Mutable data representations for lightweight publishing and curation

Abstract

Web site authors frequently exhibit collections of structured data that visitors can contribute to, using specialized interfaces. Website authors also desire powerful tools for managing their website's data, so they can integrate visitor suggestions, search past versions of their data, and perform edits. However, content management frameworks have too steep a learning cure for casual users, and require programming to customize how a site's data is generated, viewed, and edited. Incorporating a curation process into lightweight data publishing frameworks can lessen the burden of data submission and management for web site visitors and authors alike. The proposed thesis investigates a data submission process that is easy, customizable, and portable. It also explores the characteristics of successful data management interfaces as applied to evolving sets of data.