Thanks To Those Working On The Wiki

[Xian]

Just wanted to say thank you to everyone who is contributing to tidying up the Official Wiki (https://wiki.ubuntu.com/) and translating the content. I was reading a page (https://wiki.ubuntu.com/SynapticHowto?) recently that Matthew East (https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MatthewEast) has been working on and it really is looking sharp. Thanks Matthew and all the others who spend their time developing this very essential resource.

[az]

Let's not forget the forum's knowledgebase on the wiki at

https://wiki.ubuntu.com/forum

If many people from the forums get involved, we can have a pretty sharp collection of stuff for the next release. Perhaps that would speed things up for the next Ubuntuguide, too....

[poofyhairguy]

Yep thanks a lot to the wiki people.

I think for Breezy, it should be a rule (enforced by honor, not us admins for the most part) to post the how tos on the wiki (its better for that job anyway) and leave a link to it on the forum. The the posts in the forum can be discussions of the wiki. That way the how to section doesn't have to be reinvented when the next release comes...just upgraded.

Just a well thought out idea....

[TravisNewman]

love it poof!

[poofyhairguy]

love it poof!

Thanks. I have had that idea for a while. The forum often messes up how tos (it destroyed my luminocity one) and it is impossible to upgrade.

When Breezy comes I want to make a new task force. The duty of this task force will be to copy as many of the current Hoary How Tos here on the forum that could apply directly to Breezy (most could with minimal modification I bet) to the Wiki. Then Breezy could have 30+ How Tos in a month, and the forum could do what its best at doing (provide a way to talk about the guides).

Plus....it would be a good way to get the forum into the wiki more....

[az]

That is what the forum-wiki delta is for. And we should get on this right now so that we can follow the development of Breezy. Once it is out, we will already have a pile of documentation.

[poofyhairguy]

That is what the forum-wiki delta is for. And we should get on this right now so that we can follow the development of Breezy. Once it is out, we will already have a pile of documentation.

I see...good call...I work on my plan this month instead of the next then...thanks for the info.

[mattheweast]

good work guys. I just wanted to repeat in this thread the purpose behind the /forum section on the wiki: to allow forum users to post in useful information that they have found on the forum without having to learn the wiki markup.

Once the guides are in good condition, they can be moved into the main section of the wiki by willing volunteers :)

If you already know the wiki markup and wish to insert a howto, you can insert it directly into the main part of the wiki without having to go through the /forum subsection! :)

Matt

[az]

Once the guides are in good condition, they can be moved into the main section of the wiki by willing volunteers :)
Matt

When Henrik and I had first discussed the forum section, it was supposed to have a similar format (more or less) to the ubuntuguide because that is what the forum users are used to.
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=33898

I would just like to clarify your statement about "moved into the main section" I think that if people beleive that their page will suddenly dissapear, they will not use the wiki. I think we have to shape a format and stick to it.

For example, I can make a page there about how I got my webcam to work. Every now and then, the upstream source gets updated, so I can visit the page and update the url to the latest source. I can also refer people to my page when asked about webcams on the forum.

It would be pretty inconvenient for a user to come back and say that the page was no longer there.

I beleive that the content on the forum-wiki delta should remain there. I think it would be tremendously useful for others to copy the content and create other pages, if they need to make a coherent work out of many forum knowledgebase pages.

Is this what you meant, or do you have a different view?

[mattheweast]

I understand your points. However I am slightly concerned that the /forum section on the wiki will become like a "second wiki". As far as I understood the purpose of that section was to encourage people to bring content into the wiki without having to learn the markup. People who know the markup would then merge the material into the main part of the wiki. In fact that purpose is outlined on the page: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/forum Perhaps we have misunderstood eachother!

Basically I believe that there is a great amount of useful information on the forum, and that this can be brought into the wiki, but I don't think it is necessarily a good idea to make a second wiki, for two reasons:

Some material will become duplicated. For example there is great material in these two pages: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/forum/hardware/ndiswrapper and https://wiki.ubuntu.com/HowToSetUpNdiswrapper. If this material were to be combined it would make for better documentation.
People looking for information on a particular point will have to look in two places, instead of one. If they use the search, they will find both documents, but will have to read them both and attempt to reconcile them themselves, rather than this merging job being done by the authors or other editors.

I see the /forum section as an excellent opportunity for attempting to bridge the information gap between wiki and forum and harnass the informative power of both, as Henrik also mentioned. I am slightly concerned that branching, or forking the wiki will not achieve this important objective!

Perhaps there is a middle ground to be found here. What do you think?

Matt

[az]

I suppose that I am really optimistic.

I think that if there were a small percentage of forum users who contribute to the wiki, it would triple in size in a few weeks. There are a tremendous number of posts here every day.

The main reason people seem to stay away from wikis is that things are disparate and hard to organise. I truly beleive that if people who tend to use the forums have to search the wiki to find a solution, they will just ask their question on the forums. It is that much easier. That is also another reason why the Ubuntuguide is so popular.

So, I think it is a priority to make things easy for forum users. If that means duplication, I think it is a small price to pay. Forum threads can go on for a long time. Some solutions are still referenced months later. It is impossible to change the url to a page in a post automatically when it is moved on the wiki.

Otherwise, you can just do away with every other forum page other than the FrontDesk. But you would have to find a way to make the pages ridiculously easy to find.

By nature, the search feature of the wiki is a pain. You have to wade through several useless pages that generated a hit before you find what you want. Do you think there can be some sort of index for the forum content that can follow the content if it gets moved or merged into another page? Would something like that be as simple as just making a /forum subpage?

I do not know how to solve this. I really think this can fail if you expect forum users to use the wiki in the regular wiki way.

What if there was not a "forum" knowledgebase, but just a simple wiki knowledgebase organised in the current forum-wiki delta format and just merge all the other pages into that? If it is just as simple, the forums could populate that without it neccessarily bearing the "forum" name?

wiki.ubuntu.org/knowlegbase/hardware/video/webcam
With an index starting at wiki.ubuntu.com/knowledgebase.


Just rename forum to knowledgebase and we are there... (forum-wiki delta is a funny name anyway...)

I dunno....

Centralisation is good.

*EDIT* What is outlined on the page is what Henrik wrote when he created the test page. I never got around to clarifying it...

[az]

"Perhaps there is a middle ground to be found here. What do you think?"

"Just rename forum to knowledgebase and we are there... (forum-wiki delta is a funny name anyway...)"


That would be too easy, wouldn't it? Am I asking too much?

[mattheweast]

There is a lot of common ground between us: I also want as many forum users as possible to contribute to the wiki. I understand the difficulties of the wiki, and the benefits of the forum. I too want to make documentation easy to find for people.

I too am optimistic ;)

However I do strongly believe that duplication of material is not in the best interests of any users, whether wiki or forum users. If we can arrange it so that documentation is easy to find on the wiki, I believe that a single wiki is more useful than two wikis, with overlapping material. We have been doing some work on making documentation easier to find on the homepage for documentation: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UserDocumentation

I believe that the /forum/ area on the wiki is useful, and that if we can get forum users contributing to the wiki it will grow enormously and beneficially, but I believe in centralisation and I am a strong opponent of division of resources! The reason that the forum-wiki delta was given the name "delta" is that it can be a place where material comes into the wiki and is then channelled into the relevant places so that the documentation can improve.

Renaming the forum-wiki delta area to knowledgebase would simply be branching the wiki so that there would be two separate areas in which users could find documentation, leading to the difficulties I've described in my previous post.

my two euro cents

Matt

[az]

As a testament to the havoc that is wikiness, I had not yet visited https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UserDocumentation!

(*Bows head in shame*)


Is the documentation there static? Can I refer to a link there and it will still be there in two months? That is a feature that is essential to forum use of the wiki.

If so, then we should port all the subpages in the forum-wiki delta there and keep the FrontDesk page for forum users who do not want to learn markup.

Otherwise, not only do you have duplication, but you get confusion associated with the transitional nature of the delta.

The stuff in the delta should not be there long enough for it to be structured, in that case.

[mattheweast]

As a testament to the havoc that is wikiness, I had not yet visited https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UserDocumentation!


Not your fault! We are working hard now to make things clearer: UserDocumentation is now the only link under Documentation on the FrontPage: we intend it to be the "home page" for all documentation.


Is the documentation there static? Can I refer to a link there and it will still be there in two months? That is a feature that is essential to forum use of the wiki.

To be honest: nothing on the wiki is static. Everyone has complete access to editing pages. That applies to all the pages on the wiki, including the forum area and even the FrontPage. The philosophy of the wiki is that through many eyes and many editors, the best links and information get retained. The wiki team will keep an eye on the UserDocumentation page to try and ensure that useful links don't get deleted, but due to the nature of the wiki, nothing is static.



If so, then we should port all the subpages in the forum-wiki delta there and keep the FrontDesk page for forum users who do not want to learn markup.

Otherwise, not only do you have duplication, but you get confusion associated with the transitional nature of the delta.

The stuff in the delta should not be there long enough for it to be structured, in that case.

Now we are really getting somewhere :)

Porting the subpages in the forum delta to main wiki pages and making links in UserDocumentation is exactly what I had understood to be the objective :) I don't think that forum users who don't wish to learn markup should necessarily be limited to the forum/FrontDesk page, but I agree that the current structure might be confusing for users. We can help by trying to make it clear what the different parts of the wiki will do.

I hope that I am not getting ahead of myself here... the forum/ area of the wiki doesn't have to necessarily limit itself to having one objective! Perhaps Henrik will comment on what his ideas for the area are! I have posted him a link to this thread.

Matt

[Henrik]

"Just rename forum to knowledgebase and we are there... (forum-wiki delta is a funny name anyway...)"

Hey, I was really pleased with myself when I came up with that name :grin:

Matt, I see your point about not wanting to duplicate things too much. I think the issue at the moment though is that we're not having much content moving from the forum to the wiki (and from there to CD and web based docs).

Perhaps we should just encourage forum users to start filling up the delta area and let us all work out how to structure the data as we go along (or am I being too optimistic?) Once we get a core of 10-15 forum members actively using the wiki (whatever part), then we will be in better shape to discuss the different technologies.

The concern about fragmenting wikis is a valid one though. We currently have two 'satellite wikis', udu and edubuntu, which are becoming a pain to maintain separately and which we will now be merging in with the main wiki.

azz, I'm not sure we can guarantee that the pages (or information rather) will end up at the place they started out. No information really ever get lost in a wiki because you can trace back the history (but the URL always gives the latest version). We can associate certain categories with the information, which should make it easier to group things and search for them. Searching features have improved in the new wiki though, and we are working on further improvements.

Really, forums are better at tracing information chronologically. So here is one idea: what if we establish a thread in the forum for posting a copy of a new wiki page and then the thread would be used for making suggestions and would serve as a change-log. The wiki page would have a link back to that forum thread. That way, if you want to give someone a permanent link, you give them the forum one, which will always be valid. This might also bring wiki people into the forum, because we could add a notice saying: This page originated in the forum. If you make significant changes, please add a brief comment in this thread.

I also want to make the general point that structuring and distilling information is hard and complex work. Therefore we shouldn't be discouraged when it all looks a bit hazy to begin with. On the code side, the developers have a real genius for bringing different applications, patches and translations together into a smooth collection that we know and love as Ubuntu (note: I'm not a Linux developer myself). Mark, especially has a real gift for seeing how things can be brought together, both in terms of code and other forms of information and dynamics. We should draw inspiration from this and try to achieve something similar with documentation.

[az]

To be honest: nothing on the wiki is static. Everyone has complete access to editing pages. That applies to all the pages on the wiki, including the forum area and even the FrontPage. The philosophy of the wiki is that through many eyes and many editors, the best links and information get retained. The wiki team will keep an eye on the UserDocumentation page to try and ensure that useful links don't get deleted, but due to the nature of the wiki, nothing is static.

By static, I mean that the link stays there. Of course, the content will evolve. So long as the pages there do not dissapear weekly, I think it can be useful for the forum users. Dead links from the forum to the UserDocumentation page will only confuse people. Again, some quotes from the ubuntuguide from six months ago are still relevant and quoted daily here.




I don't think that forum users who don't wish to learn markup should necessarily be limited to the forum/FrontDesk page, but I agree that the current structure might be confusing for users. We can help by trying to make it clear what the different parts of the wiki will do.

I hope that I am not getting ahead of myself here... the forum/ area of the wiki doesn't have to necessarily limit itself to having one objective! Perhaps Henrik will comment on what his ideas for the area are! I have posted him a link to this thread.

Matt

You are not getting ahead, as I am ready to port any pages that are not already there over.

As for "the delta", well, creating subpages _is_ learning markup. Anything more than a user cutting and copying text kinda defeats the purpose. In that perspective, what else should the delta include, other than the FrontDesk and a bit of explanatory text?

[az]

"Just rename forum to knowledgebase and we are there... (forum-wiki delta is a funny name anyway...)"

Hey, I was really pleased with myself when I came up with that name :grin:

Matt, I see your point about not wanting to duplicate things too much. I think the issue at the moment though is that we're not having much content moving from the forum to the wiki (and from there to CD and web based docs).

Perhaps we should just encourage forum users to start filling up the delta area and let us all work out how to structure the data as we go along (or am I being too optimistic?) Once we get a core of 10-15 forum members actively using the wiki (whatever part), then we will be in better shape to discuss the different technologies.

The concern about fragmenting wikis is a valid one though. We currently have two 'satellite wikis', udu and edubuntu, which are becoming a pain to maintain separately and which we will now be merging in with the main wiki.

azz, I'm not sure we can guarantee that the pages (or information rather) will end up at the place they started out. No information really ever get lost in a wiki because you can trace back the history (but the URL always gives the latest version). We can associate certain categories with the information, which should make it easier to group things and search for them. Searching features have improved in the new wiki though, and we are working on further improvements.

Really, forums are better at tracing information chronologically. So here is one idea: what if we establish a thread in the forum for posting a copy of a new wiki page and then the thread would be used for making suggestions and would serve as a change-log. The wiki page would have a link back to that forum thread. That way, if you want to give someone a permanent link, you give them the forum one, which will always be valid. This might also bring wiki people into the forum, because we could add a notice saying: This page originated in the forum. If you make significant changes, please add a brief comment in this thread.

I also want to make the general point that structuring and distilling information is hard and complex work. Therefore we shouldn't be discouraged when it all looks a bit hazy to begin with. On the code side, the developers have a real genius for bringing different applications, patches and translations together into a smooth collection that we know and love as Ubuntu (note: I'm not a Linux developer myself). Mark, especially has a real gift for seeing how things can be brought together, both in terms of code and other forms of information and dynamics. We should draw inspiration from this and try to achieve something similar with documentation.

Actually, I see Matt's point and cannot see why the forum subpage is any differnt from the UserDocumentation subpage. The trasitory nature of the forum subpage that you mention is counter-productive since forums users can go quite a way back in time sung the forum search.

Insofar as using a thread as a changelog, that may work. The How-To threads that we currently user are long and messy, though. I think we are all hoping to simplify things on the wiki...

[mattheweast]

"Just rename forum to knowledgebase and we are there... (forum-wiki delta is a funny name anyway...)"

Hey, I was really pleased with myself when I came up with that name :grin:

Matt, I see your point about not wanting to duplicate things too much. I think the issue at the moment though is that we're not having much content moving from the forum to the wiki (and from there to CD and web based docs).

Perhaps we should just encourage forum users to start filling up the delta area and let us all work out how to structure the data as we go along (or am I being too optimistic?) Once we get a core of 10-15 forum members actively using the wiki (whatever part), then we will be in better shape to discuss the different technologies.


I agree that what we need to do is to encourage forum users to contribute data to the wiki. However I just wanted to ensure that the purpose of the "delta" was defined, because otherwise it leads to misunderstandings of the sort that me and azz have had on this thread. I'm glad we've cleared it up.

One point I will make: once forum users are accustomed to using the wiki, I think that we should make it clear that they do not _necessarily_ have to add their howto in the /forum section, but can put it in the main part of the wiki, and add links to pages like UserDocumentation.

The other thing is: there is already quite a bit of material in the delta, I think we can already start to think about how to structure the data.



Really, forums are better at tracing information chronologically. So here is one idea: what if we establish a thread in the forum for posting a copy of a new wiki page and then the thread would be used for making suggestions and would serve as a change-log. The wiki page would have a link back to that forum thread. That way, if you want to give someone a permanent link, you give them the forum one, which will always be valid. This might also bring wiki people into the forum, because we could add a notice saying: This page originated in the forum. If you make significant changes, please add a brief comment in this thread.


Sure, good idea. Links to forum threads can be made on any pages. However _if_ we think that we want to start moving pages from /forum/ into the main part of the wiki, we need to keep in mind the necessity of fixing links.


I also want to make the general point that structuring and distilling information is hard and complex work. Therefore we shouldn't be discouraged when it all looks a bit hazy to begin with.
Agreed, I'm not discouraged, I'm encouraged :D Dialogue like this can only be good

Matt

[mattheweast]

By static, I mean that the link stays there. Of course, the content will evolve. So long as the pages there do not dissapear weekly, I think it can be useful for the forum users. Dead links from the forum to the UserDocumentation page will only confuse people. Again, some quotes from the ubuntuguide from six months ago are still relevant and quoted daily here.

There is nothing we can do to stop users from removing links on the UserDocumentation page, short of locking that page down (bad idea). However, we CAN keep an eye on the page and ensure that when links are removed, they are put back. There is also a warning on that page which is aimed at making users think carefully about changes. :) In general, I feel that useful links won't get removed from that page, but if they are, we can help restore them.


You are not getting ahead, as I am ready to port any pages that are not already there over.
Cool! I suggest we make this task part of the Wiki Team's tasks too! (https://wiki.ubuntu.com/WikiTeam)


As for "the delta", well, creating subpages _is_ learning markup.
Yeah, but maybe we can create some subpages for them? I'm not sure...

[az]

"One point I will make: once forum users are accustomed to using the wiki, I think that we should make it clear that they do not _necessarily_ have to add their howto in the /forum section, but can put it in the main part of the wiki, and add links to pages like UserDocumentation."

I am actually opposed to having a forum section altogether, now. I do not see the point. The UserDocumentation serves the purpose.

Making the process a three-step thing rather than the one or two step process is just fine.

I would find it easier getting people on board by just explaining the meaning of the UserDocumentation section, rather than going about it the other way.

This has to be really straightforward. Is there a dissadvantage to Forum users jumping right into the UserDocumentation page?

[az]

"Cool! I suggest we make this task part of the Wiki Team's tasks too!"

Forget it. It will take me twenty minutes...


"Yeah, but maybe we can create some subpages for them? I'm not sure..."

Well, then, a FrontDesk with a few subpages?

[mattheweast]

"One point I will make: once forum users are accustomed to using the wiki, I think that we should make it clear that they do not _necessarily_ have to add their howto in the /forum section, but can put it in the main part of the wiki, and add links to pages like UserDocumentation."

I am actually opposed to having a forum section altogether, now. I do not see the point. The UserDocumentation serves the purpose.

Making the process a three-step thing rather than the one or two step process is just fine.

I would find it easier getting people on board by just explaining the meaning of the UserDocumentation section, rather than going about it the other way.

This has to be really straightforward. Is there a dissadvantage to Forum users jumping right into the UserDocumentation page?

Possibly: that page is intended to have links to those wiki pages which are (relatively) mature. Once howtos from the forum are ported to the wiki in terms of getting the markup right, links to them can be posted on UserDocumentation. However, if a forum user wishes to add material without worrying about learning how the wiki works and how the markup works, the /forum area provides a cool place for them to just paste it in, paste a link to a forum thread, etc. The wiki team (or others) can then format it correctly and integrate it with the existing material.

In terms of just "looking" for documentation rather than adding it, I agree that the user's first port of call should be UserDocumentation. If that doesn't help, the search engine :)

Matt

[mattheweast]

"Cool! I suggest we make this task part of the Wiki Team's tasks too!"
Forget it. It will take me twenty minutes...

Erm... Maybe that is possible if you just port all the pages to the main section of the wiki. But if you want to merge duplicates (e.g. the ndiswrapper material, the lucent material etc), it will take a little longer.


Well, then, a FrontDesk with a few subpages?
++
:)

Matt

[az]

Possibly: that page is intended to have links to those wiki pages which are (relatively) mature. Once howtos from the forum are ported to the wiki in terms of getting the markup right, links to them can be posted on UserDocumentation. However, if a forum user wishes to add material without worrying about learning how the wiki works and how the markup works, the /forum area provides a cool place for them to just paste it in, paste a link to a forum thread, etc. The wiki team (or others) can then format it correctly and integrate it with the existing material.
Matt

Well, then why does it have to be a forum section? What is the difference between the forum section and a sandbox?

Also, by including material which is less mature but more accessible onto the UserDocumentation page, you optimise it's chances of being useful because more people will see it, use it and improve it.

I do not think people will understand the concept of a seperate section. I think the information in the transition zone will be more-or-less ignored by forum users until it is on the UserDocumentation page. That does not capitalise on the wiki effect.

Not that I know much about wikis. I just think I am being realistic about what to expect from "instant-gratifiation" forum users. They will be less tempted to scratch a small itch than a bigger one.

[mattheweast]

Well, then why does it have to be a forum section? What is the difference between the forum section and a sandbox?


I think a reason for making it a forum section would be because the majority of cool material that could be copied and pasted would be from the forum. It might also give greater visibility to users who use the forums a lot and don't use the wiki that much. But you're right, in theory it should be open to ALL users to paste things into the wiki without having to worry about formatting and so on.


Also, by including material which is less mature but more accessible onto the UserDocumentation page, you optimise it's chances of being useful because more people will see it, use it and improve it.


I didn't necessarily mean mature in the sense of being a complete document (many howto's from the forum are already complete enough), but just mature in terms of formatting and consistency with other parts of the wiki (again I return to the ndiswrapper example).


I do not think people will understand the concept of a seperate section. I think the information in the transition zone will be more-or-less ignored by forum users until it is on the UserDocumentation page. That does not capitalise on the wiki effect.

Not that I know much about wikis. I just think I am being realistic about what to expect from "instant-gratifiation" forum users. They will be less tempted to scratch a small itch than a bigger one.

I see your point. From one point of view I take all of your points but from the other I still feel that the forum section might be useful for those people who want to paste in howto's from the forums, but do not want to take the extra time to format it or merge it with existing documents on the same subject.

Let's sleep on it (my bed time has arrived) ;)

Matt

[az]

"I didn't necessarily mean mature in the sense of being a complete document (many howto's from the forum are already complete enough), but just mature in terms of formatting and consistency with other parts of the wiki (again I return to the ndiswrapper example)."

Had I visited the UserDocumentation section before I made the ndiswrapper page, I would have either user the UserDocumentation version when replying to a forum questions, or added to it and then use it in a reply...

I guess you can say that some time was wasted because I looked into and put it into the forum section first.... That is my point.


"I see your point. From one point of view I take all of your points but from the other I still feel that the forum section might be useful for those people who want to paste in howto's from the forums, but do not want to take the extra time to format it or merge it with existing documents on the same subject.

Let's sleep on it (my bed time has arrived"

I have to leave work and give baths to the kids, too... I see your poiint about merging. But that only applies to prewritten articles. I would expect users to not have anything written until they get to the wiki.

I am being persistent because I am zealous. In the end, you guys are the wiki gurus...

[mattheweast]

Had I visited the UserDocumentation section before I made the ndiswrapper page, I would have either user the UserDocumentation version when replying to a forum questions, or added to it and then use it in a reply...

I guess you can say that some time was wasted because I looked into and put it into the forum section first.... That is my point.
Yeah I see your point. But if you didn't want to know how the wiki worked, you wouldn't want to go and search the wiki to see if there was existing documentation on ndiswrapper and how it could be improved (N.B. UserDocumentation is not yet a complete record of all documentation on the wiki, there are hundreds of other pages that we need to add). You'd just want to dump the material somewhere. The delta provides that possibility.


I am being persistent because I am zealous. In the end, you guys are the wiki gurus...
Heh, not me! I am zealous like you :)

In the end there is no massive disagreement between us: we both want to add to the Documentation on the wiki, we both want to centralise it and make it easily available.

--> bed

[Henrik]

But if you didn't want to know how the wiki worked, you wouldn't want to go and search the wiki to see if there was existing documentation on ndiswrapper and how it could be improved

Here is another random idea (that needs a volunteer ...) Perhaps someone could write a 'Brief guide to documentation in the wiki' to be posted in the forum. It would simply appear as a posting under an appropriate heading, but it would be nice if a bit of work was put into it so that thinghs appeared in sensible categories and links were clickable. Not large quantities of text, but basically a table of contents for wiki-based documentation that has a place in the forum. That would encourage forum users to a least have a look at what's available in the wiki and when a question comes up in the forum they might remember to point to the right place in the wiki.

It's true that this sort of table of contents is actually best maintained in the wiki itself, because it can be updated as the wiki content changes. But the point here is to build bridges to bring users over from one medium to another from time to time. A wiki page with the same mission might be 'Usefull stuff that appeared in the forum this week', updated weekly like a blog.

[az]

If the wiki's table of contents is the most up to date, I see no reason not to use it. The UserDocumentation page is the only page to which I would refer forum users. If the links are not neccessarily permanent, well I can see the use of descriptions working better.

"Go to the UserDocumentation page on the wiki. Look under Hardware, ndiswrapper..."



"Here is another random idea (that needs a volunteer ...) Perhaps someone could write a 'Brief guide to documentation in the wiki'"


I think a link to the UserDocumentation page on the top right corner next to Bugzilla would be great. I will ask UbuntuGeek. The page itself is straightforward. It is an index. Instead of writing something up about it, I (and others - PoofyHairGuy mentioned creating a task force) would just refer to it in daily postings. There is no such table for the Unoffical Ubuntuguide, but links to it get kicked around a lot.

As far as contributing, should there not be an entry on the page itself about that? "How-to contribute User Documentaion" That is something I would refer to when a user posts a really compelling solution to a problem and I would encourage them to make it more permanent on the wiki.

In that How-To, you could detail the workings of the forum-wiki delta (although it would apply to more than just the forum) and users could take it from there to wherever they feel they can handle.

I guess I am pro-wiki, but feel the UserDocumentation page made the forum-wiki delta obsolete.

[mattheweast]

I think a link to the UserDocumentation page on the top right corner next to Bugzilla would be great. I will ask UbuntuGeek. The page itself is straightforward. It is an index. Instead of writing something up about it, I (and others - PoofyHairGuy mentioned creating a task force) would just refer to it in daily postings. There is no such table for the Unoffical Ubuntuguide, but links to it get kicked around a lot.

As far as contributing, should there not be an entry on the page itself about that? "How-to contribute User Documentaion" That is something I would refer to when a user posts a really compelling solution to a problem and I would encourage them to make it more permanent on the wiki.

Here's the thing: there is a link already at the top of the Forums to the "Official Wiki", and the front page of the wiki points directly to User Documentation in the documentation section. In my opinion the thing that has caused a problem is that when users visit https://wiki.ubuntu.com, the wiki software does not take them to the Front Page, but instead to the last wiki page they visited. This has led to the Front Page not getting viewed a lot, and probably has led to people not knowing about important parts of the wiki (such as UserDocumentation). If we can correct this, there may be no need for a new link, as UserDocumentation will automatically get more visibility.

With regard to a guide on how to post, there is an extensive help section in the wiki (https://wiki.ubuntu.com/AboutContents), _however_, it can be said that this help section is long and complex, and a page such as the one you suggest which makes things simpler and explains the forum-wiki delta as well, IMO would be very useful. In fact the Italian team had identified this problem too and was planning on writing such a page.

EDIT: In fact what we can do is combine your idea with Henrik's: write a brief guide to documentation in the wiki and how to post it, and place it both in the wiki AND in a forum thread for people to read.



I guess I am pro-wiki, but feel the UserDocumentation page made the forum-wiki delta obsolete.
That page is not new: it has always been there. However in the past it has not been particularly useful, because it was a bit of a mess. We've been trying to tidy it up recently and post more links. Hopefully with forum users help (it was in fact a forum user who identified how messy it was and has been very proactive in improving it), we can make it rock!

M

[kleeman]

I have to agree that an easy to follow howto on wiki page creation would help a lot. I have followed this thread with interest and have some ideas on adding to the wiki but have been repelled by the complexity so have left my howtos on the forum. BTW a great and well organized wiki is the Lyx one:

http://wiki.lyx.org/LyX/LyX

[mattheweast]

I have to agree that an easy to follow howto on wiki page creation would help a lot. I have followed this thread with interest and have some ideas on adding to the wiki but have been repelled by the complexity so have left my howtos on the forum.
Ah thanks for posting: your experience is exactly the sort of thing we want to improve. We will definitely work on a howto on wiki page creation, in the mean time, perhaps you would like to post links to useful howto's in the https://wiki.ubuntu.com/forum area? That way we can work on bringing some in.



BTW a great and well organized wiki is the Lyx one:
http://wiki.lyx.org/LyX/LyX
Thanks, will check it out.

Matt

[Henrik]

BTW a great and well organized wiki is the Lyx one:
http://wiki.lyx.org/LyX/LyX
Hm, so that's basically a table of contents. Well, it's worked in books for years ...

For some reason, the front page seems difficult to agree on though. Everyone has an oppinion about it. What if we created a TableOfContents page that was manually maintained and was somewhere between the clean front page (which could then be made even simpler) and the complete listing (https://wiki.ubuntu.com/TitleIndex).

[mattheweast]

Hm, so that's basically a table of contents. Well, it's worked in books for years ...

For some reason, the front page seems difficult to agree on though. Everyone has an oppinion about it. What if we created a TableOfContents page that was manually maintained and was somewhere between the clean front page (which could then be made even simpler) and the complete listing (https://wiki.ubuntu.com/TitleIndex).
Well for documentation, that is what the https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UserDocumentation page is intended to be. I've been trawling through the index of all page titles for useful documents to link on that page. I think the FrontPage is quite clean now, especially with regards to documentation, but the only problem is that people aren't seeing it.

As far as a table of contents for other areas of the wiki, I think it would be a lot of work... and not necessarily that useful if we can get as many pages as possible into categories.

M

[Henrik]

Well for documentation, that is what the https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UserDocumentation page is intended to be. I've been trawling through the index of all page titles for useful documents to link on that page. I think the FrontPage is quite clean now, especially with regards to documentation, but the only problem is that people aren't seeing it.

As far as a table of contents for other areas of the wiki, I think it would be a lot of work... and not necessarily that useful if we can get as many pages as possible into categories.

M

True. But perhaps a page with all the categories listed would be good, giving a brief explanation of each. A bit more than the CategoriesCategories list provides. (I'm sure that's been mentioned before)

[mattheweast]

True. But perhaps a page with all the categories listed would be good, giving a brief explanation of each. A bit more than the CategoriesCategories list provides. (I'm sure that's been mentioned before)
Sure, good idea.

Any news on making the FrontPage the default redirect from https://wiki.ubuntu.com?

sorry if this thread is taking some weird OT directions...

M