User:Billinghurst/Wiki for family historians

Wiki
A wiki (Listeni/ˈwɪki/ wik-ee) is a website that allows the creation and editing of any number of interlinked web pages via a web browser using a simplified markup language or a WYSIWYG text editor. Wikis are typically powered by wiki software and are often used collaboratively by multiple users. Examples include community websites, corporate intranets, knowledge management systems, and note services. The software can also be used for personal notetaking.

What is a wiki?
a website that allows a group of people to write and edit any number of interlinked webpages using a web browser

At the face
 * an editable webpage
 * a construct

Approach
 * Inhabited
 * Collaborative
 * Only as good as the data input, so it could be rubbish in, rubbish out
 * a tool
 * extensible
 * customisable

What isn't a wiki?

 * A typical database with search results and search within results
 * complete
 * perfect
 * hierarchical
 * an easy work processor
 * vandal-proof
 * a place to hide something

Wiki construct
A wiki is a designable construct.
 * Somebody / some people work out how it flows, how it lives and breathes
 * Not static it evolves

Namespace
Pages on a MediaWiki wiki are grouped into collections called "namespaces", which differentiate between the purpose of the pages at a high level. Pages in certain namespaces can also have special properties or behave differently when they interact with other pages.

A coin it has two sides
 * A content layer
 * A discussion place for a content layer

Page
A place that holds the content that you wish to present

Talk: Page
Where you can
 * talk about the page
 * what is on the page
 * what isn't on the page
 * how it looks on the page
 * structure & content

A wiki is a sum of the namespace and the page content

Wikipedia

 * — an encyclopaedia

Wikisource

 * ../Wikisource/

Genie links

 * FamilySearch wiki
 * National Archives
 * GeneaWiki, part of GeneaNet
 * WeRelate
 * Public Record Office Victoria