Thanks for your thoughts.
In fact, I have in mind that there will be a Jabber server with an interface from/to MediaWiki. On the discussion page there will be a "Chat" link (next to the "edit" and "+" links), so that clicking on it will launch the IM program (such as GAIM) with a session that is archived in the discussion page from where the session was started/joined. That is, the logging of conversations will be implicit as users will start up their chats from within wiki. There will also be a list of other online users in the page and a way of inviting them to a chat session.
Regarding your comments:
- Batch Edits - Please batch together IM dialog as a single edit rather
than having each new statement in a conversation be a new "Edit" to the page. This is to prevent flooding of the Recentchanges as well as the pages edit histories.
Hmm, these are valid considerations. One would hope that conversations are not too long. If you have IM sessions that are still alive after a couple of hours then those outside the session might miss quite a bit of the pending discussion page update.
- Consent - It would probably be good to have a way for your users to
"consent" to having their IM conversations logged as wiki pages since this amounts to a sort of cyber-monitoring system.
As mentioned above, the IM conversation is launched from within the wiki making the logging implicit, but you're right that users should be made aware of this. "Use implies consent to archiving of the conversation in this page" sort of thing.
- Bot Edits - Depending on popularity, it would probably be a good idea to
attribute these automatic edits to a bot user. This is to limit flooding of Recentchanges and watchlist emailings (if they're enabled).
Kind of same as above. If an entire IM conversation gets saved by the bot and assuming that there won't be more than a couple of these per day then a flooding is not too likely. Of course an entirely different case may exist on chat-crazy sites.
That's what I can think of off the top of my head. Good luck!
Thanks Jim!
Robert.