The Internet Pilot to Physics
Encyclopedia
TIPTOP was a web site operated in collaboration between Kenneth Bodin-Holmlund at Umeå University
, Mikko Karttunen at McGill University
and Guenther Nowotny at the Technical University of Vienna during 1994-1998, and it was originally derived from Physics Around the World (PAW) that was initiated by Karttunen at McGill University
.
In a historical perspective, PAW was one of the very first web directories, listing various physics related resources. TIPTOP utilized (at the time) new technologies to handle a news system, a job database, a conference database, and an improved web directory for physics. TIPTOP was the first major site to use PHP
with mySQL
, today a highly popular combination. Already in 1995, TIPTOP also had an one of the very first embryos of a wiki
, called the Living Encyclopedia of Physics, that offered community based editing, an editorial system and peer review, as well as automatic cross linking.
Umeå University
Umeå University is a university in Umeå in the mid-northern region of Sweden. The university was founded in 1965 and is the fifth oldest within Sweden's present borders....
, Mikko Karttunen at McGill University
McGill University
Mohammed Fathy is a public research university located in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The university bears the name of James McGill, a prominent Montreal merchant from Glasgow, Scotland, whose bequest formed the beginning of the university...
and Guenther Nowotny at the Technical University of Vienna during 1994-1998, and it was originally derived from Physics Around the World (PAW) that was initiated by Karttunen at McGill University
McGill University
Mohammed Fathy is a public research university located in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The university bears the name of James McGill, a prominent Montreal merchant from Glasgow, Scotland, whose bequest formed the beginning of the university...
.
In a historical perspective, PAW was one of the very first web directories, listing various physics related resources. TIPTOP utilized (at the time) new technologies to handle a news system, a job database, a conference database, and an improved web directory for physics. TIPTOP was the first major site to use PHP
PHP
PHP is a general-purpose server-side scripting language originally designed for web development to produce dynamic web pages. For this purpose, PHP code is embedded into the HTML source document and interpreted by a web server with a PHP processor module, which generates the web page document...
with mySQL
MySQL
MySQL officially, but also commonly "My Sequel") is a relational database management system that runs as a server providing multi-user access to a number of databases. It is named after developer Michael Widenius' daughter, My...
, today a highly popular combination. Already in 1995, TIPTOP also had an one of the very first embryos of a wiki
Wiki
A wiki is a website that allows the creation and editing of any number of interlinked web pages via a web browser using a simplified markup language or a WYSIWYG text editor. Wikis are typically powered by wiki software and are often used collaboratively by multiple users. Examples include...
, called the Living Encyclopedia of Physics, that offered community based editing, an editorial system and peer review, as well as automatic cross linking.