Hypercompendia

Just so I have the info here for future information, one of the mistakes I made that caused trouble for me in putting a Storyspace project online was in the way I had filled out the url on the template. It was, believe it or not, a missing forward slash. What I did was create a file in my Lunar cPanel named ‘BoB’ in the uploads folder of wp-content and after creating an export file for the project in Storyspace, uploaded the individual files (I know, I could’ve ftp’ed the whole BoB folder instead) through the Lunar file manager upload. In Storyspace, I filled in the url as: https://susangibb.net/blog2/wp-content/uploads/BoB/  (That last slash was the one I’d missed originally).

Then, in Pages – My Work, I added a link to the first page of the project.

I used the very simple piece of “A Bottle of Beer” since there was little that could go wrong (forgetting about the Spanish letter accents!) and I’m glad I did so because the “next” and “previous” are still a mystery as to how they’re working a bit off. With a piece such as “Paths” with its more complicated link patterns I’ll have to figure out some of the quirks of the process before I attempt putting it online.  I’d also like to see if I can add the images in which I’ve sort of left out in this first attempt.

One of the main reasons that I wanted to set up my own sites away from Typepad’s restrictions was to be able to offer some of my own work online, in particular, the hypertext work done in Storyspace so that it could be read.

Well, I finally was able to export one of my pieces, A Bottle of Beer, originally worked in Hypertextopia and transferred to the Storyspace format so that it was more available to my own whims. Though it’s basically a linear piece that was worked specifically for the Hypertextopia form of hypertext using ‘shards’ or what may be considered ‘asides,’ it was easily put into the Storyspace format. And today I was able to export the pieces into html format via the Storyspace templates, upload it here into the Pages-My Works part of this weblog.

There are some kinks to work out; some of the links point to a 404 page and I suspect it has to do with the titles of the nodes. Another problem seems to be the incorrectness of the links show as ‘next’ and ‘previous’ but I seem to recall Steve Ersinghaus having had that problem when he first exported a file and so I may find an easy answer to that if he recalls it. At any rate, despite the problems, it’s here.

(Posted originally at Spinning 01/02/09)

As always, I read and write with the basic idea of borders, nodes,
times and spatial levels in mind since messing around with a bit of
hypertext and interactive fiction some years back. One thing that hit
me along with all the other editing done in reading and reading and
reading my own work was the notion of the separation of time and place
via nodes or lexias that is the hypertext way. Perhaps because the past
in this piece is enclosed within the face of a four-slice toaster, a
visual space that separates the events; past and present, and the two
women who are so much alike.

I don't really do a good job of
hypertext writing, using it not to its complexity of levels of story,
so not really getting everything out of it for the reader's benefit, I
suppose. But even on the simplest mapping of two or three or four main
story paths, I cannot fail to see the past as an ongoing story that is
not only closely related to the present (the present becoming the past
in the flash of a nanosecond) but is responsible for it as it plays out
toward the future.

The other main appeal (for me) of hypertext
is the simultaneous happening of time within different space. Easier
put: I'm sitting here in CT typing on my laptop, but what's Willie
doing and where?

This particular story is not prime for hypertext, but perhaps all stories contain the possibilities.

Steve Ersinghaus reminds us of the late June Hypertext '09 conference to be held in Torino, Italy. Steve will be part of the program committee and headed a workshop at the Hypertext '08 event in Pittsburgh, PA this past summer. Mark Bernstein of Eastgate Systems is once again chairing the Hypertext and Community Track.

Deadlines are fast approaching for submission of papers so check out the site for information if you are planning on submitting a proposal or attending this exciting event.

It’s been done to a certain degree, is being done each time a user goes online: a story is being written following a series of plot points from hypertext link to link.  But…

What if a story was consciously plotted out from web pages? 

Simple example: A story called Dawn to Dusk with a starting point of a title page set up on a website, with a clickable link to an image, likely one found on Google of a dawn, then…

Okay, ran smack into my first problem: overriding the intended link found on the site. Also, overseeing the "reader’s" path or paths. 

One workable method (though likely not with the Google dawn above) is to carefully select each site to ensure that it not only bears linkage to a possible narrative flow, but also that a "clue" of sorts is given so that the reader is directed or guided on a preplanned thread.

Interesting.  But then again, this could also somehow be done on a single website through pages, but that’s cheating.

A hypertext poem in living color by Mary Ellen here.  Do we have a convert?  Will the next step be Storyspace?  Inquiring minds want to know…

It’s likely just my own lack of inspiration lately but this hypertext is coming along at a snail’s pace. As you can see from this latest mapview, the writer’s and the old woman’s stories are developing a stronger line and I’ve found places where they tie in and possibly link.

I still don’t feel comfortable about how I’m doing the linking and am rereading Mark Bernstein’s Patterns to see if that may help me.  I’m beginning to think that while I totally enjoy writing into the form, I’m just not mentally geared to the process and perhaps linearity is more my speed.  But I like the concept of movement within a piece, and I love what hypertext does for backstory, setting, tense, and depth of character.  Only I just don’t have the mental alacrity to make use of the levels that hypertext is designed to perform.

A temporary character shows up:

…is getting a little weird:

I seem to be drawn–if ever so gently–to the old woman here; a minor character I thought.  She’s desolate, her world a bubble around her to float through the real world she no longer knows.  But bubbles are transparent, and sometimes she’ll see something that will make her reach out…and draw back in.  Because a bubble is also a wall.

Haven’t been inspired to work on this piece for a while, yet in the middle of nailing a corner together in the frameshop, I got this:  She ran her hand along the edge of summer…  Which with a bit of coaxing became this:

She ran her hand along the edge of summer, touching the overhead branches that drooped with the weight of the sun. A shiver shook her bones, sent them to sing like a tuning fork plucked by the long reach of September.  Cold wind remembered nibbled away at her skin.  She paused to button the front of her sweater, her fingers melting in the mink coat her mind wore.

I need to read McCarthy, Gay, poetry.  I’m wandering too far from the fountain with the narratives I’m currently reading.  I need to read more hypertext as well.  We are what we eat; what our mind chews on and swallows, what makes us smack our lips with delight.