Hypertext vs. Papertext: Linear vs. Non-Linear

Linear and non-linear? What do they mean on the Web? Linear and non-linear are two distinctly different styles of thinking and writing. Linear writing is straight-line writing. Most papertext documents are linear. A linear document would have a fairly definite beginning, middle and ending. Most arguments are structured linearly with an introduction, supporting information, and a conclusion. Non-linear writing is more associative. Non-linear writing involves many different paths, sort of like this document. There may or may not be a beginning, but there is rarely a definite path or a single ending. This makes for a more reader-based document, and allows the reader to make choices.

Most good Web documents are more non-linear and associative. The hypertext medium lends itself to this by the linking feature. It is easy to connect words in one document to places in other documents. If you were to draw out all these connections, it would look like a web. This is where the term web comes from.

There are two styles of non-linear documents. The first one is to have each separate page of text have a list of choices at the bottom. This is somewhat non-linear and allows the user to navigate through the document. This is similar to a Choose Your Own Adventure book. A true non-linear document would have links from many different words which would lead to other pages. This would allow the user not only to make choices, but also do some semi-free association. If the user saw a word that caught her interest, she could click on it and be brought to another document.

Building good non-linear documents can be tough. The main objective in building non-linear documents is to look for the associations. You need to find both the obvious and non-obvious ones and take the opportunity to build a link to satisfy those connections. This helps you find and see the connections in your own document, as well as lets the user truly browse your document, letting his mind follow where it wants to go.

There are always some exceptions, and their may be some documents worth putting on the Web that should be linear. However, in general, a non-linear document is more interesting to the reader and more useful to the reader.

Which path would you like to follow?

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