Wiki workshop

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Using Wikis in organizations

Where do they come from?

  • Wikis predate wikipedia hgttg, everything

Visualizations

  • Vandalfighter / Beren
  • Touchgraph

Problems solved

  • Reference
  • Collaborative definitions
  • Personal or workgroup notes/database
  • Knowledge management (using categories)
  • Share organized info without blasting everyone
  • Bliki (blog in a wiki)

Stefan comments:

  • a wiki is like play-doh or paper and you can make anything out of it. With a few formatting conventions i've seen wikis used for documentation, task and TODO lists, planning and timelines, bug tracking, tracking physical resources (where is this piece of equipment and has it been paid for yet) and customer relations
  • it's faster and easier and safer than emailing around a bunch of word documents with "track changes" turned on

Helen comments:

  • What makes me a Wiki enthusiast after tonight, however, is that I've now seen how wikis enable the management & generation of knowledge, and the planning & generation of work. Specifically, I think it's incredible that with wikis (or at least this particular wiki software), you are expected to generate the title (reference) for a link BEFORE you generate the content for the link. So if I'm tackling a multidimensional beast, even just a complicated grant, I can start with the main text, and put in links to appendix documents without having those documents in existence yet. In other words, it's a conceptual approach -- I LIKE!!

DavidM comments:

  • I like wikis because of their flexibility. Once they learn a few tricks, "users" can easily create pages and organized content, and with semantic wikis, "users" can be programmers, creating their own data types, forms and views. There is also a culture of openness, enablement and expecting more.

Compared to other applications

  • More generalizable, less rigid
  • Not really for communications (but see Blikis)
  • With semantic wikis, they will become more like applications

How do they work

  • Rows and columns, relational databases – hypertext and wikis
  • Easy editing, on the spot
    • Simple syntax, typically no rich text editor
  • Typically write-able by anyone
  • Full history is always there, can revert
  • Use discussion tab for comments and questions

Creating a page

  • From main – a few links per page
  • Keep each major topic on its own page, or move to one when its time
  • When editing other's work, be considerate of what they were trying to say

Hands on

  • Create an account
  • Create your user page with a heading and a link
  • Fill in the link

Issues

  • Not everyone has access to a computer / is comfortable using a wiki
    • Summaries
    • Don't rely on them exclusively
    • Different workflows for different people -storyteller, coder
  • Making information available
    • NPOV, substantiated
    • Culture is changing to be more critical, expect more
  • Different wikis are better at different tasks
  • Managing expectations

Types of Wikis

Sample wikis

http://techpresident.com/blog-entry/wisdom-feds-internal-wikifying-obamas-open-government-directive use in government

Semantic wikis

  • Properties – ad hoc and non
  • Categories & querying

Hands on

  • Put yourself in the Person category
  • Add your birth date
  • Add your postal code
  • Add your favourite colour
  • Views

Problems solved

  • Databases with finely and arbitrarily defined data, with forms and querying

Applications for CED

Other applications?

mel knows how to edit, thanks david [[1]]