Weaving a Web: the Structure and Creation of an Object Network Representing an Electronic Reference Work

For the improvement of large-scale electronic publications, such as encyclopaedic reference works,we propose an object-oriented document model that in addition to the SGML-structured text corpus represents other access structures, in particular a fine-grained, highly structured, tightly interconnected network of domain-specific objects and facts. The paper presents strategies and tools for efficient acquisition of the desired object network into an Editor’s Workbench. The application context is the Dictionary of Art, to be published as a print edition by Macmillan Publishers Ltd. in 1996.