Wiki: the ultimate tool for online collaboration

July 13, 2006
Meredith G. Farkas, Distance Learning Librarian, Norwich University

This was a very good overview session on wikis. She went over what a wiki is, what a wiki is not, what they are good for, what they are not good for, how various libraries are using wikis and how to start your own.

Most of the first part I was familiar with, the what is and what for parts. It was interesting to know who is using them, however, what I wanted was the "how to get started with wikis" session.

After attending this session I have a better overview of the software available, but still don't know how to really set one up inside a corporate firewall environment. I have some access to the server, but the software you install yourself assumes knowledge and access I don't have. I suppose that information is good to have and I will have to deal with IT. I was hoping I could just download something to a folder in my library webserver folder and it would go.

I tried wikimedia and could not understand the installation instructions and finding the location and actual file do download was not as easy as I would have liked. I did find a simple download and one click install system and wondered why the others cannot be as easy to install. Projectforum gives you one zip file which self extracts, loads and goes. The install asked me almost nothing and it still works. It is not, however, free. I need something I can use to prove to management that wikis are a good thing and I have no budget for this. It is not really my job, but someone needs to do it.

I will keep trying. Perhaps I can talk an IT person to look at this with me. Here's hoping!!

This SirsiDynix seminar is available to view at anytime from their archive at: http://www.sirsidynixinstitute.com/archive.php