Primer Project 2.0 - About

Welcome, to the Primer Project, version 2

History

Years 1996-2000, Primer Project 1.0

The original Primer Project (designated version 1) seems to have been a major ISSS project (in association with other institutions) taking place between the years 1996 - 2000.
The main concept seems to have been a large group of people and institutions, writing a handbook to help introduce and establish, key concept of systems and the system sciences. A large body of papers were produced, and presented in various ways. For example, as a Seminar, and as a as an online resource

It seems to have been:
- A Special Integration Group, of the International Society for the Systems Sciences (ISSS)
- Run a Seminar: "One-Whole", The First International Electronic Seminar On Wholeness, 2000.
- Over 200 papers
- "Created and maintained by Thomas Mandel, assisted greatly by Co-editor Heiner Benking, was inspired in part by the Association for the Scientific Study of Consciousness, (ASSC) first electronic seminar held during July of 1996."


2020, Summer, ISSS server migration

In the Summer of 2020, the ISSS was redesigning their website, and migrating their content to a new server. As part of the migration, the content of The Primer Project was reviewed

What was found:
There was much excellent content and design found in The Primer Project files, but over time, and possibly due to other factors such as isss.org content re-organisations, the original structure, usefulness and access of The Primer Project had been degraded:

- The content (and links) seemed to be distributed between several servers, some which no longer existed.
- There were many broken links, and missing files.
- There were duplicate files, and no obvious structure to the Primer Directory, and sub-directories, and filenames.
- There was a mixture of finished work, and work-in-progress, and slightly different versions of the same file.
- There was no clear ways to access and use the content of The Primer. Several pages were accessed in different ways.


Primer Project 2, 2020, Autumn

A project was undertaken to review the content of The Primer Project (version 1), and to make it more accessible (version 2).

The changes included:


• A new Welcome page was created, to bring readers up to date
• An INDEX of all found pages was created
• Some new navigation links were created
• A new page layout (a house style) to improve presentability, was formulated
• Some pages were edited to improve their readability.

It is a hope that The Primer Project will be reviewed, to learn from, and potentially build on, for future action.

 

Technical Notes

Source of The Primer Project Files

Copy taken from back end of ISSS.org server, and stored in a single archive file: "primer.zip", as part of the Summer 2020 migration of the ISSS.org server.

 

Files found, and Directory Structure:

Original Version 1 Directory structure:

			/primer
				/primer/911
					/primer/911/problematique
				/primer/backpapers
					/primer/backpapers/problematique
				/primer/data
				/primer/oldsite
				/primer/principle
					/primer/principle/gsj
				/primer/round
				/primer/seminarprimer
					/primer/seminarprimer/tetx
				/primer/sigdilog
				/primer/tetron
					/primer/tetron/tetron
						/primer/tetron/tetron/jophead
						/primer/tetron/tetron/papers
						/primer/tetron/tetron/United States Patent 4,286,330_files
				/primer/tetx
				

			NB. Many of the version 1 Files seem to be duplicated in multiple directories.
			

New Version 2 Directory structure:

			/primer (all the files of Version 1 above, some of which are updated to Version 2 formatting)
				/_v1_Archive
					(all the Directories and Files of Version 1 above)
					/primer/911
						/primer/911/problematique
					/primer/backpapers
						/primer/backpapers/problematique
					/primer/data
					/primer/oldsite
					/primer/principle
						/primer/principle/gsj
					/primer/round
					/primer/seminarprimer
						/primer/seminarprimer/tetx
					/primer/sigdilog
					/primer/tetron
						/primer/tetron/tetron
							/primer/tetron/tetron/jophead
							/primer/tetron/tetron/papers
							/primer/tetron/tetron/United States Patent 4,286,330_files
					/primer/tetx
				/PP1
					(all the Files of version 1 above, all in a single directory. Used by the INDEX)
			

 

Version 2 House Style Changes:

Links:

Removed external Links, or deactivated them, and reformatted internal links. Re-linked to internal files, where available, all stored in /primer

Examples of external links removed:

• http://www.newciv.org/

			--------------------------
			I am not sure what connection newciv.org has to ISSS?
			- whether there was someone on the ISSS Primer Group CIG that was associated with newciv.org?
			- why many of the links on the Primer link to newciv.org?
			- if ISSS has copywrite or control over ISSS Primer SIG content stored on the newciv.org website
			- many of the pages link to a newciv mailing list: "Send e-mail to issstopics-L@newciv.org". I have emailed issstopics-L@newciv.org, and got a Message Delivery Failure: "550:550-5.1.1 The email account that you tried to reach does not exist. Please try"

			- newciv.org seems to be the main site for the: New Civilization Network
			- A huge site with membership
			-- 279 pages of news postings going from 5 Aug 2001 to 15 Jun 2016: http://www.newciv.org/news2/
			-- About page here: http://www.newciv.org/ncn/ncnfaq.html
			-- run by: Flemming Funch. The web site and most mailing lists are housed in a server administered by Flemming Funch.
			https://www.healthyplace.com/alternative-mental-health/sageplace/flemming-funch-on-the-qnew-civilizationq

			===> Given all the unknowns above, I will remove all references to newciv.org in the The Primer pages (including links, and mailing list references)
			--------------------------
			

Page colour and background:

Some pages had a background colour and 'watermark' gif image: BGCOLOR="#d2ecff" BACKGROUND="blksym.gif

Decided not to use BACKGROUND, as it confuses the reading. Changed the colour to: BODY BGCOLOR="#ccffcc" to distinguish v1 from v2

 

Headers and Footers of pages:

Many version 1 pages (e.g. on 'The Taster Tour') had a 'screen of headers' before the page got to the content. This 'screen of headers' was replaced with a simpler 'Main Navigation line' and header sections (see below)

Example version 1 'screen of headers':


			---------------------------
			THE PRIMER PROJECT
			An activity of the Primer Group

			A Special Integration Group (SIG) of the
			International Society for the Systems Sciences (ISSS)
			originally SGSR, Society for General Systems Research.
			and
			IISII
			INTERNATIONAL INSTITUTE
			for
			SYSTEMIC INQUIRY AND INTEGRATION

			Presenting
			THE FIRST INTERNATIONAL
			ELECTRONIC SEMINAR
			ON WHOLENESS
			http://www.newciv.org/ISSS_Primer/seminar.html
			---------------------------
			

Example of version 2 page layout (Headers; Content; Footers):

			[Header Navigation paths]: e.g. "ISSS   |    The Primer Project 2 Home & Welcome   |    About   |    Pathways through The Primer Project 2: [ Seminar Tour | Taster Tour ]   |   INDEX"

			[Header title]: H2 size font; Center aligned

			[Header Sub-title]: H3 size font; Center aligned

			[Content]:  'normal' size font; Left aligned, generally

			[Footer Navigation paths]: Repeat of Header Navigation path

			

where, on the Navigation path:


1. ISSS - A link to the ISSS.org main web page
2. The Primer Project 2 Home & Welcome - A new page created for version 2. Welcomes readers to version 2
3. About - A new page created for version 2. Describes some History and Activities of version 2.
4. Pathways through The Primer Project 2: [ Seminar Tour | Taster Tour ] - A new term created for version 2. See 2 below.
5. INDEX - A new page created for version 2. A list of all content files found in The Primer Project version 2.
 

List of possible Pathway navigations:

Pathways are a new term in version 2, for a version 1 concept. A Pathway in version 1 is a selected path through some of the content of The Primer Project.

The following is a list of Pathways that the version 1 authors seem to have developed:
- Seminar Tour
- Taster Tour
- Kids Only
- A Story
- Four Domains


Of the above, the following have been selected for conversion to version 2 House Style formatting; and have been put on the Main Navigation line:
- Seminar Tour
- Taster Tour


Log:

• 14 Oct 2020: v2 released
 

Possible next steps:

• Add more pathways
• Improve Index data on files not in the pathways
• Improve content layout of pages
• Review the content
• Review the objectives of the original project