing - I tried to improve it just now. Yaron Koren 14:10, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
 * yes, nowbody is able to skip the text know :-) - I am very fascinated by this technique and after some more experience I will design a datastructure and implement Semantic Media Wiki and Semantic Form to my wiki. I watched some "semantic wikis". Some of them have a weak performance. I wonder if this is more a question of weak infrastructure or more a question of weak datadesign? In any case, I would like to warmly thank for your extension and semantic web - I didn't knew it before. - --Ulli 757 18:51, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

I don't know - performance isn't really my specialty. And I don't know if I can take credit for the semantic web, but thanks. :) Yaron Koren 03:03, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Property field
Instructions are fine, thank you very much. Just one question. When I'm going to choose the property it isn't there unless I created it first (is that right?). Andonce I create the property what type do I give it? SInce it's gonna create a link by itself, if I choose "Page" would it cause a conflict somewhere. Just confused about that. Thanks in advance for answer. --Mark 08:37, 13 December 2009 (UTC)


 * Yes, that's right. And if you're not sure what type to give a property, I would go with "String". Yaron Koren 02:22, 14 December 2009 (UTC)
 * Thanks Yaron, you paved my way to semantic SUCCESS :) --Mark 13:42, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

Author Template
Thanks a lot for the example, I am still learning on the SMW stuff, and am liking it.

There is a tiny bit of confsion when you say add data the add data page in SMW gives text on how to do it, etc. No big deal, I went to the category (in my case books) and clicked the form link from there and I went on fine.

I followed your steps to the T. I first entered an Author (James Fenimore Cooper) filled out the form. I then added a book (The Pioneers: The Sources of the Susquehanna; a Descriptive Tale) I then went to the Author's page and the book did not come up. I went to the template and saw that was being used in.

This is the "Author" template. It should be called in the following format:

Edit the page to see the template text.

The book did not show, I changed it to and it worked fine.

Could this be because of the namespace? mine should stil be (main).

The whole thing works fine, and having in it is not a problem for me specifically, just wanted to let you know. Thanks Ojmorales0002 01:05, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

Links in data added through the 'Form'
Hello again. Following your example, which is the best thing out there for SMW (honestly) since seeing it in action is great. When I add a Link to something I put in the Book or Author form, any field, I get Property name::LINK On the page

Should I be writting the links in another format?

Thanks Ojmorales0002 03:34, 20 December 2009 (UTC)


 * It sounds like SMW isn't parsing it - is SMW running at all? Yaron Koren 21:44, 20 December 2009 (UTC)
 * Hi Yaron, yes SMW is up and running, I've created a few of everything, Properties, Types, Forms, Templates, etc. I am trying to find soewhere to host it so I can show you better. Let me see if I can explain it better.

In your example there is a step to: Country of origin - you create a property called "Is from country", of type "String". I follow your instructions, they are fine, I use the form to create a page "Omar M" in the Country I put in USA. All works as planned. however if I enter: USA It shows me: Is from country::USA The link to create the USA article is a redlink. I know the Property type is String. I thought that String and Text accepted Wiki syntax. I just want to know either way, to find a solution for this. Thanks.

Also, if you dont mind I might post some 'Acutal Use' examples for some of the manual sections.

Ojmorales0002 01:01, 21 December 2009 (UTC)


 * Oh, I think I understand - you need to add "$smwgLinksInValues = true;" to your LocalSettings.php file. Yaron Koren 02:27, 21 December 2009 (UTC)
 * You rock. That fixed it, I can add Links and URLs. If you don't mind me asking where wouold I have found the information for that config line? Ojmorales0002 02:43, 21 December 2009 (UTC)


 * Cool. It's listed in the SMW Help:Configuration page - which is admittedly very hard to find. I'd recommend using the "SMW Quick Reference" guide, which I created - you can download it in both PNG and PDF form. Yaron Koren 11:38, 21 December 2009 (UTC)

Enable Links to forms Section?
In the part where it describes how to enable links to forms there is a reference to "was written by" property page? What and where is this property page?


 * It would be the page called "Property:Was written by". Yaron Koren 03:06, 28 July 2010 (UTC)

Edit in the same form
Good tutorial!

But I have some questions,when i go to Book form to add the book lets call it Lord of the Rings, i see the form Authors: Genres:Year: Number of pages ... I add the book, now when i added the book I go to that Lord of the Rings book page, now when i click edit button it shows me this code:

So here is my question, is there a way i can edit that Lord of the Rings book page in the same form that i added instead just seeing this code? Alex


 * Yes - it's explained in the example, although very briefly (probably too briefly). You need to set in both categories their respective as their default form - you should add something like " Has default form::Book " to the Books category, for instance. If you use Special:CreateCategory, there's an option for that. Yaron Koren 07:07, 24 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Thank you, it worked great!
 * Alex

Edit link for each field
If it is possible, is there a way that each field ex. Authors:, Genres:,... have its own edit link? For ex. if i want to edit specific field such as "Authors" i need to edit the whole article by clicking on "edit with form" instead i want to have "edit" link for each field, one for Authors, one for Geners and ect. I don't know maybe there is a special module to this module that provides this kind of feature.


 * I tried to use Book Form first and later realized that it just edits the book form and not the output of the information. So, then I saw a Template_Book, I tried editing the code by adding ==== around this code, so everything worked fine, a saw the [edit] link around the Authors, But, after clicking the edit link I realised that it just edits the variable and not the authors name, for ex. instead of seeing this |Authors=Mark Volkov i saw this | . So far I got stuck... any help is appreciated.


 * You can create additional forms that only contain that one field, and then have the page (via the template) link from each field in the page to the relevant form to edit that one field. Personally, I don't see the problem in just having one big form for anything, but that's a matter of taste. Yaron Koren 02:15, 1 November 2010 (UTC)


 * I didn't really fallowed this "... then have the page (via the template) link from each field in the page to the relevant form to edit that one field." Can you provide steps/tutorial demonstrating what you said above, lets say using authors field? If you have time that is. And, I also what to thank you for you help, not that you just helped me with my questions, but I also start to understand better mediawiki and semantic form extension.


 * The basic idea is, you create a bunch of "mini-forms", one for each field, and then have the page link to each one. Yaron Koren 14:02, 1 November 2010 (UTC)


 * Ok, so I created forms, and I still don't get this part "then have the page link to each one". Is it by copying the code from one of the form templates and placing it in the main page where all the mini forms will be placed?


 * Ow boy, ok so I tried to figure this step myself again and I think I failed, while I was looking at Create a property page I noticed that there an option similar to what your step is telling me to do, This property will link to pages that use the form: but it talks about linking properties to form, and nothing about forms linking to pages, so obviously I am in a wrong place. So, then I looked at this tutorial again, and focused on Enable links to forms step thinking maybe I should be adding type of the code like this Has default form::Form:Author to the page, maybe this is what you said by linking forms to pages, but again this code tag doesn't make sense. Once again I am stuck.