-----Original Message-----
From: Karl Frank [mailto:karl@fsarch.com]
Sent: Sunday, October 03, 1999 8:55 PM
To: Roy Roebuck; 'W.M. Jaworski'; 'Andrius Kulikauskas'; remigijus.gustas@kau.se; kkaw@multicentric.com; jremmel@ucsd.edu; roy(AT)one-world-is.org; valis@vil.ktu.lt
Subject: Re: "caring about thinking" relevance for enterprises. Are we all on the same sheet of music, or even playing the same musical score?

In this context, the implication of an organization with different individuals in different roles is important, and the definitions Roy favors, though the appropriate ones in other respects, make the organization out to be a _business_ organization.  A government or community organization is definitely to be included whether or not it is regarded as a "business" (and I for one do not think it is -- but I am agreeing with Roy in that they are to be regarded as fitting the appropriate definition.

An organization with a shared purpose, whether commercial or scientific, is denoted.

The reason this is  important is that it is the isolated thinker who may be breaking radically new ground does not want tools, it is the thinker trying to communicate with others in the context of a shared subject domain and a shared purpose within that domain, this is the context in which caring about thinking can use some help.

At 05:04 PM 10/3/99 -0400, Roy Roebuck wrote:

Hi:

A long and detailed response follows.  See my numbered comments to the preceding message below, as well as tagged <rer>comments<\rer> embedded in the messages.

Roy Roebuck

1.  What definition of "enterprise" is to be used (see below and at ../dem/slides/img003.gif) , and what is the corresponding definition of "business"?  This clarification is doubly important because the participants in this effort (enterprise) are not only coming from different functional/technical backgrounds, but from different cultures with different languages.  For example, an enterprise can encompass organized activity at any scale, from individual to global.  It can encompass any business purpose such as crime, economic, environmental, governance, etc.  I recommend business definition #1 and enterprise definitions #1 and # 2, unless someone suggests that governments or communities do not conduct "business" and are not enterprises.
--------------------------
http://www.gurunet.com
en·ter·prise (en't?r-priz') n.
1.  An undertaking, especially one of some scope, complication, and risk.
2. A business organization.
3. Industrious, systematic activity, especially when directed toward profit: Private enterprise is basic to capitalism.
4. Willingness to undertake new ventures; initiative: Through want of enterprise and faith men are where they are, buying and selling, and spending their lives like serfs (Henry David Thoreau).
-------------------------
http://www.gurunet.com
busi·ness (biz'nis)
n. (Abbr. bus.)

1.a. The occupation, work, or trade in which a person is engaged: the wholesale food business.
1.b. A specific occupation or pursuit: the best designer in the business.
2. Commercial, industrial, or professional dealings: new systems now being used in business.
3. A commercial enterprise or establishment: bought his uncle's business.
4. Volume or amount of commercial trade: Business had fallen off.
5. Commercial dealings; patronage: took her business to a trustworthy salesperson.
6.a.  One's rightful or proper concern or interest: The business of America is business (Calvin Coolidge).
6.b.  Something involving one personally: It's none of my business.
7. Serious work or endeavor: got right down to business.
8. An affair or matter: We will proceed no further in this business (Shakespeare).
9. An incidental action performed by an actor on the stage to fill a pause between lines or to provide interesting detail.
10. Informal. Verbal abuse; scolding: gave me the business for being late.
11. Obsolete. The condition of being busy.

n.attributive.
Often used to modify another noun: a business computer; a business suit.

SYNONYMS: business, industry, commerce, trade, traffic. These nouns apply to forms of activity that have the objective of supplying commodities. Business pertains broadly to commercial, financial, and industrial activity: decided to go into the oil business. Industry is the production and manufacture of goods or commodities, especially on a large scale: the computer industry; the arms industry. Commerce and trade refer to the exchange and distribution of goods or commodities: laws regulating interstate commerce; involved in the domestic fur trade; foreign commerce (or trade). Traffic pertains broadly to commercial dealings but in particular to businesses engaged in the transportation of goods or passengers: renovated the docks to attract shipping traffic. The word may also suggest illegal trade, as in narcotics: Traffic in stolen goods was brisk. See also synonyms at affair.
--------------------------

Is a common language, and consequently a common dictionary and then lexicon to be identified and used?  I suggest English because of its current prevalence on the Web and it's increasing ubiquity, and a online English dictionary.  From this we can begin building an online lexicon.

I recommend the use of a web content annotation, discussion, and co-authoring tool such as ThirdVoice (http://www.thirdvoice.com) to create an iterative-build lexicon and other group products at the Michiu Sodas web site.  I also suggest use of web-based threaded discussions such as those provided by the Ultimate Bulletin Board (http://www.ultimatebb.com)  To the group as whole, I am suggesting these and other collaborative technologies because old/low-tech solutions such as email,  phone, and listserves are slow, ineffective, inefficient, and burdensome/overloading in a distributed collaborative endeavor such as this.  If these older technologies are the ones you are most comfortable with, then I encourage you to learn to live with the discomfort of the edge or prepare to become bypassed/redundant by those whom embrace the flexibility, creative power, and responsive speed that high-tech provides.  I am taking this approach because I've used this type of technology since 1981 and have had lots of time to evaluate (professionally, academically, and personally) which technologies give the biggest collaborative return.

As an analogy, think of yourselves as explorers mapping a new territory, not homesteaders seeking to civilize the wild.  If there is benefit in civilizing the wild world of our technology and its influence on our species, our economy will do this, so we need to be able to elaborate on the benefits of the world we seek and envision in a way they understand (samples of what's possible and maps to where more is available).

2.  Even more fundamental that the terms "enterprise" and "business" are the terms "caring" and "thinking".  The usage of "caring" indicates emotional concern.  The usage of "thinking" indicates human internalized information processing or creation activity, instead of anything related to enterprise or business.  When recognizing that the organizers of this effort (this enterprise) are not native English speakers, there is a need to validate that their phrase "caring about thinking" is clearly translated.  It could perhaps be translated, as shown by the context of their usage, as "directed empirical and naturalistic research on organization of information".

---------------------
http://www.gurunet.com
car·ing (kâr'ing)
adj. Usage Problem.
1. Feeling and exhibiting concern and empathy for others: We formed Generations United to argue for a caring society (Jack Ossofsky).
---------------------
http://www.gurunet.com
think·ing (thing'king)
n.
1. The act or practice of one that thinks; thought.
2. A way of reasoning; judgment: To my thinking, this is not a good idea.

adj.
Characterized by thought or thoughtfulness; rational: We are thinking animals.
---------------------

3. Until this common ground is established through collaborative or directive action, or some combination thereof, this group faces the risk of strong and potentially irreconcilable divergence of its energies and capabilities.  Once the kernel of a lexicon is formalized, then a taxonomy of subjects related to the group's interest can be established, published, referenced, and maintained.  I recommend XML, Java, and UML as the underlying technologies of the group's "collaborative engine and store".  >From this, the group will be able to build up the "tree" of subjects, the "star" of associations between tagged subjects and subject content, and the "arrow" of changed content and structure in the "tree" and "star" components.  Andrius' terms of "sequence, hierarchy, and relationships" correspond to our discussion early this year of the common design patterns of information structures I've named "arrow, tree, and star". (../dem/slides/img033.gif  )


4.  See tagged <rer>comments<\rer> as insertions below.


Roy Roebuck
Enterprise Engineer
One World Information System
roy(AT)one-world-is.org

and

Principal Information Engineer
SAIC, Global Command and Control Support Division
roy.e.roebuck@cpmx.saic.com

-----Original Message-----
From: W.M. Jaworski [mailto:gsinc@gen-strategies.com]
Sent: Friday, October 01, 1999 5:03 AM
To: Andrius Kulikauskas; remigijus.gustas@kau.se; kkaw@multicentric.com;
jremmel@ucsd.edu; roy(AT)one-world-is.org; karl@fsarch.com;
valis@vil.ktu.lt
Subject: Re: How is "caring about thinking" relevant for enterprises?


Approach and Hard Work
-----------------------------------
As a team we are able to deliver (virtual laboratory, generic templates |
structures | schemata ...) provided that as individuals we are willing and
able to communicate STRUCTURED knowledge.

Please review PPT presentation at:
http://www.gen-strategies.com/papers/agile/EnterpriseStrategist and PPT
presentations
listed in references.
Structured  knowledge is reposited in P2S format (XLS files) and attached to
PPT presentations for downloading.

PPT presentation drafts and P2S models are used in my course at Concordia
University.

To manipulate P2S models a specialized system is required. For small models
standard MS Excel is sufficient.

Domain
-----------

In a nutshell I am supporting Remigijus Gustas' focus. Namely:

(1) ". The problem is that nobody can understand its semantic structure,
>dependencies.
<rer>This was my thinking when I first began working with libraries 32 year ago in my early schooling period (../dem/slides/img016.gif ), and has carried forward to the Internet.  I disagree with the assertion that "nobody can understand", but rather counter that the old structure models for visualizing these dependencies don't work as we move to recording and manipulating more complex information structures (../dem/slides/img090.gif ). Like any natural thing (i.e., chaos), it's too big, detailed, and dynamic to directly perceive it all, so we use tools that allow us to aggregate, approximate, and present (i.e., order) the information at higher and higher levels of abstraction.  For examples of implementations of this approach see the tools at http://www.inxight.com.

Our physical libraries, and most of our Web of recorded and mental information, are not structured deeply enough to be of much use without dedicated searching and researching, thus making "scholarship" a tedious task.  By "not structured", I mean that information carriers, containers, and content are not addressable (e.g., via tags) deeply enough to make the information directly accessible (for creation, connection, processing, maintenance, and presentation) at much more than the "container" level.

As a result we get the "stacks" of books/magazines/collections in a physical library with only a card catalog and a library numbering system to guide us in our search for information.  On the Web we get even less capability, equivalent to a library with incomplete card catalog, no encyclopedias or dictionaries, and incompatible and thus inconsistent numbering systems.  This yields a Web of ineffective and inefficient index-based search engines and subsequent human or automata search compilers, with increasingly effective and efficient use of subject taxonomies (Yahoo and similar subject trees, Verity Agent, Oracle Context, Netscape Compass with GrapeVINE, etc.), and increasingly valuable taxonomy-selection-based profile/personalization/customization/privacy/knowledge-packaging (new "online portal") techniques.  See ../dem/slides/img114.gif .  >From an enterprise perspective, part of this structuring process involves moving information out of an enterprise participant's mind into an increasingly structured and shared form (http://www.brint.com/wwwboard/messages/3155.html).  It is my assertion that the cost of deeply tagging, indexing, saving searches, categorizing searches, and profiling use of all global enterprise and Web content will pay for itself in increased learning, understanding, decision support, and adaptive management within a couple of years, because the technology is already in place.  What's missing is the understanding that it is possible and the will to learn and do it.

Over the past 17 years I have come to view our recorded-information content as structured, semistructured, and unstructured, progressing from very simple "flat" structures to very rich "multicentric" structures (../dem/slides/img095.gif ).  I view our mental-information content, organization, and navigation along the same lines.  In all cases the containers of information (recorded or mental) need to be connected so that interchange/education or exchange/economy can take place.  See my posting at http://144.214.54.67/group1/_gp1/00000015.htm in a threaded discussion on KM.

The tree/star/arrow structures, when packaged together, represent a particular knowledge "object" (also known as "expertise" within a specific body of knowledge) which consists of data (tree/star/arrow structure of content), properties (metadata about knowledge object) and methods (procedures for manipulating knowledge object).  These methods can be used to "call" a knowledge object for some interaction with its content or structure. This is the underlying concept for "Topic Maps", the Natrificial Brain product, the Infomap product, MindMan's Mindmap product, and my own Total Enteprise Management concept/design/prototypes. In this regard, it appears that XML-schema will provide the tree structure, XLL (XML-Path and XPointer) will provide the star of links to node addresses, XSL will provide the customization (transformation/formatting) of the tagged and linked content, WebDAV with RDF (i.e., versioning) will provide the arrow of change tracking/projection/comparison, XMI (XML+UML+WBEM) will provide the notation and method for model and metadata storage and use, Java and other ubiquitous processing mechanisms will provide the engine, and LDAP-based PKI will provide the authentication service for appropriate access (need to know/show/hide/act/avoid).<\rer>

Currently the Internet has no opportunity to capture
>business process models."
<rer>What about XMI at www.dmtf.org? <\rer>

(2) "  we can study and
>define graphical models to describe e-commerce or public structures on
>the Internet (XML can be used to store these structures). "

(3) "The overall topic of
>business process modeling in connection to Internet applications is very
>hot."
<rer>I disagree that "business process modeling in connection to Internet applications is very hot".  I've been doing "business process modeling" for almost two decades, and it is never "hot", just frequently visible until the enterprise faces its next operational crisis.  From a "business" perspective, anything that reduces operational crises or provides better (less time or cost, more quality, etc.) operational response capability is hot.  I would say that determining what is "hot" enough during a given month for this group to pursue is part of the adaptive strategic management direction and control process described at ../stratman/Strategic_Performance_Management_Guide.htm .<\rer>

(4)   ?????

Specifics
-------------

For next interaction


Regards

WMJ


-----Original Message-----
From: Andrius Kulikauskas <ms@ms.lt>
To: remigijus.gustas@kau.se <remigijus.gustas@kau.se>; kkaw@multicentric.com
<kkaw@multicentric.com>; jremmel@ucsd.edu <jremmel@ucsd.edu>;
roy(AT)one-world-is.org <roy(AT)one-world-is.org>; karl@fsarch.com
<karl@fsarch.com>; valis@vil.ktu.lt <valis@vil.ktu.lt>;
gsinc@gen-strategies.com <gsinc@gen-strategies.com>
Date: Friday, October 01, 1999 12:58 AM
Subject: How is "caring about thinking" relevant for enterprises?


>To: Remigijus Gustas, KK Aw, Jeff Remmel, Roy Roebuck, Karl Frank,
>Valentinas Kiauleikis, W.M. Jaworski,
>
>Hello,
>     I am writing this letter to ask for your thoughts on formulating an
>objective for our laboratory that would relate to the needs of
>enterprises.
<rer>Is it time for objectives?  The progression of enterprise management activities proceeds from Mission, to Vision, to Goals, to Objectives/Measures, to Strategies, to Current Operations Awareness and Control or to New Initiatives/Requirements, to Performance Assessment, to Course Correction.  See ../stratman/Strategic_Performance_Management_Guide.htm. Stepping outside that sequence leads to fragmentation of effort and loss of focus for those involved.<\rer>

The Minciu Sodas is devoted to "caring about thinking".
>That is our mission!  It covers four goals: clarifying reasons for
>thinking, providing tools for thinking, developing structures for
>thinking, promoting formats for thinking.  We pursue these goals by
>formulating concrete objectives.  Some objectives that I feel we have
>made some progress on: creating an import/export standard for aggregates
>of notes, putting together toolkits for thinkers, and designing virtual
>laboratories.  These are objectives that make concrete our mission of
>caring about thinking.
<rer>As stated above, we need clear and accepted definitions first before we can unequivocally state the mission.  Who's mission is it?  Who are the stakeholder and have they signed up for that mission?  The phrase "caring about thinking" might describe a purpose and lead into a vision of what you impact you seek to have, but not why this group exists.  The four goals given are closer to mission statements than goals.  Goals must be quantitatively or qualitatively achievable, as illustrated in the preceeding hyperlink, else they are vision.<\rer>

>     I meet more and more people who would like to work on an objective
>that would result in a qualitative leap in how and why enterprises
>function.  I have not managed to formulate such an objective that would
>be a straightforward consequence of our mission of "caring about
>thinking".  I am therefore offering you this challenge.  What we believe
>will happen!
<rer>"how and why enterprises function" is a vague pointer to management science.  If you want this answer, look there.<\rer>


>     You can reply to all, or just to me (I assume your replies are in
>the public domain, unless you state otherwise) and I will include
>excerpts in our next Investigator Update.
>     Yours,
>   Andrius Kulikauskas
>   Director
>   Minciu Sodas laboratory
>   +1 (619) 881-2667
>   http://www.ms.lt
>   ms@ms.lt
>
>*************************
>I quote an excerpt from Remigijus Gustas' letter:
>
>I think your idea and contact with the HP people is important. Any
>laboratory can be regarded as an enterprise (so it is an enterprise
>modeling problem as well). To understand how it works, we need to
>describe its services, customers, internal actors, their problems and
>goals (ideas), etc.
<rer>See ../dem/slides/sld092.htm  and ../stratman/Strategic_Performance_Management_Guide.htm  to see an illustration of this concept.<\rer>

>I have a feeling that HP needs a method for description of Internet
>enabled business services (so-called business process models). The same
>problem has the overall Internet. Many Internet users are spending
>(rather loosing) a lot of time to find a relevant information. The
>problem is that nobody can understand its semantic structure,
>dependencies. Currently the Internet has no opportunity to capture
>business process models. Structures of THEBRAIN are too weak
>to support this idea.
<rer>Concur with the assessment of the Brain.  It's a nice associative/star navigation and organization tool (with virtually no hierarchical capability), but only for unstructured and semistructured data.  In the same vein, Windows Explorer is a nice hierarchical/tree navigation and organization tool (with weak associative capability via shortcuts), but also for unstructured and seminstructured data.  When version control is introduced, you get the ability to manage change/arrow navigation and organization.  LDAP, relational databases, and XML (with change logs) can provide tree/star/arrow navigation and organizaton for structured data.  What is now needed is a tool (probably following the TopicMap direction) that allows combined tree/star/arrow navigation and organization capabilities for unstructured, semistructured, and structured information.  This is what I've been envisioning, designing, and prototyping since 1982.<\rer>

>
>I think we can do a lot within this area. At least we can study and
>define graphical models to describe e-commerce or public structures on
>the Internet (XML can be used to store these structures). Once upon a
>time, something similar has been done in the database area
>(recall relational, hierarchical, network schemas). The overall topic of
>business process modeling in connection to Internet applications is very
>hot.
>
>
>

Karl Frank

daytime phone 617.428-3600

email: karlfrank@acm.org