[freeroleplay] Re: Open World Project
- From: Ricardo Gladwell <president@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: FRPGC <freeroleplay@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: 28 Jul 2003 12:26:27 +0100
Hi Bryce,
I hear where you are coming from. I've had similar experiences trying to
set-up a Wiki for the Netbook of Planes:
http://www.netbookofplanes.org/
But, given my experiences there, I think we can work enough to overcome
some of the problems with wikis.
On Sun, 2003-07-27 at 18:30, Bryce Harrington wrote:
> At WorldForge we developed a game world through Wiki. As a big Wiki
> fan, I thought it'd be cool. It worked in the sense that much content
> was submitted, but we encountered a few problems. First, it was
> difficult to "print the whole thing" (as a PDF preferrably) because you
> had to navigate around through a bunch of links to find all the pages to
> make up the system.
I did think about that: my idea would be to generate a simple PHP script
that could do precisely the above. For example, to construct a new
'book' from the wiki you would simply create an Index page which, like
any table of contents, would reference, through wikilinks, the various
chapters and sections that you would like to include in your 'book'. The
script would then simply extract all the linked pages (to a given depth,
for example '1') and chuck out one long wiki page. The wiki syntax is
simple enough that it would be trivial to convert the output into, say,
Latex, Docbook, LyX, or Scribus format so it can then be turned into a
PDF.
> Second, since it was easier to make new pages than
> to flesh out and finish existing ones, the whole suffered from
> "nodification" - at any point in time the number of woefully incomplete
> areas far outnumbered the completed ones, which made the whole kind of
> unusable.
I agree, this is a problem with the Netbook of Planes... unfinished
pages left forgotten. Nevertheless, with some effort we could constantly
review material in the wiki. Forgotten, useless pages would be deleted.
It would be a little time consuming but its no different to the work a
normal editor might be asked to do. The only difference is that we are
all editors.
> Third was more of a personnel issue. A nice thing about Wiki is that it
> tends to be fairly ownerless. This has its benefits, but when you're
> trying to find out who to talk to about what was written it's a
> problem. Also, some people like having stricter control over their
> writing and would get irate at other members for changing what they'd
> written; this led to a lot of friction. On the other hand, some people
> don't like having responsibility for maintaining their area, so would
> leave it unfinished expecting others to flesh it out, but people would
> resist touching it because they weren't sure if the guy was still
> working on it... etc. etc.
I agree, this has also lead to a lot of friction in the Netbook of
Planes. But, then, this is also a huge problem on Wikipedia. The key
here is to expect it, make people aware that when they submit material
they can no longer be considered its 'owners'. Similarly, creating a
healthy etiquette also helps. We've decided that all major changes
should at least be discussed on a related forum first which helps to
smooth feathers.
> Fourth was kind of a tools issue. With a wiki you don't really have a
> notion of "release number" that can be referred to. So if someone is
> using a copy from a couple months ago, and wants to print extra copies
> for new players, well now things have totally changed on the site. He
> also does not have an easy way to find the answer, "What has changed in
> the world documents since release 1.1?"
Hmm... this could be resolved. I have some experience with PHP
programming and I believe code to 'tag' wikis in the same way you might
a CVS repository already exists. I could definitely add such code to
PHPWiki if its a feature you think would be useful.
Alternatively, we could use my proposed script above and create
'releases' by periodically running it and storing its results in a
proper CVS repository?
> Fifth was another tools issue - most wiki's are implemented such that
> you have to use the browser edit window for editing, but unfortunately
> browser edit windows seem to be the most anemic form of text editor in
> existance. People really wanted to be able to edit the content with
> their preferred editors, but it was a lot of hassle to try to figure
> out solutions. (I figured out a few tricks, like launching emacs from
> within lynx, but they were still a hassle.)
I understand where you are coming from here. My thoughts on this is that
its simple to copy-and-paste into your favorite text editor. Otherwise,
there's not much we can do about this.
Otherwise, I'd be interested if the above makes any sense and if you
think it resolves some of these problems. Of course, some of these
problems will never be resolved but I would be interested to hear
peoples thoughts and concerns.
Regards...
--
Ricardo Gladwell
President, Free Roleplaying Community
http://www.freeroleplay.org/
president@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
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