Comments on: 10 Ways To Improve Wikis; 2 http://www.alittlemadness.com/2006/05/03/10-ways-to-improve-wikis-2/ A man needs a little madness, or else he never dares cut the rope and be free. -Nikos Kazantzakis Wed, 07 Jan 2009 03:01:18 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.2.1 By: Jesse Wilbur http://www.alittlemadness.com/2006/05/03/10-ways-to-improve-wikis-2/#comment-134 Jesse Wilbur Fri, 09 Jun 2006 15:34:31 +0000 http://www.alittlemadness.com/2006/05/03/10-ways-to-improve-wikis-2/#comment-134 You've been spot on with so many points, but especially 8 & 10. The organization I work for is trying to find a wiki that can handle being integrated with blogs and browsers, and it's not working out as well as we'd hoped. Although we can sort of blindly tie MediaWiki in as a section of a site, it's difficult to get the level of integration that we're looking for without writing a custom system. It hurts waiting for wikis to move forward. You’ve been spot on with so many points, but especially 8 & 10. The organization I work for is trying to find a wiki that can handle being integrated with blogs and browsers, and it’s not working out as well as we’d hoped. Although we can sort of blindly tie MediaWiki in as a section of a site, it’s difficult to get the level of integration that we’re looking for without writing a custom system. It hurts waiting for wikis to move forward.

]]> By: Steffen Poulsen http://www.alittlemadness.com/2006/05/03/10-ways-to-improve-wikis-2/#comment-86 Steffen Poulsen Sat, 13 May 2006 19:18:46 +0000 http://www.alittlemadness.com/2006/05/03/10-ways-to-improve-wikis-2/#comment-86 I can't disagree enough with #10 (Wiki discussions). What I believe is excellent about the "flat wiki pages" approach for discussions is the easiness it gives to refactoring. When a consensus is reached or there's a need to change the body of the page to reflect current findings, discussion and changes to body of text are easily changed and tracked together (DocumentMode and ThreadMode synergy effect). Imho insisting that discussions should be threaded is hyping a "fire and forget" approach, which will eventually leave a wiki with a lot of stale info in threads which are not easily "uncluttered". - Not very maintainable? Remember, wikis are just a tool. As any other tool they can be used in a multitude of ways - but some approaches might not bring the end result wished for. I can’t disagree enough with #10 (Wiki discussions). What I believe is excellent about the “flat wiki pages” approach for discussions is the easiness it gives to refactoring. When a consensus is reached or there’s a need to change the body of the page to reflect current findings, discussion and changes to body of text are easily changed and tracked together (DocumentMode and ThreadMode synergy effect).

Imho insisting that discussions should be threaded is hyping a “fire and forget” approach, which will eventually leave a wiki with a lot of stale info in threads which are not easily “uncluttered”. - Not very maintainable?

Remember, wikis are just a tool. As any other tool they can be used in a multitude of ways - but some approaches might not bring the end result wished for.

]]> By: Daniel http://www.alittlemadness.com/2006/05/03/10-ways-to-improve-wikis-2/#comment-74 Daniel Wed, 03 May 2006 11:08:39 +0000 http://www.alittlemadness.com/2006/05/03/10-ways-to-improve-wikis-2/#comment-74 Hi Neville, Thanks for the info. Will give it a try and see how it holds up. Cheers, -Daniel Hi Neville,

Thanks for the info. Will give it a try and see how it holds up.

Cheers,
-Daniel

]]> By: Neville Franks http://www.alittlemadness.com/2006/05/03/10-ways-to-improve-wikis-2/#comment-73 Neville Franks Wed, 03 May 2006 10:39:14 +0000 http://www.alittlemadness.com/2006/05/03/10-ways-to-improve-wikis-2/#comment-73 Hi Daniel, WordPress 2 includes Akismet which does an excellent job of preventing spam. I was getting heaps of spam with Wordpress 1.5 and haven't had any since upgrading to WP2. So you should just be able to loose the captcha. Neville Hi Daniel,
WordPress 2 includes Akismet which does an excellent job of preventing spam. I was getting heaps of spam with Wordpress 1.5 and haven’t had any since upgrading to WP2. So you should just be able to loose the captcha.

Neville

]]> By: Daniel http://www.alittlemadness.com/2006/05/03/10-ways-to-improve-wikis-2/#comment-72 Daniel Wed, 03 May 2006 10:28:10 +0000 http://www.alittlemadness.com/2006/05/03/10-ways-to-improve-wikis-2/#comment-72 Hi Neville, We have had a couple of reports of people having problems with the captcha that we are using which is not good. We have tried to tweak it without much success. Might have a look for an alternate implementation since the idea of texasholdem comment spam really doesn't appeal to me. Thanks for saying hello! Cheers, -Daniel Hi Neville,

We have had a couple of reports of people having problems with the captcha that we are using which is not good. We have tried to tweak it without much success. Might have a look for an alternate implementation since the idea of texasholdem comment spam really doesn’t appeal to me.

Thanks for saying hello!

Cheers,
-Daniel

]]> By: Neville Franks http://www.alittlemadness.com/2006/05/03/10-ways-to-improve-wikis-2/#comment-71 Neville Franks Wed, 03 May 2006 10:13:33 +0000 http://www.alittlemadness.com/2006/05/03/10-ways-to-improve-wikis-2/#comment-71 Hi Guys, Great to see another Oz software company blogging. Wiki's are great at presenting information, but I'm not so sure about writing it in the first place. CamelCase etc. leaves me a bit cold. Brad Neuberg's Dojo.Storage might present a solution to the problem of loosing content in the Browser. See: http://codinginparadise.org/weblog/2006/04/now-in-browser-near-you-offline-access.html Best of luck with your products and blog. Do stop over at my neck of the www some time. PS. I've just had to type this up a second time as the previous submit complained I entered the security code incorrectly. Pressing Back as told presented a blank form. :( This time I've saved the post in Surfulater, just in case. Hi Guys,
Great to see another Oz software company blogging. Wiki’s are great at presenting information, but I’m not so sure about writing it in the first place. CamelCase etc. leaves me a bit cold.

Brad Neuberg’s Dojo.Storage might present a solution to the problem of loosing content in the Browser. See: http://codinginparadise.org/weblog/2006/04/now-in-browser-near-you-offline-access.html

Best of luck with your products and blog. Do stop over at my neck of the www some time.

PS. I’ve just had to type this up a second time as the previous submit complained I entered the security code incorrectly. Pressing Back as told presented a blank form. :( This time I’ve saved the post in Surfulater, just in case.

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