References reloaded

Ideas & Features
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The integration of a token system could further enhance this New Relation/References feature in several ways:

  1. Field Combination: As discussed earlier, tokens could allow users to combine fields from different entities, including relations/references. This means that you could display information from a relation’s fields alongside the entities it connects, all within a single cell or card.
  2. Nested Relations: If relations can contain other relations, a token system could help navigate and display this complex, nested data structure. For example, you could use tokens to display information from a relation within a relation.
  3. Custom Formatting: Tokens could allow users to control how relation data is displayed. For example, you could use tokens to define the format of a date field within a relation, or to control the display order of multiple fields within a relation.
  4. Dynamic Views: Tokens could be used to create dynamic views that change based on the state of a relation. For example, you could use tokens to display different information based on whether a relation is empty or contains certain data.
  5. Automation and Logic: If tokens are used in automations, they could also be used to automate tasks or apply logic based on the state of a relation. For example, an automation could be triggered when a relation is added or removed, or when a field within a relation meets certain criteria.

In summary, the integration of a token system could greatly enhance the flexibility, power, and user-friendliness of Fibery’s new relation feature. It would allow users to manipulate and display relation data in a wide variety of ways, making the system more adaptable to their specific needs.

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Sorry, I mean real use case examples you would like to solve currently, but you cannot because of Fibery limitations.

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About Reference entity topic
when I read this
image
Some kinds of things pop up in my head. This name field basicly Ontology define in Compass Framework, this define relationship type between 2 entities. In obsidian, Excalibrain plugin does it as page level (meanings entity level), But with current dovetail can do, we can apply this as higher level (block level) in fibery
this link describe exactly ontology meanings https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7rnsULzez-g&ab_channel=Zsolt'sVisualPersonalKnowledgeManagement
and the way it display right relationship in Obsidian by plugin called Excalibrain https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8LE_QdYQZVk&ab_channel=Zsolt'sVisualPersonalKnowledgeManagement
Hope this can help in Reference creation or even a basic graph view

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Related to References Reloaded:

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Related:

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Related:

The new reloaded reference will be an entity, which would allow a relation fields to contain such popup information (e.g. a summary field), as well as fields of other linked entities at the same time in one popup. Think for example when an inline task reference could show through a popup its Project, the project team members, related tasks, status, all at once.

Also related:

39

@kalman this is great news and I just noticed your post! I have made many suggestions around references here in the forum, I hope you have read some of them. Sorry I am in a rush now, I will come back later and try to do a better job “referencing” what I’ve suggested, but here are a few:

Ability to quote text across Fibery like in Discourse
For Activity Stream, ability to see in chronological order References & Comments

Add COMMENTS and REFERENCES to Feed

I hope some of this stuff can be implemented in the new version of references, which already are one of the differentiating features of Fibery. Thanks!

1 Like
40

do we have any release timeline for implementing this, this took an really important part for our research processs, and seriously I’m really looking for this appear on timeline

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As it says in the original post, this is something in consideration for the second half of this year, so fingers crossed.

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42

Thanks for joining the discussion! Here’s a quick response to your points:

Saving Highlighted Text in a Reference Database in Markdown Format
We are planning to save highlighted text in a separate reference database, and it will be in Markdown format. This means the highlight won’t update automatically if the original text changes. For instance, if you quote something like “the customer loves the red color,” and later, the original text changes to “the customer hates the red color,” the meaning of your quote would change too. We think it’s important to notify the person who created the reference if the original text changes so it can be reviewed and updated it as needed.

We plan to save the quoted text without links (since we cannot follow them) or images, replacing them with placeholder text.

Organizing References Chronologically
We are also working on organizing reference entries in a database. This will allow you to view them in a list and create formulas, automation, and reports. I believe this will address most of your concerns.

Feel free to ask if you have more questions.

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43

After a long radio silence, we have begun developing the Reference Creation and Settings feature. While there are still some moving parts, the core concept is finalized.

Please watch the video that explains how the Reference creation will work.

This is the right time to provide feedback on the functionality and flow of the feature.

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44

Seriously I’m really waiting for this, day by day, week by week to looking this release. I dont know how Thursday evening become my routine to check the release weekly.
I just watched the demo, that’s really make a fantastic move when It can solve both pkm and user feedback
Really looking for this week release. Anyway thank you for your team

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45

You might want to dampen down your enthusiasm :wink: I don’t expect there will be a release of this functionality for a couple of months yet, at least.

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46

My first question is: Does References 2.0 extend to the standard Relations between database items, do they also get fields, or are Relations still a completely separate thing technically?

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According to the current plan, this will be a separate solution with a possibility of migration: please see here.

please let me know if you have further questions.

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Thank you, I will study that first. In the meantime, please update the important but dead link Reference entity in your initial post of this topic? Thanks

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fixed

Reference entity — Roadmap Item | Fibery

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Although I have been very interested in this work, I have to admit I haven’t fully reviewed and understood the proposal, so apologies if this is clearly laid out in the roadmap or in the threads.

But I was hoping for a quick clarification of my understanding:

The Reference Entity feature (discribed here) is intended to extend unstructured text with links to structured date (i.e. fibery entities). This was already possible before in some form with the System Reference Database (from any database to any other). However, with the new User Reference Database, it is possible to add more structured context to the reference itself (with the only limitation being limits on number of sources & targets, at least for now). As such it finds its best use in identifying insights & ideas, indicating related entities (concepts, people, projects, metrics, etc.) and providing some data on things like degree of relevance, … and providing ways of measuring & reporting on these references.

The Polymorphic Relations feature is intended to extend the relationship model between structured entities/data to be more flexible than fibery’s existing entity relation model. My understanding of this work is that whereas relations limit the source and target of relations to one type as well as very rigidly & specifically define the context/type of relationship between entities, polymorphic relations would allow not only mixing of different sources and targets but also (hopefully) richer description of the relations without a need to create a relation field for each type of relation (e.g. separate many-to-many fields for “relatives” and “co-workers” and “friends” …) or creating separate join table to support the relation model. I can see two types of uses:

  • Being able to select different types as targets would allow curation of specialized entities with similar relations together (e.g. being able to capture a person’s attendance in different types of meetings, events, etc. in a consolidated relation)
  • An equally useful feature would come from the properties of the relations through representing semantic relationships between entities (on the edges), for example between people (e.g. John is Jimmy’s brother, John is Tina’s partner, John and Amy worked together) or a persons employment history which links people and their roles to organizations/companies along with a temporal context (all useful things to have in a CRM).

Is this more or less aligned with how these features are viewed by the fibery team?

If the above is true, I think that there is one type of relation which is not covered by this: relation one between unstructured/text data (i.e. text block in one entity/document and another). This is currently not possible in fibery (apart from hyperlinks to titles). However, it is covered under block references or transclusion blocks in tools like Roam or Obsidian. Does this make sense?

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51

@kalman thanks for your response to me!

Could you let me know, in particular, if these two requests are on your radar as far as improvements to references:

Show in Reference Highlights Referenced Entity more clearly

and

Ability to quote text across Fibery like in Discourse

This second one is such a natural extension of your existing iteration in Fibery that it would really be too bad if something like this doesn’t come into existence. With the way references are structured already, my team extensively uses #-tagging to point out other entities when writing and commenting around Fibery. We are missing however the ability to simply quote some text somewhere, and then reference that in a continued dialogue. Instead, we have to either screen shot the quoted text and past it, or use the primitive existing quotation capability, which has one huge flaw in that if you are trying to write text with a “soft” return - using “shift” + “return” in order to maintain the reference itself, the quotes won’t work because you’ll quote the entire set of text.

Here’s an example: I am commenting in an entity and I want to write a few references. I have to write like this, using “shift” + “Return” in the breaks here, or I lose the reference (because if I do a “hard” return hitting just “Return” the reference doesn’t pick up the text above the hard return):

Let’s imagine I’m commenting in an entity that is a project:

During the meeting that took place of FIRST REFERENCED ENTITY, we said:

(now I have to use a soft return or I lose the reference above to the meeting)

THIS PROJECT (the entity I’m commenting in) is going to be late 2 weeks. This is due to the issue raised in NOW THIS IS ANOTHER ENTITY, LET’S CALL IT AN “INCIDENT” ENTITY by user x…AND NOW HERE I’D LIKE TO QUOTE THE COMMENT IN THAT OTHER ENTITY I JUST MENTIONED

if I want to actually put the quote from the other entity here with Fibery quotes, I’ll wind up quoting everything above, unless I do a hard return. But if I do the hard return, the above references are lost

I hope I’ve explained this right and I’m eager to get your response, thanks again!

1 Like
52

Thanks for diving deep into the features we’ve been working on. You’ve got a solid grasp on it

Just to highlight a bit more: when we talk about the polymorphic relation and fields that describe the reference relation, right now, they’re only available through something we call “References 2.0.” But we’re planning to expand this in the future.

You’re also spot on about the relation between unstructured data. We aware this gap, and I can tell that addressing this is among the different features in our backlog.

If you have any more questions or if there’s something you think we might’ve missed, please let me know.

4 Likes