category specificity, SOPE on a rope, Flint

[Cindy C.]

Amy:

> My big question is how specific to get in creating
> categories.  First post, topic: Ginny.  It's a general
> post (not very interesting, truth be told) and I
> thought, what if I were using this catalogue to write
> a FAQ on Ginny?  Wouldn't it be great if the catalogue
> did what I was going to have to do otherwise: not only
> find all the Ginny posts but put them into categories?
>  So I created a heading called Ginny--general.
> 
> When it comes to other characters, I can foresee
> dozens of subcategories.  Snape--ESE?, Snape--hair,
> Snape--loyalty, Snape--courage, Snape--teaching
> ability . . .  Very nice for FAQers.  Necessary at
> this stage?

I have to kick this over to Dicey for tech advice.  Dicey, say a 
post is catalogued as "Snape" "Hair" "Prank" because it discusses 
how everyone played pranks on Snape because of his long greasy 
hair.  Is it possible to do a sort in Excel so that not only do all 
the Snape keyword posts get sorted together but the Snape & Hair 
posts get sorted together?  I don't think so, but I'm not sure.

As far as Ginny goes, I'm not sure it's all that helpful to have "--
general."  Imagine that someone comes across a post that talks about 
Snape's mean teaching methods.  Let's say that they key it as "Snape-
-teaching methods."  Someone writing a FAQ comparing the teaching 
methods of various teachers or comparing teaching styles in Britain 
and the U.S. would miss the post.  Keying it as "Snape" 
and "Teaching methods" would avoid this.

That said, I'm not sure I'm right.

Amy:

> Or--<holds breath>--will there be a way for users of
> this catalogue to search for cross-listings, 

Dicey?

I kind of assume that the editor will have some issue "Harry's 
courage."  The editor will sort and then copy (or print) the blocks 
that come up under "Harry" and "Courage."  The editor can then have 
his or her personal issue-specific catalogue to play with.  The 
editor can then do things like search for other words that might 
appear in the comments section -- bravery, fearless, etc.

Does that sound right? 

> I prefer Flint because FLINT makes it look like an
> acronym, which it isn't.

Dicey:

I don't think it matters, because the search function will pick up 
FLINT and Flint and flINT.

Cindy -- who isn't sure she's right about any of this.