Comments on: We have wiki!

By: Brian Gray

Brian Gray — Mon, 21 Jan 2008 06:16:32 +0000

My library also just initiated a wiki for our subject guides. We did it for a few reasons. First, it allowed the librarians to make immediate changes as the full site does through a webmaster for approval of content. It also appeared that it would be easier to convince other librarians to participate as it was easier syntax than the CM. We also liked that now we could push discussions for course guides.

By: Meredith Farkas

Meredith Farkas — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 16:54:24 +0000

Hi Michelle. I wish I could recommend something to you, but I didn’t find anything like that myself when I was doing it (that’s not to say that there isn’t something like that… the documentation for MediaWiki is really disorganized). I don’t think you need a course in PHP to tweak the skin. My technique for doing it was basically trial and error. I looked really closely at the PHP to get some sense of how it was structured and then I’d try changing something and seeing if it worked. Sometimes I’d get an error message, sometimes it would work as I’d wanted it to. It would certainly be easier for someone who knows PHP, but it’s doable.

If you want, I’d be happy to share my altered PHP file for cologne blue with you so you can compare it to the default file and see what you might want to change. Just send me an e-mail letting me know you’d like it and I’ll send you a copy of the PHP file.

Good luck!

By: Michelle Ayers

Michelle Ayers — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 15:14:46 +0000

Meredith,

First, let me say how much I enjoy and learn from your blog.

I am in the process of created a wiki for this very same purpose here in our Court Library – subject guides. Creating the content is not the problem! I am struggling with tweaking the skin.

Can you recommend an online guide (for dummies!)that will help me understand how to remove, as you did, unecessary links in the monotype or cologne blue skin, add the table design and even the color change to cologne blue? So far all I’ve been able to figure out is how to add our logo to the skin.(I’d provide a link to our wiki so you can see but it is not on the web for security reasons and is only housed on our in-house court server.)

Do I really need to take a course in .php to do this? Your advice is greatly appreciated.

By: Meredith Farkas

Meredith Farkas — Mon, 14 Jan 2008 20:10:33 +0000

Most people are freaked out when they first see wiki markup. I know I was years ago when I first got started with them. It usually isn’t until you start using it that you realize that it’s really quite simple. But the way it looks at first blush can be overwhelming. Many people trying to “sell” the idea of wikis to their colleagues get discouraged if their colleagues initially react negatively to a wiki. It’s important to recognize that it’s quite normal and that it often just takes understanding, sensitivity, persistence and hands-on activities to get people more comfortable with wikis (or any unfamiliar technology for that matter). It’s important for people to realize that at first blush, many people are freaked out by wiki markup, but that it is easy for most people to learn.

By: Als Supervisor

Als Supervisor — Sun, 13 Jan 2008 01:45:36 +0000

I have a hard time believing her colleagues were “freaked out”.

How much more professional would it have been for her to just simply express her gratitude that everyone was on board.

By: Edward M. Corrado

Edward M. Corrado — Fri, 11 Jan 2008 00:45:01 +0000

It will be interesting to know as time moves forward how often the guides get updated and if librarians are really more likely to make the minor changes because of the self-service and ease-of-use of the Wiki software. I think you did a good job covering up that it was a Wiki. Really, the only give a way that I noticed was on the search results page (The “Search in namespaces: …” box). And that may only be because I’m familiar with the software.

Good luck with the guides!

By: Meredith Farkas

Meredith Farkas — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 19:01:47 +0000

So true. With wikis, it’s really about finding that “hook” that works for your population. That’s why it’s often difficult for me to offer concrete advice on an exact thing people can do to attract their colleagues to wikis; it’s all very dependent on the group.

Congrats on getting your population to use your wiki, even if the response isn’t what you’d hoped. It rarely is with wikis.

By: Laura

Laura — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 18:48:04 +0000

Congratulations! They look great.

It’s interesting to me to see what it takes to make people interested in using a new technology. I put together a wiki as a sort of intranet for the county over a year ago, but it never got used until I thought to put the menu plan for our holiday potluck on the wiki. Then suddenly many people jumped in and put their name down next to a dish. Now a few are doing the same on the suggestions for the next all-county staff meeting.

By: docwolf

docwolf — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 01:56:02 +0000