Quickstart

Wandora application is launched running bat scripts in bin folder. Folder contains bat scripts for Windows and sh scripts for Linux and similar systems. Default bin script is Wandora.bat and default Linux script Wandora.sh. Default script gives Wandora a memory amount of 750M.

After you have launched Wandora application, you should see initial Wandora window with six different GUI areas of Button bar, Topic tree, Finder, Layer stack, Topic panel and Info fields. Window also has a menu bar containing Wandora tools.

• File menu contains options to Open and Save Wandora projects, options to import and export topic maps and RDF documents for example.
• Edit menu contains usual Select, Cut, Copy and Paste options.
• View menu is used to control how topic panel views current topic.
• Topics menu contains tools to create and modify topics and associations.
• Layers menu contains options to control topic map layers and layer stack.
• Shortcuts are topic map bookmarks easing the navigation.
• Tools menu contains tool manager and special user selected tools.
• Server menu is used to control Wandora's embedded HTTP server.
• Help menu contains few info dialogs and a shortcut to Wandora Wiki.

Button Bar

Button bar at the top of the window contains at least Open and arrow buttons. Arrow buttons behave like WWW browser's back and forward except that history contains topics. Back button recalls previous topic in the Topic panel and right button restores next topic in the history. If there is no topic in the history to restore the arrow button is disabled. Right clicking the arrow button reveals context menu of history topics. Selecting a topic in menu opens the topic in Topic panel.

Button bar contains also Open button. Button opens a Select topic window with Topics, Finder, and Select tabs used to specify the topic to be opened. Topics tab contains topic tree. To open a topic with topic tree, find and select the topic and click OK. Select tab contains simple search fields to locate a topic with topic's subject identifier, subject locator or basename. To open a topic with the select tab, enter topic's identifier into the search field, press find, and click OK if search result field indicates successful match. Unfortunately you can't use wild cards or other advanced match operations within the search field of Select topic window.

Select topic window is very common GUI element in Wandora. It is generally used to request a topic. For example adding a class topic tool requests the class topic with Select topic window. Below is an example of Select topic window.

Topic Tree

Topic tree is one of the most convenient and most used GUI element in Wandora. Topic tree is used to browse and select topics. Topic tree is similar to file and folder hierarchy but contains topics instead of files, and the arranging principle is based to topic relations.

When you open the application there is a default topic tree in top-left corner. Tree's root node is Wandora class and there is only one branch below. By default topics are arranged in the tree along type-of and super-sub-class relation. The "hollow triangle" icon represents super-sub-class relation between topics. "Filled rectangle" icon represents type-of relation between topics.

Clicking the handle opens subtree of the topic. Double clicking a topic in the tree opens the topic into the topic panel. Right clicking a topic in the topic tree reveals a context menu with a large number of topic tools. Below is an example of topic tree with Wandora class and Schema type topics open. Notice that Schema type is a subclass of Wandora class. Visible topics are part of Wandora's base ontology. Base ontology contains Wandora's schema topics for example.

Finder

Although topic tree offers very efficient method to browse and select topics there may be topics in the topic map that can not be reached with the topic tree. Finder offers more fuzzy manner to find topics. Finder tab locates beside the Topics tab.

Finder is simply a free text search to the topic map. You may search with any topic element or element combination. Search result appears below the search field. Double clicking a topic in the search result opens the topic into the topic panel. Right clicking a topic opens context menu with a large number of topic tools. Below is an example of finder where user has searched with word title. Search results locate below the search word field. Search result contains topics including word title in their base name. To open search result topic for detailed inspection you can double click the topic for example. Wandora contains also more sophisticated search dialog you can open with menu Edit > Find.

Layer Stack

Layer stack GUI is below the topic tree and finder. Layer stack contains all topic maps open in Wandora. Wandora allows you to open multiple topic maps at once. Layer stack keeps all topic maps separate.

Initially layer stack contains only one layer with the predefined schema map called Base. You should be careful in adjusting the Base map. Especially deleting topics or subject identifiers in the Base may break Wandora application.

You can add new layer to the stack right clicking the empty space within the stack area and selecting New layer. New layer is created after you have selected layer type and entered name for the layer. To create a database topic map you have to enter database connection information also.

Only one topic map layer is selected at once. Selected layer has darker color than non-selected layers. Layer is selected by clicking layer's name with left mouse button. All "write" operations to the stack are targeted to the selected layer only.

You may also hide and lock layers. Near layer name locates two symbols: an eye and a lock. Clicking the eye symbol toggles layer visibility. Clicking the lock symbol toggles layer lock. If layer is invisible you can not see or edit topics and associations in the layer. If layer is locked all changes to topics and associations in that layer are blocked.

Below is an example of Layer stack with three separate layers i.e. topic maps. Topic maps have been labeled Base, Ontology @ Grip, and Vocabulary (database). Base layer is dark gray indicating the layer is selected. The icon at the right edge indicates Base and Ontology @ Grip are memory topic maps while Vocabulary (database) is database topic map. All layers are visible and unlocked.

Topic Panel

Topic panel covers the right column of Wandora window. Topic panel is a GUI area where topics are shown in more detail. To open a topic to the topic panel, double click topic in the topic tree, for example. Topic panel is changed with menu option View > Topic panels. Current version of Wandora (Dec 2009) has four different topic panel types called Traditional topic panel, Tabbed topic panel, Graph topic panel, and Custom topic panel. By default topic is viewed with Traditional topic panel.

Traditional topic panel collects and shows the internal structure of topic:

• Base name
• Subject locator
• Subject identifiers
• Variant names
• Classes
• Occurrences
• Associations (where topic is a player or a role)
• Associations where type
• Instances

Topic panel contains edit fields for base name, subject locator, and variant names. Subject identifiers, classes, instances, occurrences, and associations are edited with tools found in context menus. To open class, instance or association player topic double click table cell with topic's base name. Thus, topic panel is a kind of topic browser. You can open a topic in topic panel by double clicking it.

Tabbed topic panel is similar to traditional topic panel but views topic elements in separate tabs. Graph topic panel is used to view topic map graphs. Each graph node represents topic and edge single association. Custom topic panel allows Wandora user to write simple scripts that searches for topics viewed in the panel.

Info Fields

Last but not least there is a info field strip in the bottom of the Wandora window. The leftmost information snippet is a base name of the current open topic. Second field contains topic's layer distribution of the current topic. Layer distribution 0:1 indicates how the inspected topic merges between layers. Third field contains name of current layer. Two icons on the right edge indicate current topic panel type and embedded server status. Clicking the topic panel type icon reveals a pop-up menu used to change the type of topic panel. Clicking on the server status icon starts and stops the embedded HTTP server.

Tips

To start using Wandora

• Try to right click topics and UI elements in Wandora. Many important tools locate in context pop-up menus.
• Try to double click table cells and tree nodes to open topics for inspection.
• Try to drag and drop stuff. In Wandora you can drag topics and text snippets.

To get more familiar with Wandora you might want to see available documentation now. Or maybe you want to watch tutorials on wandoratv.