Create new topic

New topic is created with New instance topic... or New subclass topic... options in Topics > New Topic menu. Top menu bar also contains option New topic... to create disconnected topics. All options open dialog window used to enter initial base name and subject identifier for the topic. If basename field is left blank created topic has no base name. If subject identifier field is left blank the topic is given a default identifier. Topic in Wandora must contain at least one subject identifier.

After topic creation you may want to open topic for more detailed edition. If you created topic with New instance topic... or New subclass topic... options it is probably available at topic tree. In any case you find new topic with finder panel. Double click the topic in topic tree or search result and Wandora opens topic to the topic panel. Now you can edit the topic as described in How to open and modify topic. If you created disconnected topic with New topic... you may need Finder to locate and open the created topic.

Creating topic with existing base name or subject identifier

Topic map standard defines that a topic should have unique base name (within the scope) and subject identifiers. If two topics share same base name (within the scope) or at least one subject identifier topics should be merged.

If you give new topic a base name or a subject identifier that already exists within another topic Wandora merges new topic with the existing one. If both topics locate in the same topic map layer the merge is real. Real merge is always irreversible. If both topics are part of different layers the merge is virtual. Virtual merge keeps both topics apart but the real-time representation of topics is a merged topic. Merge is confirmed with a dialog window. If you disallow the merge the topic creation is cancelled.

Implicit topic creation

Wandora creates topics also whenever you

• Paste association, instances, or classes to Wandora. Paste uses clipboard text and interprets text as tab and new line separated base names. If Wandora faces unknown base names ie. names that have no corresponding topic, new topic is created for the base name. As paste does not know topic's subject identifier, default subject identifier is given to the created topic.
• Drop associations, instances, or classes to Wandora. Drop feature works just like paste described earlier. Wandora assumes dropped text contains tab and new line separated base names and creates new topics if base name is not found.
• Use extractors successfully. Extractors generate topics and associations using various source data. Created topics depend on used extractor.