Contribution Wings

The NE manages hyperlinks between different collections of information via its three association areas - the affinity area and two contribution wings. Contribution wings manage certain kinds of knowledge relations. These relations are slightly different depending on whether you are looking at a knowledge map or  at an object model.

In a knowledge map, NEs can be related in several different ways. One of these ways is in a "from...  to..." relation. Exactly what 'from' and 'to' are up to you. But for instance, the history of personal transportation includes the step "from" the horse & buggy "to" the automobile. Therefore, you could represent this relation by saying that the horse & buggy contributes to the automobile. This type of relation is represented visually using the two wings on either side of the NE. The contributes to wing (left wing) links an NE to everything that impacts on it and the contributions by wing (right wing) links an NE to everything that it impacts on.

In an object model, the use of the wings situates each NE as a discrete step in a strategy. Each step is represented by an NE in the model. For any step, the steps that lead to it are to the left and the steps that follow it are to the right. The model, like a chain, is constructed link by link, so, for each NE in the model, the immediately preceding NEs go in the leftmost contributions by wing and the immediately following NEs go in the rightmost contributes to wing. The indirect forward and backward links for this NE in the model  (that is, NEs that are several "steps" away) are then available for view in the Maps room.

Models are built link by link. That is, when you are building a model, you only need to be concerned with the step 'right before' and 'right after' whatever step it is that you're looking at. When you open the NE in the Maps room, the DNE will draw out the whole map, following the links you made. This makes the task of building even the largest and most complex maps much less daunting: you do not have to worry about building the whole map - you only have to worry about the NEs one at a time.