Wiki tutorial

From Publication Station

Wiki Intro

A little history

The first wiki was create in 1995 by Ward Cunningham, and it was called Wiki Wiki Web (Wiki in Hawaii means quick!).

Interview with Ward Cunningham

Wikis are about speed and easiness of writing and publishing on the Web.

Also about collaboration. According to Ward Cunningham ‘People discovered that they can create something with other people, that they don't even know. But they come to trust and they make something that surprises them in terms of its value’.

For a more detailed page on Wikis, its historical historical perspective and some of its many possibilities see the Wiki page.

This page is more how-to guide.

As it is a wiki, feel free to edit it.

Wiki editing

account creation

In order to start contributing to Publication Station wiki, like in most wikis, you need to create a user account. Do so by clicking on Create Account, in the top right corner or the wiki,

You'll be taken to a page where you will be asked your account details, a question to see if you are not a robot — as you guessed the answer is Kooning.


editing

How to write on the wiki?

Writing on a wiki is not not very different from writing a blog.

You have a Read and Edit mode.

Edit lets you enter content and make changes to existing content.

While you are editing, you can preview your changes in the Preview window.

Once done editing save the page, otherwise your contribution will be lost.

text formating

Although there is a specific syntax to format the text, you can use the menu to do much of the formating you need. In case you are interested to get to know the syntax here is cheat-sheet with the most important syntax.

You can experiment with writing and formating your own User page. You can get go to this page by clicking in your username, next to the little person drawing. The user page, is normally used to say something about you, but can also be a nice testing ground.


Attention: to create line breaks you need to leave at least one empty space between one line of text and the next.

Title Headings

You can make titles with different hierarchic levels by using "=" as follows:

=Main Title=

==Sub Title==

===Sub-sub Title===

===Sub-sub-sub Title===

You can place content under each of these section

The result when the page is saved will be:

Main Title

Content under Main Title

Sub Title

Content under Sub Title

Sub-sub Title

Content under Sub-sub Title

Sub-sub-sub Title

Content under Sub-sub-sub Title


page creation

How to create a page?

In a wiki the information is organized into pages or articles ( no great distinction between the two). If you want to say something about something for which there isn't a page, you create that page and start writing its content.

To create a page create internal links [[name of new page]] for that page

The other easy way to create is to use the search function with the name of the page you want to create. When searching, you are given the possibility to create that page.

Note: For your work you should use sub pages under your user namespace. [[User:yourusername/mypage]]

  • Red link = previously non-existing page.
  • Blue link = existing page.

Wiki - an existing page

oooooooo - an non-existing page

external links

To link to external webpages, use the world icon.

You'll be presented with: [http://www.example.com link title] and simply need to replace them with url and title(optional)

like:

[http://beyond-social.org/ Beyond Social] == Beyond Social

Audio-visuals

uploading images

You probably want not only to write, but also to use images, audio and video on the pages you'll be developing.

Wiki allows the following formats:

Medium Formats
image png, gif, jpg, jpeg, svg
audio ogg, mp3
video ogv, webm, mp4

To upload you can use the picture icon on the menu. It asks you for the file name of the file you are going to upload (they must match) and a caption, if you to say something about that image, video, or audio.

When at this upload menu, instead of "caption" select "none" as the format of your upload.

[[File:myimage.png|My caption]]


This action doesn't upload the file, it only inserts a bit syntax that allow you do the upload the file. In order to do so, you need to:

  • Save the page you are working on
  • Click on the red link of the file you want to upload
  • Follow the instruction to upload your file

File:Myimage.png

image captions

Captions can be added to images by using a vertical bar

[[File:myimage.jpg|Caption under the image]]


Youtube/Vimeo videos

To include, you need:

  • the ID of the video you want to include in you page
  • to write {{youtube|id}} for Youtube or {{vimeo|id}} for vimeo. Where the id is the sequence of numbers and letters that follow ?v= in Youtube videos url, and vimeo.com/ in Vimeo videos)

Example: {{youtube| XZN_X6gPjEc}} {{vimeo|68841788}}

will results in:

{{#widget:Youtube|id= XZN_X6gPjEc}}

Template:Vimeo


Chaging pages' titles

Pages' titles can be changed by using the function Move in the top right corner in a dropdown menu next to the star.

The Move page permits you to attribute a new name to the current page


Communication

How do collaborators, editors, proofreaders, coordinators and designers communicate withing this ecosystem ? Say one totally disagrees with what is said in page where she is collaborating.

There are several ways to go about it.