Reflections On Personal Experiences In Using Wikis

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    Reflections On Personal Experiences In Using Wikis - Presentation Transcript

    1. Exploiting The Potential Of Wikis: Reflections On Personal Experiences In Using Wikis Brian Kelly UKOLN University of Bath Bath Email [email_address] UKOLN is supported by: http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/web-focus/events/workshops/wiki-workshop-2006/ Abstract A brief review of personal experiences in using Wikis and some reflections of implications for institutional provision of Wiki services. This work is licensed under a Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 licence (but note caveat) Resources bookmarked using 'ukoln-wiki-workshop-2006' tag
    2. Contents
        • Making a start: Wikalong
        • Using Wikipedia
        • In-house use: Twiki and MediaWiki
        • Bundled Wikis: Moodle
        • Web 2.0 services: Writely, WetPaint, Jot, Pbwiki, …
        • Reflections
        • Using Wiki To Support Ourselves
    3. Wikalong
      • Wiki used for workshop on " Beyond Email: Strategies for Collaborative Working and Learning in the 21st Century ", Nov 2004
      • Wikalong tool used:
        • Hosted service for annotating Web pages
        • Firefox/IE plugin
        • Also referrer service
      • Experiences
        • Easy to use
        • Data copied to UKOLN
      http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/web-focus/events/workshops/ ucisa-wlf-2004-11/discussion-groups/discussion-wikis Eventually (year+ later) spambot add link spam to page (& try to make invisible)
    4. Wikipedia
      • Also in Feb 2004 created Wikipedia entry on Rapper Sword, a personal interest (not morris dancing!)
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rapper_sword Over time content grows, appearance improves (through community support – e.g. corrections to German grammar). Decision to give geographical & historical emphasis. No longer in complete control (new-fangled US rapper team first to have entry in Wikipedia)
    5. In-House Wiki - Twiki
      • In 2005 Twiki software installed locally and used to support UKOLN's research interest (e.g. collaborative discussions on metadata elements by international metadata community).
      • Twiki then started to be used for other purposes. But:
        • Was it the right tool for other purposes
        • Would be get locked in
        • Training & support issues
    6. From Twiki To MediaWiki
      • MediaWiki used to support (a) events and (b) JISC standards catalogue.
      http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/interop-focus/ community/index/IWMW2006 Wiki provision for events seems sensible: admin support; community building; clarification; etc. Wikis for collaborative document work seems sensible. Need to have shared agreement or mechanisms for handling tensions. Other issues: (A) Wiki as a process for stuff which is deployed elsewhere (e.g. writing papers) or Wiki as a delivery vehicle and (B) interoperability of Wikis; exporting data and application logic.
    7. Experiences of In-House Wikis
      • Ideal solution not yet identified:
        • MediaWiki is liked by techies (MySQL, extensible, …) & is used in Wikipedia (scalable)
        • Patterns of usage not yet established (one Wiki or multiple instances)
        • Management of MediaWiki extensions may be a support issues
        • Transclusion (embed content from one Wiki to another) sound great – but technical issues (performance, recursion)
        • Usability issues: what does home mean?
        • How much training, support & development do we invest?
      We have a need for an event which will help to resolve these issues!
    8. Let's Try Some More!
      • Various externally hosted Wikis used to gain experiences of approaches
      Pbwiki – note RSS links to pages (and versions of pages) http://iwmw-barriers.pbwiki.com/ http://alt-c-2006.wetpaint.com/ Wetpaint – attractive interface and also RSS links to pages (and versions of pages) Suprglu – RSS aggregator, which can bring together RSS feeds from disparate Wikis (and other tools) http://altc.suprglu.com/
    9. Bundled Wikis - Moodle
      • Do you need dedicated Wiki software, if the functionality is provided in other enterprise software (VLEs, CMSs, etc.)
      • As part of ongoing evaluation of tools, approaches, etc., Wiki in Moodle used for planning a paper & arranging event.
      • Thoughts:
        • Poor interface
        • Poor quality HTML
      • Issues:
        • Evaluation of subjective aspects
        • Improvements in next versions
        • Replaced functionality (e.g. SOA)
    10. Licensed Wiki At Event – Jot
      • Licensed Jot Wiki service used at ALT 2006 Research Seminar in Holland.
      • Used by participants in " Emerging technologies & the Net Generation " day's event.
      http://altspring.jot.com/ Participants described interests in Wiki prior to events Reporters summarised discussion groups using Wiki – and reported back where sat (chair scrolled through notes) Notes in digital form made it easier to produce white paper
    11. Web 2.0 Services: Writely
      • Writely used for planning paper. This provides:
        • Word-processing style interface
        • Authentication system
        • Multiple ways of saving file (publish to Blog; save locally in various formats)
        • RSS disclosure
      At one stage (just after Google buy-out) email authentication didn't work (invalid sender field meant email was not sent). However message sent to Writely forum resulted in fix within 2 days
    12. What Is A Wiki?
      • Is Writely a Wiki or a Web-based word processor?
      • Is Google Spreadsheets a Wiki: fill in values and see how the graph alters.
      • Thoughts:
        • Stop confusing things: it's like Wikipedia; it doesn't matter.
        • We need to properly scope our Wiki deployment exercise; otherwise the scientists who wish to collaborate build data structure will be unhappy with a text-based Wiki service.
      Is Gliffy a Wiki or a Web-based collaborative drawing tool: add a location where you think Wikis are on Gartner hype curve. Is a personal Wiki a Wiki ( Wikipad on Palm)?
    13. Third Party Services
      • Third party tool used on Web site to convert RSS to HTML
      • On 10 Oct, email received saying page was corrupt
      • Page fixed and problem investigated & documented
      • Company had failed to pay bill for domain (admin error)!
      • Bill was paid & domain quickly restored
      • Discussion:
        • Demonstration of why 3 rd party services must never be used
        • Minor irritation; process for fixing worked & improved processes for minimising future risks developed (& processes will improve with community involvement)
      • No innovation until central services get round to evaluation & deployment, or certain amount of risk acceptance. What’s the answer?
    14. Reflections
      • Some thoughts:
        • Support : Net generation happy to pick up and use various tools vs Oversimplistic
        • Authorisation : Leave open vs simple authorisation vs need for single signon / Shibbolised services
        • Usage : What do we want to use Wikis for?
        • Take-up : What will users use Wikis for and hpw with they use them (if at all)?
        • Key features in selection : technical (open source, backend database, …) vs user features (interface, ease-of-use) vs institutional (enterprise software; backend integration; …)
        • Outsourcing : Evil Thatcherite nonsense vs. sensible business decision vs sensible technical decision (APIs, Web Services, REST, RSS, …)
    15. Wikis & The Wider Community
      • We've heard about:
        • Personal use of Wikis
        • Institutional use of Wikis
      • In discussion groups on deployment strategies let's also discuss use of Wikis to support our communities:
        • Wikis for the support services (library, IT) on evaluation of Wikis, deployment and support experiences, etc.
        • Wikis for case studies on use case scenarios
      • If we can't produce sustainable Wikis, can we expect this to happen in our institutions?
    16. Questions?
      • Any questions

    + Brian KellyBrian Kelly, 4 years ago

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