Who can resist a book with such a title? And with a lemur on the cover? Not I. Searching is an ancient problem, going back to our hunting and gathering days. This book turns the problem inside out and examines it from the point of view of the objects being searched for.
turns the problem inside out and examines it from the point of view of the objects being searched for.How do we organize things so we can find them? I've written a lot of database retrieval systems, and the process is fairly simple. The customer says "we need to search by name or account number". The account number is simple, the name is more complicated due to inconsistent spelling, but the solutions are well known.
Nowadays our information is on the web, and most of it is found by search engine, not by going to the home page and looking in the table of contents. A lot of information is found serendipitously while looking for something else. How do we organize for findability when we don't know who the searchers are, or what they're looking for, and someone else wrote the search engine?
The book has more questions than answers. In fact, the author begins by asking the reader how he found the book. I was looking for something else. I looked up something in the card catalog at the library, and didn't find it, but I browsed the shelves above and below the shelf that didn't have what I was looking for. The title, with its juxtaposition of two unusual words, jumped out at me.
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Finding things depends on having the appropriate sense to detect that which one wants to find. So, in order to be found, something would have to ensure that it had the appropriate characteristics that the seeker would recognize.
"When the student is ready, the teacher will appear!" usually relates to what is known in some circles as "serendipity" and in others as "psychic" development of inherent but untrained abilities.
Then there is the idea that when you think something you "magnetize" yourself to attract those things.
For example, how I bought an Apple computer:
My niece, Lisa, uses a mac and my daughter Liz wants to author cartoons, Lisa recommended that Liz look at getting a Mac. This was on a trip to Disneyland last December. Lisa also, legitametly, could get software at a discount for friends and family from work. In addition to buying some Microsoft software for my XP, I bought Office for Mac users and put it on my shelf as I realized that I would soon be buying a Mac.
I had now altered my search parameters to include Macs. I was unaware at the time, of the positive impact this would have on a long list of stuff I wanted or wanted to accomplish.
In February, I noticed an ad in a Fry's flyer for Macs. I go there fairly often and one of my requirements for shopping somewhere is that I know how to get there, and that the drive and parking are not too onerous. I went to Fry's with my friend, Pam, who buys dvds there. I was looking for another computer desk, trying to find one that didn't put my arms in awkward typing positions. On the way to the furniture department was the Apple department. There were some men/boys playing with the photo booth display. I just wandered around checking it out.
I asked our furniture guy about the Apples, he didn't know anything, so I left, but now had two positive things: Lisa's recommendation and knowing where the computers were sold. I wanted someone knowledgeable about these strange things to help me.
I talked to Liz about buying one for her, she was non-committal, since she was having fits with computer classes at the time. So, I decided that I would buy a Mac and learn how to use it so I could decide if it would be easier for her and then I could teach her how to use it over the summer.
It was now close to my birthday in February and I needed to buy a printer-fax for notary work, so, I went back to Fry's to get a machine and to see what else I could find out about Macs. I asked for help and the sales man called the Apple guy over. This was a man who had been using apples for many years. He explained many things to me. And I bought a MacBook and a printer/fax.
I was fiddling around with the Mac: loaded on the Office software and going on line wirelessly and stuff like that. It was really easy, but I still had a lot of unanswered questions.
About a week before Liz was to fly home for summer, my neighbor asked me to drive her to some store in Walnut Creek, to pick up a power cord for her grandson. She said she knew how to get there, but didn't like driving in Walnut Creek - well who does? On the way over I asked why we had to go to Walnut Creek and she said it was where the Apple Store was.
She showed me an easy way to get to the store that avoided most of the mess and it was right next to Barnes and Nobles with a big parking structure, so any additional trips there would kill two birds with one stone, which is something else I like to do.
I also found out that they have one-on-one tutoring, which is something I wanted for Liz, someone else to teach her computer stuff and for her to direct her computer questions. She needed a larger computer than I had, so we got her a Pro and signed her up for one-on-one tutoring. After working with her and a tutor who had basic sign skill but was able to communicate with her, I decided that I wanted one-on-one tutoring as well.
In a six month period I went from knowing nothing about the solution to many of my problems and frustrations to having had them resolved - transferring and editing old movies, scanning and organizing old photos, etc. someone near Liz in Hawaii who could help her learn how to use her computer, and when a friend showed us how we could video chat it took care of one of the core problems in communicating with a deaf person at a distance.
I didn't do any research or spreadsheets, I just recognized what I was searching for when it presented itself. Being helpful to my neighbor helped me more than it helped her, even though I didn't know at the time where we were going.
Also, Apple had everything in place for me when I finally got there. It makes me wonder ......many things!
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