user since
Mon May 21 2001 at 06:33:06 (23.5 years ago )
last seen
Tue Jun 28 2016 at 13:33:14 (8.4 years ago )
number of write-ups
10 - View mrob27's writeups (feed)
level / experience
0 (Initiate) / 96
mission drive within everything
basically just lurking now
specialties
technical writing of limited interest
school/company
mrob.com (Munafo Robotics)
motto
Recapitulation is fundamental and universal
most recent writeup
Radio Foyle
Send private message to mrob27

I am Robert Munafo.

Areas of expertise: Mandelbrot set

Other areas I can contribute to: large numbers, robotics, analysis of complex problems, anthropology, theology, distinctions of transcendental self-help movements, computer programming particularly under Linux, supercomputers

Hobbies and affiliations: extropian, Libertarian, inventing, etymology, open source, freedom of information,

For 12 years (2000-2012), the Google search "mrob mu-ency mira ries sdram" has found my home page, followed by this page.
Old mission drive within everything2 (2000-2012): "Deal with the fascism or else leave gracefully"
Material temporarily quarantined because of the ban on noding about noding:

If you wanted to find this node, what would you search for?

The E2 policy on titles seems to indicate that it is unacceptable to name a node by a description of what is discussed there. But sometimes that prevents users from finding the information.

For example, if you want to find out about sentences in foreign languages that use at least one of each letter in their alphabet, but don't know that such a thing is called a pangram, then you won't be able to find it unless there is also a node called sentence with all the letters.

The brief non-content titles policy seems to prevent a solution to this issue. And the ban on discussing noding techniques prevents the policy from being changed, because no-one is allowed to speak out about it.

Some ASCII formatting tests

h6 code
h6 pre
sm pre

URLs die, but keywords live forever

optimally focused keywords

In web pages, as in all writing, it is important to acknowledge sources and provide references to material that is supplemental to your own work. On the internet it is natural to use URLs in your references (in addition to the standard author, title, date, and so on) so that your reader can immediately read your source.

However, URLs had a very poor reliability record during their first 10 years and the situation is unlikely to improve. Many of your readers will find that the URL does not work.

When the URL fails, the reader can go to a search engine. However, they will probably have little to search on aside from the author, title, date, and perhaps one or two direct quotes you used in your writing. Unfortunately, they will usually find that this is not enough to find the source online. It usually finds many other references by other writers who have quoted the same source, perhaps even using the same direct quotes you did.

There ought to be a way to tell the search engine "I only want the original source material, not quotes and references". And there is.

optimally focused keywords are keywords that, when used in a search, will only find copies of a desired text and nothing else. While this is not possible for all texts, it is possible for almost all texts.

How to find optimally focused keywords

Find the desired text online.

You want your keywords to find something -- so,

Look for the rarest words in the text.

Use at least one proper noun.

There are many huge web pages that contain lists of all the words in the English language. If your keywords are all in the list, the list will show up as a match for a search with your keywords. However, those word lists are typically "dictionary files" (such as the UNIX file /usr/dict/words)

Keep adding rare words until your searches only find the one thing you want them to find

Remove words that don't need to be there

This might seem surprising, but after adding words until your search is unambiguous, you usually end up with one or more keywords that can be deleted. Why? Consider this: Your keywords weren't unambiguous until you added the last one. Therefore, you know that last one was important. But maybe some of the earlier ones weren't. Test each one by trying to remove it and checking the result. You will usually find one or two that can be removed without making the search ambiguous.

Test with multiple search engines.

By using more search engines, you cover a greater part of the internet. You will have a harder time finding a set of keywords that works, but once you do find it, the result will have a better quality ratio over the long term.