The "Next Planned Revision"

Values

The next planned revision at the bottom of my pages have these values (see below for explanation):

• <a date>
• continuous
• never

What dates should be attached to a web page?

Immediately come to mind:

1. the date of creation
2. the date of last modification

When you see a page with a last-modified date that is a year in the past, does that mean the content is now out of date?  When the last-modified date is yesterday, does that mean the content is very new?

What is also needed is some sort of status indicating the speed at which the content of a page evolves.

As a first approximation of that concept I have added to my pages a "next planned revision" date.  It can have these values:

• a date in the future:  because I know by when I likely need to update i.t
• the word never:  because the content is fixed, e.g. it is a story about something in the past, a page of a blog, a factual explanation.  Such content should not change in principle.  Modifications would be small corrections (typos for example) or small additions.
• the word continuous:  because the content is being kept up-to-date as time goes on.

A page that has not been modified in years but has a next planned revision of "never" still has relevant content, it's just that there is nothing new about it.

Copyright R. Cailliau — robert at robertcailliau dot eu

next planned revision: never