Dear All,

Along with ANS Fellow Neel Smith, I am working on a
system for bidirectional links between the ANS database and web pages
that refer to objects in our collection.

We are trying to take advantage of the fact that the sequence of
characters "numismatics.org:1858.1.1" is understandable as a
reference to the coin with that accession number, which happens to be
the first ever donated to the collection. We call the combination of
domain name and identifier a Domain Name ID or DNID.

At a very simple level, if everybody referring to this coin put
"numismatics.org:1858.1.1" into their web pages, Google would
eventually index those texts and then the search http://
www.google.com/search?q=numismatics.org:1858.1.1 would list those
resources.

Going further, I have set up the ANS web-server so that it can
usefully handle URLs similar to:
http://numismatics.org/dnid/numismatics.org:1858.1.1 .

"1858.1.1" can be replaced with any valid ANS accession number.

If you follow that link, you'll see that I have also set up the ANS
database so that it can initiate a search in Google for pages with
DNIDs that refer to ANS objects. Do this by clicking on "Find pages
that refer to this ANS object". This has important implications that
Neel and I would like to test.

It would be very helpful if any web authors out there would find a
place to insert either one of the following html fragments:

Aureus of the Roman Emperor Augustus:
<a href="http://numismatics.org/dnid/numismatics.org:1944.100.39073"
>numismatics.org:1944.100.39073</a>

United States 1/2 Cent donated to the ANS by Augustus B. Sage:
<a href="http://numismatics.org/dnid/numismatics.org:1858.1.1"
>numismatics.org:1858.1.1</a>


This will have a three-fold effect.
1) Google will index your page and know that it contains one of the
DNIDs.

2) Google will follow that link to the record in the ANS database.
This is very useful because most records in the db are opaque to Google.

3) When someone clicks on the "Find pages that refer..." link, your
page will show up! Or at least we think it will and we want to find out.

IMPORTANT: you can change the introductory text or put it between the
<a> elements. What really matters is that the DNID is within the
hyperlink anchor.

This is an idea that can work in other contexts. To read a
developing introduction to the "DNID System" go to http://www.dnid-
community.org/ .

Sticking to the ANS context, I have also set up the database so that
it will generate the html to make a link to a DNID for any accession
number. Just click on "[links...]" in the left hand column of any
record when searching at
http://publicserver.numismatics.org/collection/accnum/list

Please put ANS DNIDs anywhere they seem useful. You can see that I
have put them into the "External Links" section at the bottom of the
following Wikipedia pages:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Half_cent_%28United_States_coin%29
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sestertius

Neel and I welcome feedback.

With best regards,

Sebastian.

--------------------------------
Sebastian Heath, Ph.D.
Research Scientist
American Numismatic Society
96 Fulton Street
New York, NY 10038

heath@...
(212) 571-4470 x1402

http://www.numismatics.org/

ANS Digital Publications Project: http://www.numismatics.org/dpubs/
Digital Coins Network: http://www.digitalcoins.org/