[Wikipedia-l] Wikipedia's scope

[Tim Chambers]

See my column for the formatted version:
http://www.wikipedia.com/wiki/Tim_Chambers/Wikipedia_configuration_management

There was [a thread on the Wikipedia list] that got me thinking about
configuration management for Wikipedia. 

I agree with the need to accommodate Wikipedia in citations. I also
agree with the need to somehow "freeze" articles. 

So here's an outline of my proposal: 

1. Wikipedia is, first and foremost, a perpetual work in progress. I
think the September 11, 2001 Terrorist Attack article is evidence of
the value in this principle. Wikipedia contributes to the universal
body of human knowledge, offering the unique benefits of Wiki
technology: global participation, hypertext, up-to-date information,
etc. Others may want to flesh out this mission statement. We must
never compromise this key contribution of Wikipedia. 

2. Wikipedia also strives to be academically relevant by enabling
periodic releases of encyclopedia versions. The period may be much
shorter than a conventional encyclopedia, but most information
providers seem to be settling on annual updates. This also builds on
the strong tradition of hardcopy almanac?s. The 2001 edition of the
Wikipedia needs to get out soon if we go this route. 

3. Wikipedia articles can be versioned even more often than the whole
Wikipedia. We already do this thanks to UseModWiki, but the calls for
"freezing" articles are begging for a baselining system where an
article can, to some degree, be called "ready." They'll never be
"finished," but many are "ready" for "release." 

So that brings me to my overall vision. [I work] in the field of
software process engineering, and from my perspective Wikipedia needs
a [configuration management system]?. We have a [revision control
system]? for individual articles, but the 10,000 article mark seems a
good point to release our first version of the Wikipedia. Eventually
(maybe very soon?), Wikipedia will need a supervised release process. 

This model is analagous to other open source projects. For instance,
Debian released version 2.2r3 on April 17th, 2001. To be a part of
that release, developers of all parts of Linux had to "get on the
release train," as it's sometimes called. 

Here's a start to get discussion of Wikipedia's configuration
management system going. Current URLs at www.wikipedia.com would
continue to reflect the current understanding of the "wild and wooly
world." Articles are "live." But some new links can be added to each
article. Every "released" article could have a link to view diffs
compared with older released versions of the article, not just the
"older revisions." We still show visitors the live copy, but we have a
link to "release 2001" or release "September 2001" and so on. These
named releases are frozen for all time. So the world will know what
Wikipedia in 2001 had to say about the universe. There isn't an "edit"
link on released pages, but there's a "visit the live, ongoing
work-in-progress version of this article," which still has the edit
link. 

I still have a lot of vocational work done today, so enough
avocational time for today. Talk amongst yourselves... 

<>< Tim 



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