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Like the three laws of robotics, right now Magnolia CMS Concept Maps have three simple rules. I'll be honest and admit that these are more for convenience (i.e to keep things simple) and are NOT based on any 'years of experience has taught us that this is the most fruitful approach' type of methodology...

1) Restrictive

Too many information bubbles and the map becomes confusing. The information should be relevant to Magnolia CMS. The Magnolia CMS rabbit hole is rich and wondrous enough; no need to show the visitor all around the whole of IT Wonderland. To draw an analogy, while a concept map of a 'car' might include 'chassis', it probably should not include 'chase'.

This rule seems pretty solid to me.

2) Relevant

Keep the concept map relevant. Just because a topic is worth mentioning on a map doesn't mean that it deserves a map for itself. A good rule of thumb regarding the specificity of a possible map is 'take a step back'. Go up a level. Does a component merit a concept map? Or should component simply be a concept on a concept map called Template? Obviously everything is relevant, but we don't want to include everything! Instead of 'relevant' we could say 'appropriate'.

Again, this rule seems pretty solid.

3) Relational

Make things become 'obvious' through clarification: not just repeat the obvious. Second level concepts on a Magnolia CMS Concept Map should be no more than one step removed from the central-concept. There's nothing wrong with having sub-levels of conceptually related topics, but a concept is in Magnolia CMS, then that concept is in some way related to everything else in Magnolia, so there's no need to expand the conceptual circle too far.

This rule could be amplified a bit. Maybe by relational we could mean the more obvious 'explains the relationship between the different object, elements and nodes on the mapmap'.

Modules as a starting point

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User clicks CAS on the LDAP Concept Map...



! LDAP CONCEPT MAP.png!



... is taken to a CAS Concept Maps



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Phased Approach

Phase 1 - Static Concept Maps

This is essentially the outline as above, but with a text back up that points to the relevant documentation section to the items mentioned on the concept map.

Phase 2 - Semi-interactive Concept Maps

Mind maps become interactive and linked link to Magnolia CMS documentation, wiki pages, other mind maps etc. through the use of basic hyperlinks.

Phase 3 - Fully Interactive Magnolia CMS Concept Map

Searchable, graphically pleasing, the fully interactive Concept Map allows a user to look around the Documentation, in the shape of an interconnected information sphere with clickable nodes. Great for touch screen devices.