[Textbook-l] MediaWiki (was: quality.wikimedia.org and wikiquality-l launched)

[Martin Swift]

Dear community,

On Thu, Sep 20, 2007 at 04:17:27PM -0400, Monahon, Peter B. wrote:
> Peter Blaise says: Thanks for the dialog, but could we be more specific?
> When writing:
> 
> > Earlier: "...you shouldn't contribute 
> > encyclopedia articles or use Wikipedia 
> > policies [on the http://www.mediawiki.org/ 
> > wiki]...It's for the software, not an 
> > encyclopedia..." 
> 
> ... what do we mean? 

Just what it says: Don't confuse MediaWiki.org with Wikipedia.org. The
difference isn't obvious to everyone. These are different projects and
simply the fact that they use the same software to present information
on the WWW doesn't imply anything but shared technological
limitations.

But that's all it says. It's not saying you shouldn't contribute /any/
articles or use /no/ policies at all. Simply that you should keep in
mind that for different projects, different approaches are needed.

> The reason I ask is because I cannot imagine any
> other or better way to support MediaWiki software itself than: 
>
> - to be encyclopedic in scope, and 
> 
> - to be all-inclusive and democratic in participation.

I disagree. From <http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/About_this_site>:
 "MediaWiki.org has only one topic: the homonymous wiki engine
  MediaWiki."

There is nothing about this that demands either encyclopedic scope or
open, democratic participation. Nor any reason why that would be the
best way to build the site.

> Instead I find that all of us out here who implement and use the freely
> available MediaWiki software are NOT welcome and are not encouraged to
> share our experiences with other MediaWiki implementers and supporters.

I disagree again. I had a (too short a) stint contributing to MW.org
while I was working on a community project which used the MW software.

During that time I found the developers -- who were the majority of
the regulars -- to be open to new ideas and dedicated to the task at
hand.

> Is it just overzealous (or overworked?) admins?

It could be a bit of the latter (parenthesized). I found them to be
mostly trying to get the technical aspects of the documentation
settled, before attacking the huge task of moving and refactoring the
relevant manual pages from Meta.

They were, however, dedicated to doing it well and there were several
discussions on the best way to present and organize the manuals. I
think they have a good idea going. That idea is to have a consistent
manual rather than a sporadic set of slowly growing stubs that take a
whole lot of work and overview to tie together afterwards.

There is also the problem of the Meta handbook which contains a huge
amount of contributed material of sometimes very good material. The
plan is to import the good parts into the MW.org manual. Merging it
with a myriad of pages on various topics would prove to be hell for
anyone to undertake.

> For example, go to http://www.mediawiki.org/ and search for almost ANY
> basic wiki word related to MediaWiki software, and you'll get a RED
> response, meaning there's no page for what you're lookin' for.  Try:
> - smtp
> - preferences
> - navigation
> - search
> - toolbox
> - sysop

I tried them all and, though I didn't get a "red response", not once
was I taken to a specific page with information on the search-word.
Each time, however, I got a list of pages that might interest me.

Which I think is great. Now, depending on who you are (user, admin or
dev) you will be looking for different things regarding each of these
topics. There is no reason why one should make any assumptions about
the motives for the search.

As for editing the wiki. If you're interested in improving the
resources on MW.org, please begin by reading up on the structure that
has been decided on. Granted, you may have some great ideas to
contribute regarding the presentation of information on MediaWiki. In
that case, I would hope you'd take them to the community and try your
best to convince them.

Keep in mind, however, that the presentation that has been agreed upon
was decided after lengthy discussion, and that there is always the
possibility that the crowd is right. Some -- including many proponents
of democracy -- would argue that that is in fact the most likely.

Thanks for your time,
Martin Swift

-- 
\u270C