News & Events
January 21, 2004
What’s a Wiki? Tap Into the Quickest, Easiest Way to Publish on the Web
By Brian Lamb, Office of Learning Technology
Wikis: Hypertext on Steroids
Before we get too deep into why wikis are the easiest method of publishing to the web, their amazing power to support collaborative work, and the way they fundamentally reshape the relationship between online author and reader, let’s take a moment to get the usual questions out of the way.
Q: What does “wiki” mean?
A: Wiki is the Hawaiian word for quick. "Wikiwiki" means really quick. There is no quicker way to get text online.
Q: How does a wiki work?
A: A wiki usually has a link at the bottom of the page that reads “Edit text of this page”. Anyone can click that link and then instantly add, delete or change the text or structure of the page. Or they can create a new page of their own. No authoring tool, and usually no login or permission, is required.
Q: Are you saying that anyone can come in and change any page?
A: You bet.
Q: Are you insane? That means some villain could change or delete anything. What’s to stop a fiend from coming in and erasing all my hard work, or playing devilish tricks with my reputation?
A: If you don’t calm down, I’ll have to take this cattle prod to your hide. Most wikis store old versions of each page, allowing lost work to be easily recovered. Changes are flagged - email or RSS alerts can inform you immediately if someone has edited your page. And, it usually takes less effort to delete unwanted entries than it does to create them.
An open environment also encourages participation and a sense of community ownership, so the ratio of fixers to breakers tends to be very high. Active wikis usually have little difficulty remaining stable. Read more on WhyWikiWorks. If necessary, it is possible to require passwords for editing access, or to host a wiki system behind a firewall. Though in a sense that defeats the whole point.
When to Use a Wiki
Anyone can post from any machine and there are no permissions required or passwords to remember. This makes wikis ideal for keeping an ongoing list of resources, posting meeting agendas and notes, or creating a space for collaborative brainstorming and composition.
The openness of wiki environments can prompt some wonderful surprises – like when a visitor adds a few links to your collection. I’ve had the occasional user of the UBC wiki correct my grammar – though that doesn’t happen nearly often enough.
Wikis aren’t suited for every purpose. Their anarchic nature means they’re not the ideal backend for a student gradebook, or for other confidential matters. And it’s so easy to create new pages that it can become difficult to keep track of them all. Wikis are text-driven, and limited in terms of visual layout. OK, I’ll admit it, they can look pretty ugly.
Wikipedia – An Example of a Successful Wiki
The best-known example of the wiki way in the wild is the Wikipedia. It was launched on January 15, 2001 as an open-content, collaboratively developed encyclopedia, managed and operated by the Wikimedia Foundation.
Three years later, it contains over 190,000 articles in English, and nearly 200,000 articles in other languages. Built entirely by volunteers, the Wikipedia cannot claim the authority of Britannica, but in practice it works surprisingly well. Try searching for a favorite topic – you’ll likely be surprised by the quality of the entries. If you don’t like something that you read, you can always change it.
Tap Into UBC’s Wiki System
The best way to learn about wikis is to take one for a spin. UBC’s Office of Learning Technology maintains a wiki system for anyone in the learning community who wishes to apply them in their practice.
To Start Your Own Wiki:
You might start out at the LaunchPad for beginners’ instructions.
If you want to start your own wiki chain simply enter http://careo.elearning.ubc.ca/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?YourName (no spaces) into the URL field of your web browser.
While you begin, you might want to keep a copy of the TextFormattingRules handy – one of the grooviest things about working with wikis (as opposed to HTML) is the simplified mark-up language.
I’ll send you off into Wikiland with the wiki prayer:
Please, grant me the serenity to accept the pages I cannot edit,
The courage to edit the pages I can,
And the wisdom to know the difference
more information
Contact: Brian Lamb
Related Links:
• AdventuresInWikiLand
• Lars Aronsson, Operation of a Large Scale, General Purpose Wiki Website (Article title is taken from this piece.)
• Johannes Schwall, The Wiki Phenomenon
• David Mattison, Quickiwiki, Swiki, Twiki, Zwiki and the Plone Wars - Wiki as a PIM and Collaborative Content Tool
• NPR Radio Commentary
Some Other Wikis of Interest:
• EdTechPost Resources - loads of links on eLearning, visualization, metadata, simulations and games, and open source content management systems.
• Raymond Yee’s wiki : “An experimental space for that is rapidly becoming a working space/ personal knowledge repository for Dr. Yee, who is Technology Architect for the Interactive University Project at the University of California, Berkeley.
• Ecotone wiki: “a portal for those who are interested in learning and writing about place. It came about as a meeting spot for a number of webloggers who write extensively about place in their own blogs and were wishing to work more collaboratively, as well as raise awareness to this genre of weblogs.”
• Evolution wiki : “a free, reader-built encyclopedia of evolution, biology, and origins.”
Related Articles on e-Learning Tools and Social Software at UBC:
About e-Learning
UBC's e-Strategy, which includes e-Learning as a key component, helps find creative ways to use technology to enhance learning. e-Learning improves the overall learning experience of UBC's community by providing tools and infrastructure for using technology in innovative and effective ways and strengthening and coordinating support networks. Thousands of UBC students go online daily to engage with fellow students, and faculty, and access course content in new ways.
About UBC's e-Strategy
UBC's e-Strategy enables students, faculty and staff to excel in one of the world's leading universities by enhancing learning, research and community through leading-edge technology initiatives.
e-Strategy is a guiding framework to align UBC's technology initiatives with the university's strategic goals. Activities include project development, information and resource sharing, and setting long terms goals for technology at UBC.
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