[opensuse-wiki] Use of namespaces in openSUSE wiki
Primary question is, should we move articles like "OpenSUSE mailing list netiquette" to more appropriate place like namespace [1] OpenSUSE: with new title "OpenSUSE:Mailing list netiquette" and with current article left as redirect to new location, as netiquette is linked from many places? When we talk about cleaning wiki, anything that is meta/community information about openSUSE should use existing namespace openSUSE, not the Main one as it is now. I would also propose creation of new namespaces like Development, Portal, News, Sandbox, etc. with links to entry pages in Main namespace, or only entry pages in Main namespace. With this we will have clean Main namespace for user searching certain topics and ability to use wiki for more then a few documents targeted to ordinary visitors looking for help. Few indexes in Main namespace will provide links to other namespaces and keywords for search engine. [1] What is namespace and how to use it? http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Help:Namespace and particularly section "Namespace uses" -- Regards, Rajko OpenSUSE Wiki Team: http://en.opensuse.org/Wiki_Team People of openSUSE: http://en.opensuse.org/People_of_openSUSE/About -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-wiki+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-wiki+help@opensuse.org
Hi, Rajko M. wrote:
Primary question is, should we move articles [...] to more appropriate place like namespace [...] and with current article left as redirect
I'm all for it but what i think we first need an overall concept for the content. Like which Portals, Templates or Namespaces we want to have. Which wiki projects we want to start out with and so on. Essentially, i think, we need to decide which use cases we want to service with the wiki and which we don't and then we can decide on processes and start moving already existing content around. I fear that otherwise we will end up with a similar mess then we have right now. Just with a different way of implementing it. Henne -- Henne Vogelsang, openSUSE. Everybody has a plan, until they get hit. - Mike Tyson -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-wiki+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-wiki+help@opensuse.org
On Mon, 2009-11-02 at 20:46 -0600, Rajko M. wrote:
Primary question is, should we move articles like "OpenSUSE mailing list netiquette" to more appropriate place like namespace [1] OpenSUSE: with new title "OpenSUSE:Mailing list netiquette" and with current article left as redirect to new location, as netiquette is linked from many places?
When we talk about cleaning wiki, anything that is meta/community information about openSUSE should use existing namespace openSUSE, not the Main one as it is now.
You linked to http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Help:Namespace , which says that namespaces can be useful to separate a wiki's "public" content from the "maintenance" part of the wiki itself. That distinction is worth keeping. I think the "openSUSE" namespace should be instead a category... something like "Category:Community" or "Category: Community guidelines", or something like that. You know... within the openSUSE wiki, you don't need to label something as explicitly belonging to openSUSE; if it is in *that* wiki, it obviously relates to openSUSE! :) I guess what I'm trying to say is that community-related content is not really the "meta" part of the wiki; it's not administration stuff for the wiki editors, but rather it is actual, public content that we want to be easily visible.
I would also propose creation of new namespaces like Development, Portal, News, Sandbox, etc. with links to entry pages in Main namespace, or only entry pages in Main namespace.
I guess I prefer categories for most of those. Maybe "Portal" is okay as a namespace, but that's just to follow Mediawiki's conventions. Federico -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-wiki+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-wiki+help@opensuse.org
On Tuesday 03 November 2009 13:01:35 Federico Mena Quintero wrote:
I think the "openSUSE" namespace should be instead a category... something like "Category:Community" or "Category: Community guidelines", or something like that. You know... within the openSUSE wiki, you don't need to label something as explicitly belonging to openSUSE; if it is in that wiki, it obviously relates to openSUSE! :)
Categories are useful for browsing, but search needs namespaces to limit its results to default namespaces for all users, including anonymous, or to something else that is configurable in user preferences. Although, I have a lot of links to wiki bookmarked, search is still the most used interface to wiki when I look for articles on certain topic, so namespaces are important. For instance developers of YaST don't have to see instructions how to use it, but end users need them. So all of the YaST in YaST: is not good idea, just as having all the stuff in Main name space. The namespace openSUSE seems to be our Meta namespace. I guess answer on this is buried somewhere in the openSUSE wiki creation times :-) So, I have to correct my proposal, taking in mind Henne's emails and above sentence about YaST. I agree that we don't want different mess :) -- Regards, Rajko OpenSUSE Wiki Team: http://en.opensuse.org/Wiki_Team People of openSUSE: http://en.opensuse.org/People_of_openSUSE/About -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-wiki+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-wiki+help@opensuse.org
I would also propose creation of new namespaces like Development, Portal, News, Sandbox, etc. with links to entry pages in Main namespace, or only entry pages in Main namespace.
I'm wondering about the logistics of a change like this with a large amount of existing Wiki content. How do you manage the massive number of moves and the subsequent equal number of redirects. Do you draw a line in the proverbial sand and say from this day on, the pages will be moved and the old locations are simply gone (removing the redirects) or do you keep all the redirects... how well do redirects work across namespaces? (these are questions I'm asking on the OOo Wiki as well... where we face a very similar problem... ) C. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-wiki+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-wiki+help@opensuse.org
Rajko, All,
2009/11/3 Rajko M.
With this we will have clean Main namespace for user searching certain topics and ability to use wiki for more then a few documents targeted to ordinary visitors looking for help. Few indexes in Main namespace will provide links to other namespaces and keywords for search engine.
While I'm not that familiar with the implementation possibilities of MediaWiki (Namespaces, Categories) and its advantages/disadvantages (I certainly leave this to more Wiki-knowledged people), I definitely support the general idea behind it. The main namespace is interesting for an end user searching for content and pages covering "Meetings", "Team Pages", "Developer documentation", "Marketing" and such shouldn't be considered in our Wiki Usability Concept (that is clearly targeted on the end user). Also the implementation of our QA process (be it Sandboxing or FlaggedRevs in the end) doesn't make too much sense for these kind of pages or even discourage people contributing to it - I mean who wants to pass a reviewing process to edit a User page or add some information to a Meeting agenda? Thus taking those pages/contents out of the Main namespace (and maybe the search) makes perfect sense to me. Thanks for pointing that out. Best, R
-- Regards, Rajko
OpenSUSE Wiki Team: http://en.opensuse.org/Wiki_Team People of openSUSE: http://en.opensuse.org/People_of_openSUSE/About -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-wiki+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-wiki+help@opensuse.org
-- Rupert Horstkötter openSUSE Community Assistant http://en.opensuse.org/User:Rhorstkoetter Email: rhorstkoetter@opensuse.org Jabber: ruperthorstkoetter@googlemail.com -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-wiki+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-wiki+help@opensuse.org
On Wednesday 04 November 2009 05:49:39 Rupert Horstkötter wrote:
While I'm not that familiar with the implementation possibilities of MediaWiki (Namespaces, Categories) and its advantages/disadvantages (I certainly leave this to more Wiki-knowledged people), I definitely support the general idea behind it. The main namespace is interesting for an end user searching for content and pages covering "Meetings", "Team Pages", "Developer documentation", "Marketing" and such shouldn't be considered in our Wiki Usability Concept (that is clearly targeted on the end user).
That is idea behind namespace usage. Remove from default search all that visitor that is not logged is not looking for, but as with YaST example, and sincerely almost everything else that is software related, there are areas that user want to see, and those that we want to present to attract new skilled contributors, like development activity, or any contributor in community related areas. How to have both is what we should look for, and in areas that can't be reconciled we have to make decision what is more important, having happy end users, or having more contributors.
Also the implementation of our QA process (be it Sandboxing or FlaggedRevs in the end) doesn't make too much sense for these kind of pages or even discourage people contributing to it - I mean who wants to pass a reviewing process to edit a User page or add some information to a Meeting agenda? Thus taking those pages/contents out of the Main namespace (and maybe the search) makes perfect sense to me.
My opinion on Sandbox is not really affirmative. I'm not sure how it will work out: 1. Who is going to enforce that? 2. Who is going to confront authors that want article published, and in reviewer opinion it is not ready? 3. Who is going to review articles? 4. How many people will accept that workflow? Experience with SDB: is not extraordinary. Not many people ever wrote there, and many of those that did ignored not very hard formatting and style requirements/recommendations. The SDB is actually good organized if authors and editors follow instructions, but it requires quite some work to keep it that way. Besides article http://en.opensuse.org/SDB-Howto-FAQ shows one problem with SDB presence on wiki. It is confusing where to write. I'm not sure that many people will ever try to understand workflow diagram at the end of article. FlaggedRevs: It is not a magic stick that will solve problems by itself, it requires tweaking if one wants to get the it right. General description http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Help:FlaggedRevs Technical details http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:FlaggedRevs Blog http://blog.wikimedia.org/2008/07/30/quality-assurance-in-an-open- project/ Unlike plain wiki, that is explained in a lot of details on Wikipedia and Mediawiki, FlagedRevs have above 3 pages and that is about it. It is experimental feature that might be helpful to keep content of articles in good shape, but it will not organize access to articles, we have to do that anyway.
Thanks for pointing that out.
More points above :-) -- Regards, Rajko OpenSUSE Wiki Team: http://en.opensuse.org/Wiki_Team People of openSUSE: http://en.opensuse.org/People_of_openSUSE/About -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-wiki+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-wiki+help@opensuse.org
Rajko,
2009/11/5 Rajko M.
On Wednesday 04 November 2009 05:49:39 Rupert Horstkötter wrote:
While I'm not that familiar with the implementation possibilities of MediaWiki (Namespaces, Categories) and its advantages/disadvantages (I certainly leave this to more Wiki-knowledged people), I definitely support the general idea behind it. The main namespace is interesting for an end user searching for content and pages covering "Meetings", "Team Pages", "Developer documentation", "Marketing" and such shouldn't be considered in our Wiki Usability Concept (that is clearly targeted on the end user).
That is idea behind namespace usage. Remove from default search all that visitor that is not logged is not looking for, but as with YaST example, and sincerely almost everything else that is software related, there are areas that user want to see, and those that we want to present to attract new skilled contributors, like development activity, or any contributor in community related areas.
How to have both is what we should look for, and in areas that can't be reconciled we have to make decision what is more important, having happy end users, or having more contributors.
Also the implementation of our QA process (be it Sandboxing or FlaggedRevs in the end) doesn't make too much sense for these kind of pages or even discourage people contributing to it - I mean who wants to pass a reviewing process to edit a User page or add some information to a Meeting agenda? Thus taking those pages/contents out of the Main namespace (and maybe the search) makes perfect sense to me.
My opinion on Sandbox is not really affirmative. I'm not sure how it will work out: I certainly know this. That said, I'll post another discussion thread on this subject (QA process) later on to the list - I'm the assignee here (sorry, I haven't found the time yet due to other tasks I needed to take care of). During the Meeting there was a general concensus to go for the Sandboxing approach and prefer this one over FlaggedRevs but as parties in favor of FlaggedRevs haven't joined the Meeting last Friday, we decided to give them the opportunity to still discuss about it before we make an ultimate decision for Sandbox OR FlaggedRevs as our QA process.
1. Who is going to enforce that? We'll explain the Sandbox Usage within the Guidelines and encourage the editors to do only minor edits to existing pages. Major Edits and new articles need to go through the Sandbox namespace. I explained this in much more detail several times before (within my concept-proposal and during the Meeting another time - may you please read the very first part of the transcript please? http://en.opensuse.org/Wiki_Team/Meetings/2009_10_30-transcript)
2. Who is going to confront authors that want article published, and in reviewer opinion it is not ready? The ultimate decision IF an article is ready for the main Namespace is the sole courtesy of a wiki moderator. That's the reason I proposed Wiki Team Members to work in a "supporting and moderating" capacity.
3. Who is going to review articles? The openSUSE Community at the Wiki Forum at forums.o.o as well as the team IF it likes to participate in the reviewing process.
4. How many people will accept that workflow? To find that out I interviewed Martin Gräßlin from wiki.ubuntuusers.de two weeks ago. They use a Sandboxing approach for their, btw excellent, wiki for ages and he told me that the acceptance factor is awesome and the process is asy to understand for the Community. Also the maintenance overhead isn't too high from their experiences - he mentioned that the Wiki team is easily able to handle this.
I myself (personally) am definitely pro-Sandbox as it ensures QA and I can't really see the advantage FlaggedRevs should deliver here. Reviewing of Revisions has to be done anyway, with the Sandbox as well as the FlaggedRevs approach.
Experience with SDB: is not extraordinary. Not many people ever wrote there, and many of those that did ignored not very hard formatting and style requirements/recommendations. The SDB is actually good organized if authors and editors follow instructions, but it requires quite some work to keep it that way. Besides article http://en.opensuse.org/SDB-Howto-FAQ shows one problem with SDB presence on wiki. It is confusing where to write. I'm not sure that many people will ever try to understand workflow diagram at the end of article.
The SDB will anyway be moved out of the wiki and will be maintained external. I'm sorry but more detailed informations aren't available to me currently. I'll post updates once available.
FlaggedRevs: It is not a magic stick that will solve problems by itself, it requires tweaking if one wants to get the it right. General description http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Help:FlaggedRevs Technical details http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:FlaggedRevs Blog http://blog.wikimedia.org/2008/07/30/quality-assurance-in-an-open- project/
Unlike plain wiki, that is explained in a lot of details on Wikipedia and Mediawiki, FlagedRevs have above 3 pages and that is about it. It is experimental feature that might be helpful to keep content of articles in good shape, but it will not organize access to articles, we have to do that anyway.
As I said several times before, I'll ceratinly go along with whatever the decision the team makes. I just said that I'm for the implementation of Sandboxing due to the reasons I outlined previously. Thanks, R
Thanks for pointing that out.
More points above :-)
-- Regards, Rajko
OpenSUSE Wiki Team: http://en.opensuse.org/Wiki_Team People of openSUSE: http://en.opensuse.org/People_of_openSUSE/About -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-wiki+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-wiki+help@opensuse.org
-- Rupert Horstkötter openSUSE Community Assistant http://en.opensuse.org/User:Rhorstkoetter Email: rhorstkoetter@opensuse.org Jabber: ruperthorstkoetter@googlemail.com -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-wiki+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-wiki+help@opensuse.org
Hi, Rupert Horstkötter wrote:
The SDB will anyway be moved out of the wiki and will be maintained external.
Says who? Why would anyone do that? I think it's more than stupid. The place for user contributed content is our wiki. Nearly every user contributed content is in the form of howtos, problem solutions, small documentation pieces (stuff that belongs to the SDB). Why would you separate that from the wiki? Henne -- Henne Vogelsang, openSUSE. Everybody has a plan, until they get hit. - Mike Tyson -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-wiki+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-wiki+help@opensuse.org
participants (5)
-
Clayton -
Federico Mena Quintero -
Henne Vogelsang -
Rajko M. -
Rupert Horstkötter