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KWIC (was Re: Word Indexing using a Master Doc and having non-sequential pagination)
Subject:KWIC (was Re: Word Indexing using a Master Doc and having non-sequential pagination) From:Geoff Hart <ghart -at- videotron -dot- ca> To:TECHWR-L <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com>, Dick Margulis <margulisd -at- comcast -dot- net> Date:Thu, 19 Jan 2006 10:05:31 -0500
Dick Margulis responded to my dissin' of concordances: <<So raise your
hand if you remember KWIC indexes. Before there was online
documentation--before there was online anything, as a matter of
fact--IBM distributed software for generating a "Key Word In Context"
index. It generated a one-line record for every word in a text file.
The record consisted of the word, followed by the succeeding few words,
then a comma (I think), then the preceding few words. At the right was
the locator for where that word appeared.>>
Of course! In fact, I wrote an article on using these concordances in
editing: Hart, G. 2005. A less-foolish consistency: more uses for
concordances in editing. Intercom December:34–35.
Among other things, concordances can be used to test an index (to
ensure that it's comprehensive). But the key is the context: indexes
must communicate that.
<<But seriously, suppose you had a situation where searching was not
possible, that is, where only hardcopy was going to be accessible, and
where you did not have the budget for a real index. Would a KWIC index
be more useful than a simple concordance?>>
Yes, but that's not saying much. The usual context is usually only a
few surrounding words, and that means the context may not be clear,
particularly in procedural information. Moreover, it would be difficult
to present in a usable form. How would you alphabetize the keywords,
for instance, when they're embedded in the midst of a sentence?
Presumably you'd use them as headings, with the contexts provided as
subheadings.
My take: there's no substitute for a real, human-generated index.
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