I like the idea of being able to point into the middle of a document without
having to edit the document. If used properly, it would encourage usefully
rich hypertext, since following a link could take you to relevant content, not
just a page that contains relevant content somewhere.
However, just allowing a word (or list of words) will break down pretty
quickly. Some examples of functionality I would want (with a bad example
syntax):
- n'th occurrence of a word (e.g. http://x.edu/xxx#/3:cheese)
- occurrence of a word in a header (e.g. http://x.edu/xxx#/H2:cheese)
Also, for the case of a search engine returning results, I would want what I
think Dave H. is suggesting - the ability to highlight a whole list of terms
in the returned document, and easily navigate between them. (For instance,
with a "Next Relevant Region" button.)
I seem to remember that HyTime has a syntax for doing things like this - does
anyone know more about that?
BTW - if addressing all of these issues gets too messy, I still like the idea
of being able to navigate to the first occurrence of a particular word. It
addresses some of the needs, just not all of them.
- dG