Hawkwind Codex database?

[Paul Mather]

Mike,

> I figure what would be *really* neat would be to start a massive
> hypertext WWW document which would list the codex and allow each track
> to be clicked on to access either its codex entry, or where present its
> lyric file (password protected to keep the lawyers happy).
>
> That could form as a basis for adding in the writers of the track and
> linking that to biographical data, solo albums etc.
>
> Ultimately the family tree could be linked to this and the albums and
> giglists indexed by lineup.
>
> It's megalomania of course but it'd be great to start such a project and
> just add to it as we went. Sonique seems to be good at this sort of
> stuff.

Well, basically, this is what I have had in mind for a long while, and
have been silently working towards, albeit slowly.  I have a class coming
up this fall regarding the WWW which is project-based, and I thought
developing a WWW-accessible Hawkwind digital library might be a good
project.  (Finally, I'd get some time to actually do some work on this.)

Although I think a WWW-accessible hyperbase is the thing to do, I don't
think that authoring a massive set of (static) HTML documents is the way
to go, for obvious reasons (maintenance and consistency being the chief
one).  Hence my route of developing WWW interfaces to a database + ISR
system of Hawkwind info.  An appropriate front end (cgi scripts) would
access the underlying database, and generate appropriate HTML to present
the data.  This is, potentially, a lot better, because less data need be
maintained.  For example, you could think of the Hawkwind discography to
be simply an inverted index of the Hawkwind codex; the former can be
derived from the latter.  Yet currently, two documents are maintained.

> I'll copy this to the list just in case we have enough volunteers to
> make a start on such a project. I guess if we had enough people we could
> agree a specification and share out the effort...

Well, in terms of my class project, I'd have to work alone, I guess, so
I'd still plod along with what I've already started anyway.  I see the
main task in identifying what information is of interest, and how to
structure it.  I had decided to base things around recorded tracks, where
each track (version) would have known information about it, e.g. writer
credit, performer credit, recording location, engineer, producer, notes,
trivia, etc.  This would be stored in a database.  It would then be fairly
easy to create another index (database) to represent the discography (a
simple album name/tracks indexing).  Using both of these, a codex could be
derived automatically.  Of course, tracks need not be limited to just
Hawkwind, which would allow friends & relations to enter the picture.
Also, "tracks" could encompass live gig performances, and a similar index
to the discography could constructed for gig setlists.  The good thing
about going the database route is that it is easier to obtain subsets of
information (e.g. "what are all the gigs that Wishart appeared in?"),
whereas a static HTML hyperbase makes such things more difficult to do.

Cheers,

Paul.

obCD: The Bevis Frond, _It Just Is_

e-mail: paul at csgrad.cs.vt.edu                    A stranger in a strange land.