Re: [9fans] wiki?

Re: [9fans] wiki?

[nemo]

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Don't know how to set  up  a wiki, but if
a `slashdot' like site is considered to be
good enough for FAQ purposes, we have one
running here, and I could create a new forum
for Plan9. Just let me know.

hth


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From: "Russ Cox" <rsc@plan9.bell-labs.com>
To: 9fans@cse.psu.edu
Subject: [9fans] (no subject)
Date: Wed, 29 Nov 2000 03:03:55 -0500
Message-ID: <20001129080400.1134A199E1@mail.cse.psu.edu>

subect: swikis

Is anyone interested in setting up a
Plan 9 wiki/swiki?  Does anyone know
what they are?

A Wiki is a collaborative web server:
the pages are world-writable with a 
history, and anyone who doesn't like
or wants to add to a page, create new
pages, etc., can do so.  The theory is
that if you see something wrong or not
as complete as it could be, you fix it.
Apparently it works quite well most of
the time.  The history function means
that if someone comes a long and "destroys"
everything, someone else can just come
along and restore it.  This apparently
rarely happens.

The Squeak people (Smalltalk hackers)
seem to have the most common implementation,
which they call a swiki.  

I've been poking around the various Squeak-related
ones for a while and am quite impressed.
I even fixed a few broken links while
I was poking around.

http://pbl.cc.gatech.edu/myswiki/107 is
a decent jumping off point for learning
about them.

I think that such a server dedicated to
explaining various things for new Plan 9
users would be a tremendous help.  The great
thing is that it can start small and as people
find questions not answered they can add them
(and then the answers when they find them),
and it evolves as is useful, without the hassle
of a central person maintaining it, as is the
case with FAQs and the like.  (You might think
of this as FAQ-o-matic on steroids, I believe.)

They're apparently very easy to set up: they
run anywhere Squeak does, which is Mac, Windows,
and most Unixes.

Russ

Re: [9fans] wiki?

[nemo]

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Agree. An slashdot like place would only
become a faq if moderated. So let's go for wiki.
Hope anyone else has it installed...


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From: "Russ Cox" <rsc@plan9.bell-labs.com>
To: 9fans@cse.psu.edu
Subject: Re: [9fans] wiki?
Date: Wed, 29 Nov 2000 03:18:59 -0500
Message-ID: <20001129081900.F2F7D199EF@mail.cse.psu.edu>

I'm not sure what you mean by Slashdot-like,
but the (rather, one) problem with Slashdot itself
is that it's more of an online newsgroup than a
coherent collection of web pages.  My impression
is that's really discussion, and I kind of like
9fans for that.

Imagine an entire coherent web site dedicated
to explaining various common problems, etc.,
except that no one person has to maintain it,
and it just evolves over time.  It's a giant
collaborative reference.  That's quite neat.

Russ

Re: [9fans] wiki?

[Russ Cox]

I'm not sure what you mean by Slashdot-like,
but the (rather, one) problem with Slashdot itself
is that it's more of an online newsgroup than a
coherent collection of web pages.  My impression
is that's really discussion, and I kind of like
9fans for that.

Imagine an entire coherent web site dedicated
to explaining various common problems, etc.,
except that no one person has to maintain it,
and it just evolves over time.  It's a giant
collaborative reference.  That's quite neat.

Russ