Feedback > Feedback

Why I don't use the forum regularly

(1/2) > >>

woodknot:
My main interest is knots, their synonyms and homonyms and incorrect name usage. To this end I have over he last few years been compiling a relational database (MS Access) union catalogue of knots, created by going through my knot books listing individual knots and the figure and page used in each book for each knot. This is nearly complete. My frustration with the forum has been reminded to me when I revisited, having included the major step of incorporating ABOK into the database, to see if the forum entries would fit in.
What has thrown me is the use by regular forum contributors of knot names which have not appeared in any of my published sources. Three examples encountered in my most recent visit are "Gnat" (?hitch), "Andalusian" (?hitch), and "Gleipnir" (?). There were probably other different ones in the earlier visits made shortly after I first registered with the forum and from time-to-time since then.
I know my library while comprehensive is not exhaustive, and I have a complete run of Knotting Matters, thanks to the CD, but have been unable to locate these terms.
Is there anyway that the forum can be scanned to find obscure names when encountered? I tried putting "Andalusian" into the search box and got nothing, not even the entry which had raised the problem.
I don't mind being ignorant, but the use of terms not available (apparently) outside the forum gives a feeling of exclusion

Wed:
Do you have any plans on releasing your database in a format accessible to general users?

SS369:

--- Quote from: woodknot on April 15, 2014, 12:24:37 PM ---My main interest is knots, their synonyms and homonyms and incorrect name usage. To this end I have over he last few years been compiling a relational database (MS Access) union catalogue of knots, created by going through my knot books listing individual knots and the figure and page used in each book for each knot. This is nearly complete. My frustration with the forum has been reminded to me when I revisited, having included the major step of incorporating ABOK into the database, to see if the forum entries would fit in.
What has thrown me is the use by regular forum contributors of knot names which have not appeared in any of my published sources. Three examples encountered in my most recent visit are "Gnat" (?hitch), "Andalusian" (?hitch), and "Gleipnir" (?). There were probably other different ones in the earlier visits made shortly after I first registered with the forum and from time-to-time since then.
I know my library while comprehensive is not exhaustive, and I have a complete run of Knotting Matters, thanks to the CD, but have been unable to locate these terms.
Is there anyway that the forum can be scanned to find obscure names when encountered? I tried putting "Andalusian" into the search box and got nothing, not even the entry which had raised the problem.
I don't mind being ignorant, but the use of terms not available (apparently) outside the forum gives a feeling of exclusion

--- End quote ---

Good day woodknot.

If you will try again using the search function on the main page http://igkt.net/sm/index.php your results will differ possibly. Here are the results I got for Andalusian. http://igkt.net/sm/index.php?action=search2 The other names work as well.

I suspect that you won't find these searched for terms/names in KM because they probably have not been submitted by the originators.(?) These three knots that you site are new and were presented to our community for scrutiny, etc.,  and most likely not wide spread around the Internet and so the exclusivity exists. Makes sense?
And the browser (Google, etc.) searches bring the searchers here as well.
Not perfect, but it does work.

If there comes a situation where you need some help, please feel free to contact me, or pose the request in an appropriate thread. I am sure some helpful member will do their best to give aid.

I too am interested in your database and if you will be sharing it with interested people?

SS

roo:

--- Quote from: woodknot on April 15, 2014, 12:24:37 PM ---My main interest is knots, their synonyms and homonyms and incorrect name usage. To this end I have over he last few years been compiling a relational database (MS Access) union catalogue of knots, created by going through my knot books listing individual knots and the figure and page used in each book for each knot. This is nearly complete. My frustration with the forum has been reminded to me when I revisited, having included the major step of incorporating ABOK into the database, to see if the forum entries would fit in.
What has thrown me is the use by regular forum contributors of knot names which have not appeared in any of my published sources. Three examples encountered in my most recent visit are "Gnat" (?hitch), "Andalusian" (?hitch), and "Gleipnir" (?). There were probably other different ones in the earlier visits made shortly after I first registered with the forum and from time-to-time since then.
I know my library while comprehensive is not exhaustive, and I have a complete run of Knotting Matters, thanks to the CD, but have been unable to locate these terms.
Is there anyway that the forum can be scanned to find obscure names when encountered? I tried putting "Andalusian" into the search box and got nothing, not even the entry which had raised the problem.
I don't mind being ignorant, but the use of terms not available (apparently) outside the forum gives a feeling of exclusion

--- End quote ---

Hold on a second.  Have you ever considered that some knot names aren't in wide use in books or magazines because they are fairly new?

If you check the date stamp on the Gnat Hitch for example, you'll see that it's barely two years old:

http://notableknotindex.webs.com/gnathitch.html

And it should turn up in web queries.

xarax:
   Since Stone Age, humans are tying knots long ( sometimes dozens of thousands of years ! ) before they bother to name or represent them. Perhaps this could had changed, if there was an automatic knot-tying machine ( something like a more complex sewing machine ), which would had tied all the possible simple knots discovered by mathematicians... I suppose that the bone-made awl and sewing-needle users 60.000 years ago were tying half-hitches and overhand knots all the time. So, if we are not believers in some extreme variation of medieval nominalism, where there are no real things, but only names ( Lat. "nomen", Gr. "ονομα" ), we should expect that there would be knots discovered but not named yet - or, if they have been named, their names would not appear in ABoK  :) or any other "published source".     
   Moreover, I believe that what most users of the internet think as "published sources", means, sadly, only "published sources in English"... I have not seen anybody to compile a "relational database" of the knots tied and named by other sea-faring people, that had used them in sailing ships even before English-speaking people : Greek, Chinese, Viking, Portuguese, Spanish, French, Dutch... We have written references and descriptions of many knots in other languages, which do not appear in fast-knot ( like "fast-food" ) web sites and coffee table books, offering cheap knot recipes - nowadays served with colourful / spectacular pictures and animations, to attract more customers.
   Practical knots are tools, so the study of their origins and development belongs to the History of Technology. Now, technology is different from science in many ways, one of which is that it evolves very rapidly, and the many new inventions are comparable, and measurably better than the old ones. The result is that there is less public interest in the history of technology than in the history of science, and there are fewer scholars involved in it, fewer books, fewer articles, etc. So, I do not expect any extensive scientific work in the history of practical knots coming soon  :) ... Also, most people are interested in tools as means to their ends, to "do the job" - the fact that there are other people, of other occupations or nationalities, that do the same job using other tools, named otherwise, seems only secondary to them. There are Japanese, Russian and American fishermen fishing the same fishes in the same seas - yet they use different knots for attaching their hooks on the fishing lines, for example, and, of course, even when they use the same knots, they call them differently.
   In particular, the Gleipnir was the greatest invention in practical knotting since the Zeppelin bend, I believe - although it could had been invented before the bowline ! ( it works based on the same mechanism, but it is more simple / primitive than the bowline, in that it does not uses the collar ). It was a matter of luck, and a privilege, for the participants in this Forum to learn this knot before the general public : this should not mean that people that do not participate in it should sense a "feeling of exclusion" ! An old or new knot belongs to everybody - after all, we like to imagine that it would had already been discovered by the intelligent inhabitants of many distant galaxies, because we do not believe that those long cylindrical flexible things we call "ropes" exist only on Earth !  :) Perhaps we should pay more attention to the correct information about knots in the web, indeed - most Wikipedia articles about knots, for example, are really lamentable, full of inaccuracies, mistakes, ignorance, myths, and even lies !       

Navigation

[0] Message Index

[#] Next page

Go to full version