discuss: Wiki questions
Subject:
Re: Wiki questions
From:
David Lawyer ####@####.####
Date:
15 Jan 2003 08:03:40 -0000
Message-Id: <20030115075213.GB442@lafn.org>
> >> [...] what ideas are circulating?
> David Lawyer wrote:
> >
> >Of course the idea of OpenFacts
On Wed, Jan 15, 2003 at 01:49:12AM +0100, Alexander Bartolich wrote:
>
> I thought that was coming from outside, and not really solving LDP's
> problems.
True, but if they help with Lampadas, it could help LDP.
> > which would be a wiki for LDP documents, etc.
>
> Trying to create a new community around Wiki is very interesting. I do
> see a gap between the chaos of Usenet and the big HOWTOs built like
> cathedrals. Forcing authors (especially the people still using
> LinuxDoc) into this scheme can only fail, though.
No one is proposing to convert LDP to wiki. I'm somewhat critical of wiki
and yet I think that there are ways to make it work better. I think
that the idea of incorporating wiki into Lampadas was to permit authors
that wanted to let others edit their works via wiki, do so. I would
like to see them also edit source docs in LinuxDoc since it seems to be
no harder to learn than wiki.
>
> >and financed by the German government.
>
> Politics are strange, and the Internet is fast. If this endeavor is
> really free then other sites can mirror and even fork. And if
> OpenFacts is not free then they will drown in a sea of flames.
Didn't you read the start of this thread? Original docs submitted to
OpenFacts are supposed to be in the public domain. Not exactly free
since derived works may not be free, but then if the public domain works
are kept up-to-date there would not be much of a market for derived
works. The LDP stuff will have whatever license the author chose so it
will also be "free".
> > So if Lampadas ever gets going there would then be two wiki systems
> > and much duplication of effort as well as forks.
>
> Just when exactly did free software stop to be about choice and
> diversity? And even if there could only be one I would rather watch
> out for big SourceForge than a tiny newcomer.
Well, Erik Moeller explained that the BerliOS project of the German
Gov't has a site like Sourceforge, only no ads.
> Anyway, to have a say at all in this game your premise needs to come
> true: "if Lampadas ever gets going" ...
That's obvious.
>
> > Free documentation for free software needs to be efficiently done
> > and it's would be very wrong in my opinion to have 2 wiki systems.
>
> Strange approach. If someone volunteers for a redundant project then
> there is not much you can do: Emacs/XEmacs, BSD/Hurd/Linux, KDE/GNOME.
One wrong doesn't justify another IMO. I don't really mean that it was
wrong since there were logical reasons why these similar systems
developed.
> The interesting question here is interoperability. I doubt that all
> listed authors of LDP will feel comfortable with Wiki. And I doubt
> that Wiki will ever reach the flexibility planned for Lampadas.
>
One problem is reading diffs. It's claimed that all the author needs to
do to see how her doc is being modified by wiki is to read the diffs
once a month or so. If these diffs are anything like our CVS diffs
which I just tried to read, few authors will bother doing this. I found
that the diffs showed all sorts of context that hadn't changed and were
line-based so that just changing line length (via formatting) would
result in diffs when no change in contents is actually made.
> >So should we give up on Lampadas? No, since it does
> > a lot more than just provide a wiki system.
>
> s/does/would do/ and you have my full agreement.
From the context it was clear that "does" really means what it would do.
>
> > It would let authors that need help or want out to find help (or
> > someone to replace them).
>
> SourceForge has this.
But the SourceForge software is proprietary and very expensive. It's a
case study of how GPLed software can become non-free.
>
> > It would assign each doc a status and keep track of reviews, etc.
>
> SourceForge is not far from that.
>
> >[...] So I would suggest that OpenFacts (and
> > indirectly the German government) help with getting Lampadas up and
> > running
>
> It's exactly this kind of arrogance that disturbs me about LDP.
Why is it arrogance to ask for help? Of course if they offer help, it's
also up to the other people as to whether or not to accept it, especially
David M.
>
> AFAIK there is a mod_perl and a mod_python version of Lampadas in CVS,
> both aborted. David Merrill made a brave decision to start from scratch
> using Zope, but since then I did not hear much. I would really like to
> continue my low-level shell-scripting, database handling and
> translation efforts with the new setup, but all I get is a shrug. I'm
> really curious - on what grounds do you base your strong words?
What strong words? I don't know any more about the status of Lampadas
than you do. I guess that David M. is still working on it but at a
much slower pace now that he found a job.
> > [...]
> >As David M. has pointed out, Lampadas is not just for
> > the LDP.
>
> Nobody doubts your good intentions.
>
> All I really wanted to know is whether there is an alternative project
> plan.
I don't think there is. Of course we are continuing to review docs and
have rejected a few for being of poor quality (or off-topic in one case).
> Perhaps I am missing something, but there was no stampede of
> fully fledged developers breaking down the gates to help. And using
> Zope has actually increased the knowledge problem.
But decreased the time needed to program.
David Lawyer
