(2023-11-16) Mikro2nd Introducing Wikid Another Wiki System

Mike Morris: Introducing Wikid: A(nother) Wiki System. I’m writing a wiki system (wiki engine). Have I lost my mind? Why, when there are already so many wiki platforms languishing out there…?

I have been looking for a good wiki platform to use for collaboration (I have an actual use-case with real people and genuine need), and not finding many I’d rate as suitable

Quite a number of the platforms out there are just way too complex

People don’t want to spend time massaging a note-making tool with macros and custom markup; they simply want to read, write and link thoughtful notes.

The hard, unpalatable truth is that most people don’t read wikis. (Nor any other documentation!)

while the writers in the room are generally enthusiastic and take to the thing like ducks to water, those are always a very small minority in the group.

Part of my motivation for this project is to approach the concept from some slightly different angles in the hope that I might find a wedge with which to cleave this problem

But, until I have a testbed for experimentation, a platform for trying out the several angles I think about, it’s all just useless speculation. So

Second

I need a platform to form the base for my further experimentation on affordances that seem useful in CATS and GOATS

The best way to make a piece of code amenable to comfortable change — habitable — is to write it yourself in the first place. That knocks most of the simpler wiki systems out of contention: some of them are written in languages I find distasteful to work in

Third

I aim to start as simply as possible — just a very conventional (if somewhat minimalistic) wiki — and then start growing the smaller experiments atop its foundation.

I want my desktop-wiki system to remain my primary note-making tool. This is where I do all of my primary thinking and work, and I believe (fight me on this!) that the desktop remains the primary workbench for any person engaged in serious creative or problem-solving work

Then I want to be able to share any page with another wiki instance (or set thereof) on a granular basis: read-only, copy-and-forget or full-duplex read/write.

That means I’d be able to keep my notebook (zettelkasten, slip-box, personal-wiki, whatever) local and completely private, sharing only those bits I want to share. In particular it would allow me to effortlessly and fluidly maintain my web-garden (digital garden) — that subset of networked-notes that I wish to make public — by hosting a separate wiki instance “in the cloud” and sharing pages to it.

What does it look and feel like if I share a page with you, and you edit it (on your wiki instance, of course)? Am I more likely to read what you wrote? Do we want more structure to the conversation? Or to the notes themselves?