Wiki module

By razar on 19 Dec 2002 at 15:11 UTC

I wrote a wiki module for version 3.0 (it was working but still needed some more development) and am wondering if it is worth updating it to 4.1 I stoped development mainly because I dont have a wesite to host a site on and because I found that drupal was still a little primative so I thought I might wait for further development before continuing. I would like to know if anyone else would like a wiki module. Also there are basically 2 options, either create a new node type (this is what I did basing it off the colaborative book) or create a filter type module (similar to smilies etc) and I would like to know if anyone has any preferences.

Daniel

Comments

Wiki and collab. book

kyvinh@hcilib.sourceforge.net commented 19 December 2002 at 15:53

Those two are already very similar, so it depends on what functionality your wiki module would add... What was your 3.0 wiki module doing that collaborative book isn't doing?

Add wikiness to the book module

Dries commented 19 December 2002 at 19:38

I agree. Instead of creating yet another module, I would like the existing modules to improve. Razar, what about adding some wikiness to the book module? If you do, please do it step-by-step using incremental patches ...

There is no point

razar commented 20 December 2002 at 01:44

There is no point doing this, as it would be better to just make it a filter rather than making it only usable in books.

Wiki markup and accidental linking is very usefull for quickly writing link rich pages and would be very handy for blogging too.

book vs additional type

kyvinh@hcilib.sourceforge.net commented 20 December 2002 at 02:29

I can see those 2 functions (markup and accid. linking) being possible using the book type. It's all about the filter hook as you said and some operation in the book type to handle non-existing pages.
However you do it, I'll be interested in a wiki type of Drupal nodes. But please check the pros and cons of making it a new node type in order to make your efforts worthwhile.
Happy programming...

Wiki Functionality

razar commented 20 December 2002 at 01:30

There are 2 big things that wiki's have that colaborative books do not:
1. Accidental linking
2. Wiki markup
Both of these are worthwhile but seperate to the current style of collaborative book. Another nice ability of wiki's is that they create pages simply by clicking on an existing link, making it easier and more likely to used collaboratively.

sounds great

moshe weitzman commented 19 December 2002 at 17:53

i'd be quite interested in a wiki module. i do think you want to create a new node type.

Yes, I'm interested

jibbajabba@iaslash.org commented 19 December 2002 at 17:57

Daniel, I am very interested in using your Wiki module. I have had requests from people to install wikis for them and would love to be able to use wiki type interaction on Drupal collaborative book.

i would LOVE a wiki module.

adamshand commented 19 December 2002 at 18:53

funny out this stuff works out. i was just writing about this this morning. i'm in the process of migrating a few wiki sites (using moinmoin) to drupal and am discovering as i learn to use drupal that there are quite a few things i miss about my old wiki.

i'm curious what exactly your wiki module did? does it allow wiki words and accidental linking? does it allow wiki markup? backlinks etc?

if you still need a place to host a drupal site, i'll host it for you for free if you update the wiki module for 4.1

adam.

Mind to elaborate?

Dries commented 19 December 2002 at 19:48

Would you mind to compile a prioritized list of the things you are missing? You said you wrote something about this earlier today; is this document publicly available?

it's coming ... :-)

adamshand commented 19 December 2002 at 21:53

yep, i was planning on sending it to the support list for both drupal and moin. it's not finished yet but it will be hopefully tonight, though it might be this weekend before i finish it.

File attachments

(not verified) commented 9 March 2003 at 18:36

It would be nice to support uploading of images and other files (e.g., documents) for attaching to a node. I want to use a Drupal-like wiki for collaborative object-oriented analysis and design. Need a way of collaborating to edit UML diagrams, and review the documentation that lives in parallel with the diagrams.

go for filter

kika commented 19 December 2002 at 19:39

WHY new nodetype? Just implement it as a filter for WikiStyleLinks.

Any other Wiki functionality i missed? Drupal has versioning system, Gerhard was working on colored diffs for this while ago.

briefly ..

adamshand commented 19 December 2002 at 21:57

drupal's versioning isn't great. it lacks diffs and the version information is only available to admins. also automatic/accidental linking is *really* handy.

Drupals versioning

razar commented 20 December 2002 at 01:53

I was using drupals versioning for the wiki but I would be very happy if the versioning has improved to include coloured diffs. The versioning was low on my priorities for getting it working.

Coloured diffs

kika commented 20 December 2002 at 10:10

I repeat, Gerhard Killsreiter (killes) was working on this, not sure about the current progress, but his demos were convincing.

It should still work. Just do

killes@www.drop.org commented 19 December 2002 at 22:54

It should still work. Just download queue.module from the contrib-cvs.

--
Drupal services
My Drupal services

Problems with just filter

razar commented 20 December 2002 at 01:46

The big problem with using it as a filter only is that you get wiki markup working ok, but what do you do about wiki links. In a wiki when someone clicks on a wiki link that hasnt been created you are asked to create that page but on drupal you have to think about what nodetype you want it to be, and it could be a lot of different node types.

Wiki

razar commented 21 December 2002 at 03:38

From what people have said I will have a look at my code again and see if I can make it a filter and update it to 4.1. It will probably take a few weeks, what with the busy Christmas season upon us. I'll try and get something that works available soon.

I'd go with a filter, but there's a problem:

sethop commented 22 December 2002 at 00:57

The problem I can see with a filter is that it would be best to be able to set the vocabulary for the page at creation time, as well as it's nodetype. But the nodetype determines the available vocabularies, so if you don't know that first you've got a problem. One solution would be a two page creation process - first determine nodetype, then write the node and set the vocab. Another solution would be to use dhtml to show the relevant vocab dropdowns after selecting a nodetype.

I like WikiMarkups, the problem is there are so many different styles in use. Ideally I'd allow the node to have a field "WikiMarkupStyle" or some such, and allow alternate WikiMarkupModules - just start with _one_ but leave room for sysadmins to create their own if need be. And of course one should be able to set one's personal default WikiMarkup, which includes defaulting to _not_ using a WikiMarkup. I am not a drupal hacker (yet) so I don't know how feasible this is.

Probably the easiest GPL markup to borrow would be from PHPWiki - it's a pretty good Markup in my opinion, tho I've seen better. There was one really good one, but I can't remember where I spotted it. I'll let you know if I remember.

I can also offer a free hosted drupal account for experimenting. In fact, if _any_ module developer wants a free hosted drupal account I'm willing to set one up under the parameters of 5megs space, 50megs/month bandwidth. Contact me at seth@webfoundry.co.nz if you're interested.

a great addition...

ben-2 commented 22 January 2003 at 01:00

I noticed this thread dried up a month ago, but I thought I'd add my own $0.02 in. A wiki module (or filter) would be fantastic.

I've just started playing with Drupal, so I'm not totally clear on "the Drupal way(tm)". Seems like a filter would be very beneficial in that it would allow you to use wiki markup anywhere on your site... however you'd have to handle the 'accidental' linking aspect. Hardcoding the filter to create a new node/blog entry when a link is clicked through might be the way... but I don't know enough yet to understand just what I'm proposing... That could be a non-trivial task.

In any case, I'm anxious to see what this module looks like. Thanks for working on it!

Wiki'isms I would need

olav commented 9 June 2003 at 20:59

... in migrating our Basic School's homepage and wiki (currently based on TWiki) would be

wiki-style links - already implemented in title.module
structured text

Actually, a remark on zope.org made me first look at drupal at all.

I found that structured text is very easy to grasp even for younger pupils so I would like to continue offer it in an integrated (school homepage + computer lab) web publishing environment.

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Olav Schettler