It’s been very enlightening finding out that we’re still smarter than those little programs that go around and index websites. I realize that computers like IBM’s Watson are making waves on Jeopardy and elsewhere, but semantic understanding seems to still be primarily the domain of humans. Bots come up with the darndest things! The Downside […]
We’ve Got Rhythm!
Yes, we’ve all got rhythm—circadian rhythm. We usually don’t think much about it, we just go about our daily affairs. Sometimes we’re perky and other times we slog through the day, working when we’d rather be having a “duvet day.” But, work needs to be done. That rhythm that we have built in is a […]
PI Day 2019: Infinite Combinations
Since we are PI (Potomac Indexing), we’ve always held the mathematical constant, π, close to our hearts and use it in our logo. So, today being π day, we are duly celebrating the usefulness of this great and ultimately impossible-to-pin-down number (more on π’s unique qualities at Wikipedia, here). PI and Indexing As indexers and […]
Indexer Mind
Folks often ask, after the initial “Someone actually creates the index that goes in the back of a book?”: “How do you go about figuring that out?” Or someone who’s thinking about being an indexer will wonder if the career field is a good match for them. This is an important question because there’s a […]
Stretch!
We all know we are sedentary—we must think about the health issues involved in our work. If we are being health conscious we take breaks, and perhaps, even go out for a brief walk; however, to really address some of the issues of our sedentary life, we need to look at areas of our bodies […]
Numbers in Indexes
The most memorable characteristic of an index is the arrangement of the entries in alphabetical order*. It makes it easy to find what you’re looking for, and even the picky differences between word-by-word and letter-by-letter arrangement aren’t noticeable to a casual user. But what about numbers? Since they’re not letters and therefore not obviously subject […]
