HotSauce FAQ

Copied from the original page archived on 3 July 1997

Note: This is the FAQ for both the HotSauce Application and for the HotSauce Plugin.

Q: What is the relation between the PlugIn and the Standalone application?
A: They both use the same MCF format. The Plugin provides the fly-through view that the standalone provides. The plugin does not provide the finder view. The plugin provides a fly-through navigation of web sites. The standalone application provides fly-through views of web sites, gopher sites, desktops, audio tracks...

Q: What is the mime-type for the HotSauce plugin.
A: The mime-type is image/vasa. The suffix is mcf.

Q: Can I view my file system using HotSauce?
A: Yes. Simply drag your hard-drive or any folder onto HotSauce. Please note that since HotSauce creates and stores aliases to all the items, indexing a 1G hard-drive with 10,000 items could take 5-10 minutes. We will soon release a version of HotSauce that dynamically reads the hard drive.

Q: When I delete a node (or an entire subhierarchy), are the documents actually deleted?
A: No. If the node has multiple parents, the node is removed from that location. If the node does not have multiple parents, the pointer to the document is removed. It is not possible to actually delete anything from the desktop or anywhere else using HotSauce.

Q: I frequently get lost in the space. How do I figure out where I am?
A: The title bar of the window tells you where you are. Here are some shortcuts to help.

  1. Command-R to recenter the current top node.
  2. Command-T to take you to the very top.

You can also keep track of multiple places in the space by using multiple open windows. To open a new window for the sub-hierarchy under a certain node, select that node (by clicking once on it) and then type command-O. Different windows steer independent of each other. Having multiple windows open is also useful for changing the structure of the hierarchy.

If you have any ideas on cues that can be provided to help the user from getting lost, we’d love to hear them.

Q: How do I improve the fly-through performance?
A: Here are some steps you can take to improve the performance.

  1. Set the number of colors on your monitor to 256 (preferred) or thousands.
  2. Allocate HotSauce more memory. This helps if you have a slow disk.
  3. Don’t run QuickTime movies or RealAudio in parallel with HotSauce. All of these are very CPU intensive programs.
  4. Reduce the size of the window. The smaller the window, the higher the speed.
  5. Reduce the number of nodes that should be displayed.

Q: What can I drag and drop onto HotSauce Windows?
A: We have tried desktop objects, urls and audio tracks. If you try something else let us know how it works out.

Q: Can I have pictures instead of the rectangles/ovals with text?
A: Hopefully, soon.

Q: What is MCF?
A: MCF stands for “Meta Content Format.” It is a format that we have developed for representing information about information --- meta content. Hierarchical subject categorizations are the simplest example of meta content. MCF has been used for other interesting information management programs, e.g., relational database integration.

Q: What happens to the changes I have made to a subhierarchy when I ask for an update?
A: The system will give you an update that is consistent with the changes you have made. It will not undo any of the changes you have made.

Q: Is there an undo facility?
A: Not yet.

Q: How do I bring back a node that I have deleted?
A: Use the “Add...” command or use drag and drop.

Q: Which browsers does HotSauce work with?
A: Cyberdog, Netscape Navigator and Internet Explorer.

Q: Is the HotSauce application restricted to work only with Yahoo!?
A: Not at all. It can be used to view and navigate around any information available in MCF. Yahoo! is the first (meta)-content provider to support MCF and that is why you see Yahoo! there. We hope to announce more support for MCF in a few months.

Q: How can others view MCF I create?
A: Publish your mcf file using a url ending with the suffix “.mcf”. When someone does a drag and drop of that url onto their X Space, they will get the hierarchy you have created.

Q: How about finer grained and more automatic sharing?
A: The next version of HotSauce will allow for certain topics to be “open". When you drag and drop a url under an open category, everyone else will be able to see your addition. Each open node has a “home server” that keeps track of additions under that node. Different nodes (and different portions of a subhierarchy) can be distributed across different servers. The maintainer of the server has the ability to introduce some moderation if s/he wishes.

Q: How can I start off with an empty view, without Yahoo, etc.?
A: Create a new folder and copy the application into it. Create an empty folder within that folder called “Project X Data Files". Now when you launch the copy of the app in that folder, you will get an space with just WWW (which you can rename, but not delete). The first few drag and drops will be a little slow, but after that the speed will be normal.