A Data-Oriented Model of Context in Hypertext Authoring

The advent of Internet-based communication and its utilization in intranets is accompanied by a deeper insight into the status of natural language texts as units of information processing in organizations. Their task specific accessibility and user-friendly pre-processing are decisive for efficient knowledge sharing in social, academic, and economic contexts. In order to realize this demand, texts have to be semi-automatically analyzed in order to explore the dynamic interrelationship of task, context, and textual information base as determinants of knowledge acquisition and distribution. But texts are—other than formal data structures—characterized by implicit structuring. The coherence relations by means texts function as linguistic manifestations of communication processes are neither explicitly annotated on surface-level, nor do they deterministically follow a pre-established rule system. This paper describes a conceptual model of so called Systemic Functional Hypertexts which addresses the relationship of text and context. It focuses on a conceptual model of building blocks as being pertinent to context modelling in the area of hypertext authoring. The model is based on Systemic Functional Linguistics and utilizes techniques of conceptual modelling. Its aim is the distinction and interrelation of context units as a preparatory step to their semi-automatic exploration.