Wikis And Your Business

Slide 1: WIKIS AND YOUR BUSINESS Learn how to implement Wikis into your business. All links can be found at: http://del.icio.us/westervillelibrary/wikis

Slide 2: WHAT IS A WIKI?  A wiki is a website that anyone can easily create and edit.  No special tools or computer languages are required.  Recent changes can (usually) be seen.  “Wikis in Plain English” from the Common Craft Show http://www.commoncraft.com/video-wikis-plain-english

Slide 3: WHY WIKI?  Unclog your email.  Facilitate creation.  Ease group projects.  Encourages remote users.  Provide easy access to information.

Slide 4: WIKIPEDIA (www.wikipedia.org)  The most famous Wiki.  As of April 2008, has over 10 million articles in 253 languages.  All articles written by volunteers.  Requires editors to create account (register).  Uses MediaWiki.  New project – Citizendium

Slide 5: WIKITORIALS  Los Angeles Times Experiment – June 2005  Lasted 3 days.  Goal: Encourage readers to rewrite the paper’s editorials.  What happened? Site was flooded with obscene messages and images.

Slide 6: FEATURES  Edit  Search  History  Navigation  Links  Attach documents  Upload media files

Slide 7: SNAPSHOT OF A WIKI Edit & History Tabs Log in/out Navigation Search

Slide 8: SNAPSHOT OF A WIKI (EDIT FUNCTION) “WYSIWYG” Editor Save changes!

Slide 9: SNAPSHOT OF A WIKI (HISTORY FUNCTION) Rollback changes 2 recent edits

Slide 10: EDITING  2 forms of Wiki editing.  WYSIWYG or wikitext.

Slide 11: EDITING – WYSIWYG WYSIWYG = What You See Is What You Get Using this form of editing, the user is offered a toolbar to complete any markup, such as “bold” or “italics”. This is similar to word processing.

Slide 12: EDITING – WIKITEXT  Wikitext is a markup Example from MediaWiki: language (similar to HTML). What you type:  Pro: Easy to learn. You can ''italicize text'' by putting 2  Con: Not consistent across apostrophes on each side. 3 apostrophes will '''bold the text'''. Wikis. 5 apostrophes will '''bold''' and ''italicize'' '''''the text'''''. What you see: You can italicize text by putting 2 apostrophes on each side. 3 apostrophes will bold the text. 5 apostrophes will bold and italicize the text.

Slide 13: SECURITY  Public – Anyone can view and edit.  Protected – Anyone can view, but only members can edit.  Private – Only members can view or edit. Community – Change Patrol Advanced Features – Email notification, RSS Feeds, etc.

Slide 14: COMMUNITY The community can play many important roles related to a wiki. They contribute to the culture and shared knowledge. They can be:  Authors  Users  Security  Marketing  Critics

Slide 15: WIKI ETIQUETTE OR WIKIQUETTE  Be bold! Make changes!  Make notes to explain changes.  Be prepared to explain your changes.  Be polite.  Don’t take things personally.  Stay on topic.  Don’t delete useful content.  Provide citations.

Slide 16: CHOOSING A WIKI Hosted vs. Installed Wikis

Slide 17: CHOOSING A WIKI - HOSTED efinition: A wiki that is installed on a public server and administered for the users. Offers templates. onsiderations: ase of set-up. ser invitations & limits. torage space. ublic, protected or private ($). age protection.

Slide 18: CHOOSING A WIKI - INSTALLED efinition: A wiki that is installed on a private server and administered by the users/organization. More customizable. onsiderations: kill level of users. umber of contributors and viewers. eeded security level. otential size of wiki.

Slide 19: CHOOSING A WIKI – HELP!  WikiMatrix – Compare Them All  Allows you to select criteria and compare wikis side by side.  Free service.

Slide 20: PBWIKI (http://pbwiki.com)

Slide 21: MEDIAWIKI (www.mediawiki.org)

Slide 22: GOOGLE SITES (www.google.com/sites)

Slide 23: WETPAINT (www.wetpaint.com) Another Common Craft Video: www.commoncraft.com/wetpaint

Slide 24: BUSINESS USES  Reduce Email – Create one wiki entry instead of sending an email to all staff/customers.  Shared Repository – Information can be stored on the wiki instead of in a desk drawer or in someone’s email account.  Knowledge Management – As staff change, information is located in a centralized location.  Training – Centralized information makes it easier to train staff.

Slide 25: BUSINESS USES  Company or Department Intranet – Less complicated than a traditional intranet. Needs less IT assistance.  Web Publishing – Online and easily updated for staff or customers.  Simple Databases – Easily sorted and seen by the user community.  Shared Spreadsheets & Documents  Save Money – Possibly replace other costly programs.

Slide 26: WHEN NOT TO WIKI…  Community authorship is not appropriate.  Greater control over the visual layout is desired.  The content will not change often.  The content is timely and then obsolete (consider a blog.)  Concerns over privacy (copyright, trade secrets, etc.) cannot be addressed by private settings on a wiki.  There is no one to monitor/maintain the wiki.

Slide 27: QUESTIONS? Presented by Kristin 7/2/08 Westerville Public Library Presentation can be found at: www.slideshare.net/westervillelibrary All links can be found at: http://del.icio.us/westervillelibrary/wikis