Feature #144
closedPrivate wiki space
0%
Description
Hi, can't find this in the features area but of course if someone's already requested it please delete this. My colleague has asked if we have any plans to provide private wiki space? Many thanks!
Updated by Boone Gorges about 14 years ago
- Category name set to BuddyPress (misc)
- Status changed from New to Assigned
- Assignee set to Boone Gorges
- Target version set to Future release
Maybe we can use this space to have a conversation about what such a feature might look like.
- What do we call it? I propose that "group wiki" will be radically confusing, given what the regular wiki is like
- Where does it go? How do you place it in the group interface?
- What features does it have to have to be useful? (Eg: Revision history?) What features would be nice? (Eg: export as PDF/doc?)
Updated by Matt Gold about 14 years ago
Name: I agree that "Group Wiki" might be confusing. Here are some other possibilities:
WriteSpace
Writeboard (taken from Basecamp)
ShareSpace
Collaboration Space
Whiteboard
Placement: I'd say that it should be a link on the Group nav bar, with all of the other group-related links. And that, if possible, it work as an iframe so that it can be set within the regular group interface. If it would be better, on a coding level, not to use iframes, we could explore other possibilities.
Features: export as PDF/doc is a great idea, as is a revision history. Other ideas:
-- export to Group Documents section of Group
-- email to all users
-- notify members of changes w/checkboxes to select recipients (with one of them being "others who have edited this doc")
-- I'd look at the Writeboard on Basecamp, since it pretty much has exactly what we want
Other thoughts? Responses?
Updated by Boone Gorges about 14 years ago
Good suggestions. Not sure if I understand why you want an iframe. Wouldn't it be better to actually have it integrated? Or are you assuming we do this outside of WP?
Updated by Matt Gold about 14 years ago
No, I'm just being ignorant. All I meant is that it would be best if it could be incorporated directly into the page within the existing design. For some reason, I thought that would necessitate an iframe.
Updated by Chris Stein about 14 years ago
Conceptually I wonder whether people really want a wiki or more of a collaborative document editor? Functionally they're pretty much the same but, for me at least, a wiki is more about growing a knowledge base, a series of informational pieces that can be edited and linked to each other. With a wiki info is generally created on and seen all in one place and all documents pretty much look the same. A document editor is more focused on getting a single written and then it is moved somewhere else for viewing. There is more focus on visual design and being able to incorporate media. Each document is unique.
Eventually there may be room for both, My guess is that most groups as they are now want the document editor. If that is true ( maybe it isn't) then Then a wiki tool named more like a doc editor may have them asking for more and more document editing features. So I think how we present the functionality and what people expect to be able, or not able, to do with it is important.
The related issue on the technical side is what code base are we going to use for this? It doesn't seem like we have time to totally blue sky it and create whatever we want. Is there a collaborative doc editor that is even a possibility or is it just wikis?
Updated by Boone Gorges about 14 years ago
Chris, I like your way of conceptualizing it in terms of a collaborative space rather than a repository. I think you're right that 'wiki' has tones of the latter for those whose knowledge of wikis is limited to Wikipedia.
Technically, I'm assuming that we'll use WordPress itself on the back end. There is already a plugin for BuddyPress called Group Wikis http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/buddypress-group-wiki/. Right now it works in a suboptimal way, by creating new blogs for each group that wants a wiki, and using WP's built-in post revisions to act as a revision history. I know from conversation with the author that it's being rewritten to take advantage of custom post types in WP 3.0 so that this suboptimal database setup will be skirted.
In any case, even if we don't want to use that plugin (I haven't used it much so I don't know how it is - but I do know that the author has a demo site at namoo.co.uk that you might sign up for and play around with), we could develop something similar for our own needs that runs on custom post types. In theory it's a pretty straightforward thing to do, given that we would have access to the entire stable of WP features (post revisions, commenting, rich editors, taxonomies, template tags and loops, etc).
We could also try to embed some other service, such as Etherpad. That would be extremely cool but I have no idea how hard it would be to rope it into BuddyPress. It'd take a good deal of investigation before any development could begin.
Updated by Sarah Morgano about 14 years ago
I really like the idea of embedding something like Etherpad as a collaborative tool and think that groups would welcome the idea across the board. We could encourage groups to use that as a starting space, then move content over to a private/public group blog and eventually a public wiki. As Boone said I'm not sure how easily it would integrate to BuddyPress, but I think it's worth investigating.
Updated by Chris Stein about 14 years ago
I also like the idea of Etherpad. A couple of thoughts/issues on that are 1. It steps out of the Wordpress focus that the Group Wiki plugin keeps (this could be a good thing and maybe we need a larger discussion of how WP dependent we want to be) 2. It will require an unknown but probably significant amount of development. Something that Etherpad gives that a Group Wiki wouldn't is the simultaneous editing (or at least I think so, let me know if that's wrong Boone). I'm not sure that's a dealbreaker, but there does need to be some way to manage multiple people editing the document at the same time (as may happen when a deadline is approaching).
For now it does seem like the Group Wiki option will be the path of least resistance.
Updated by Matt Gold almost 14 years ago
- Priority name changed from Low to Normal
- Target version changed from Future release to 1.2
Hi All,
I want to revive this ticket and see if we can't aim to have it as part of our 1.2 upgrade, since it's something that groups want. Boone, can you update us on the status of plugin development on this? Is it the kind of thing that you might be able to help with as part of your work for the Commons?
Updated by Boone Gorges over 13 years ago
- Status changed from Assigned to Resolved
I have partnered with another BuddyPress developer to make some major improvements to http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/bp-wiki/ I have installed the current version of the plugin on the master branch in https://github.com/castiron/cac/commit/779a7cafadc6ec10f30379108344a730eb601737
For those of you playing along at home with a git checkout of the master branch, you will need to do the following to get the plugin running on your installation:
git pull origin master
git submodule init
git submodule update
(and then activate the plugin)
Deryk (the other dev) and I will be working on the plugin through a public Github repository. If you have suggestions or bugs about the plugin between now and Commons 1.2, please file a separate ticket either here on Redmine (for Commons-specific stuff like "don't call it a group wiki") or on the Github site https://github.com/boonebgorges/bp-wiki/issues for more general stuff (if you want - I will transfer things over there if you post them here but they are bugs with the plugin itself).
I am marking this issue resolved because the bulk of the functionality is in place and on schedule to be included in the 1.2 release. I'll be opening a series of tickets for things that need to be changed.
Updated by Matt Gold over 13 years ago
WOW-this is HUGE, for us and for BP more generally. Can't wait to check it out!