Andertoons 2.0 – Tags Revisited

A while back on the old Andertoons, I started displaying the tags I’d associated with each cartoon.

Very simply, when I create a cartoon and enter it into my database, I assign a number of words that apply to it. A typical sales graph cartoon might have ‘sales,’ ‘selling,’ ‘graph,’ ‘meeting,’ ‘business,’ ‘office,’ etc…

In web 2.0 sites, tags are a big deal, and a great source of simple and deep navigation, so I put the tags up for everyone to see, and made them links to more cartoons that share those tags.

The new wrinkle at the new site is something called a tag cloud. Check out the cartoon below:

Tags1



The tag ‘work’ is listed below the cartoon. Click on it and you get this screen:

Tags2



Pretty standard, except for the new column on the right:

Tags3



These are the tags most often shared by these cartoons. In cases where there are fewer shard tags, the fonts will get smaller as the list descends to indicate the lesser associations.

But here’s the really cool part. When you click on the microscope icon above, this pops up:

Tags4



Without leaving the screen, you get a tag cloud of all of the tags shared in ‘work,’ organized alphabetically, and rated by font size (the more often shared, the larger the font).

Click on a tag and you’re off again to more thumbnails. Or click outside the cloud and return to where you were.

Is that cool or what?!

It’s an entirely new way to browse the site, and, although tag clouds are now common, this sort of pop-up cloud is unlike anything I’ve seen elsewhere.

Anyway, hope you like it!

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Cartoon Info Released Into Wild

I’m happy to announce another new feature on everyone’s favorite cartoon website, Andertoons.com!

On each cartoon’s individual page, there’s now a good chunk of information pertaining to that cartoon immediately underneath it:

Newstuffblog1

For example, this cartoon is #4024, belongs to the Animal Cartoons, Business Cartoons & Office Cartoons topics, has eleven tags attached (crabs, walking, sideways, lateral, promotions, work, jobs, business, corporate, animals, seafood), has been previously published in Reader’s Digest, and lists the caption.

OK, you’re saying, big deal. A lot of info that doesn’t really help me.

But it does…

Look closely and you’ll see that each topic and keyword is actually a link. Click on, say, “promotions,” and you’ll get this:

Newstuffblog2

Click on “seafood” instead, and you’ll get this:

Newstuffblog3

Neat, huh?

Of course, this information haas always been part of the site – it’s been working diligently behind the scenes for years in the search box. But, it’s been suggested that information wants to be free, and who am I to argue.

This new searchability will allow users to drill down to exactly what they’re looking for quickly and easily, no matter how obscure their desired result may be.

Enjoy the new feature, and have some fun just browsing around.

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