How to use a wiki
Wired Magazine’s annual ‘How to’ issue offers bits of advice on everything from baking a Wii cake to ruling the blogosphere. Here’s an excerpt from how their “How to work” feature on using a wiki**:
Use a Wiki
Free online applications like MediaWiki and PBWiki make this brainstorming and collaboration tool even more valuable. Observe these dos and don’ts.
Document, don’t discuss. Wikis are best for storing shared group knowledge — tutorials, style guides, agendas, meeting minutes, and so on. They’re not mailing lists or forums.
Learn the markup. Only wiki n00bs post big blobs of run-on text. Take a few minutes to learn how to add links and create readable bullet points, section headers, and paragraphs.
Sign your name. Many wikis allow for anonymous contributions, but your fellow collaborators will appreciate knowing who said what. Plus, users with a reputation for
making valuable contributions are less likely to get their edits rolled back than an AnonymousCoward.Encourage participation.Inform colleagues that if they don’t participate in the wiki, you’ll be forced to have a — ugh! — long, boring meeting.
Compose offline, then cut and paste. Others may want to modify the file while you’re writing.
Who out there in library land uses a wiki?
For starters, there’s the Hospital Librarian’s Wiki, sponsored by the Hospital Libraries Section of the Medical Library Association, as well as UBC’s HealthLib Wiki, which has had over 300,000 page views since its launch in 2006. Meanwhile, the American Library Association has ReadWriteConnect, a wiki listing all of ALA’s blogs, wikis, RSS feeds, podcasts, and “next generation” online tools. There’s over 30 wikis available. Where’s yours?
Want more information?
Check out Brenda Chawner & Paul Lewis’ 2006 article WikiWikiWebs: New Ways to Communicate in a Web Environment from Information Technology & Libraries for an overview of wikis and their applicability to libraries.
**Wiki (wik’e): A collaborative website workspace that multiple people can edit together, share files and documents, and collaborate.