Social Software

QEDWiki

QEDWiki is an IBM product to help user to create a Wiki website. QEDWiki is a browser-based assembly canvas used to create simple mash-ups. QEDWiki is a unique Wiki framework in that it provides both Web users and developers with a single Web application framework for hosting and developing a broad range of Web 2.0 applications. QEDWiki can be used for a wide variety of Web applications, including Web content management for a typical collection of Wiki pages, traditional form processing for database-oriented CRUD (Create/Read/Update/Delete) applications, document-based collaboration , rich interactive applications that bind together disparate services, and situational applications (or mash-ups).

 

QEDWiki also provides Web application developers with a flexible and extensible framework to enable do-it-yourself (DIY) rapid prototyping. Business users can quickly prototype and build ad hoc applications without depending on software engineers. QEDWiki provides mash-up enablers (programmers) with a framework for building reusable, tag-based commands. These commands (or widgets) can then be used by business users who wish to create their own Web applications.

 

QEDWiki is a lightweight mash-up maker written in PHP 5 and hosted on a LAMP, WAMP, or MAMP stack. A mash-up assembler will use QEDWiki to create a personalized, ad hoc Web application or mash-up by assembling a collection of widgets on a page, wiring them together to define the behavior of the mash-up application, and then possibly sharing the mash-up with others. Mash-up enablers provide QEDWiki with a collection of widgets that provide application domain- or information-specific functionality. These widgets are represented within QEDWiki as PHP scripts.

 

When a user renders a page within a QEDWiki workspace, the QEDWiki framework processes the widgets on the server side and then generates a DHTML page that is sent to the browser for client-side processing. The framework includes a rich AJAX-enabled MVC (Model-View-Controller) architecture so that each wiki page is a rich, interactive application for end users.

 

By using QEDWiki, user who may not be programmers can create Web applications to address just-in-time ad hoc situational needs; they can also integrate data and mark-up using widgets to create new utilities. Users can bind rich content from disparate sources to create new ways to view information; they can also add behavior and relationships to disparate widgets to create a rich interactive application experience. QEDWiki can be used to quickly promote a mash-up for use by others and to enable multi-user collaboration on the development of a mash-up.

 

There is a new version of QEDWiki released recently, which includes some new features. It provides a new Widget Editor and Manager. Users now can now create and edit widgets and their configuration data inside QEDWiki within a wizard-like interface. The widgets can be JavaScript or PHP-based. Support is provided for widget persistence, packaging, and versioning. It also contains a user customizable palette. Users are now able to change palette drawer names as well as create a unique palette drawer into which they can store their favorite widgets. Users can also change the title that appears in the title bar of a widget on a per-instance basis as well as choose to have the title bar be hidden. The new wiki features have been added to QEDWiki, such as a page-level table of contents, improved wiki navigation, more traditional wiki mark-up, backlinks, and orphaned pages.

Posted at 01:24PM Jul 06, 2007 by Xuan Zhang in Wikis  | 

Functional Overview of Wiki

A defining characteristic of wiki technology is the simplicity with which pages can be created and updated. Many wikis are open to the general public without the need to register any user account. However, there are some private wikis whose wiki servers require user authentication to edit, sometimes even to read pages.

 

In order to edit a wiki page, user normally need to edit the source code, sometimes known as a simplified markup language to indicate various structural and visual conventions. Some recent wiki engines use a different method that is called "WYSIWYG" ("What You See Is What You Get" editing, usually by means of JavaScript or an ActiveX control that translates graphically entered formatting instructions. In this way, users would feel comfortable to edit a wiki page. Simple wiki allows only basic text formatting. However, more complex ones have support for tables, images, formulas, or even interactive elements such as polls and games.

 

Wiki in generally provides a version control function, which is used to manage the changes of a certain content. Each article provides one-click access to the history/versioning page, which also supports version differencing ("diff" and retrieving prior versions. Many wikis allow users to supply an "edit summary" along with their change. This is a short piece of text summarizing the changes made that is not inserted into the article, but is stored along with that revision, allowing users to explain what has been done and why. This is similar to a log message when committing changes to a revision control system.

 

Most wikis offer at least a title search, and sometimes a full-text search. The scalability of the search depends on whether the wiki engine uses a database. Indexed database access is necessary for high speed searches on large wikis. Alternatively, external search engines such as Google can sometimes be used on wikis with limited searching functions in order to obtain more precise results.

 

By far, the most common wiki systems are server-side. In essence, the edit, display and control functions are provided on the server through the wiki engine that renders the content into an HTML-based page for display in a web browser. A client-side wiki system requires only that the server "serve" wiki files in much the same way that a web server allows HTML files to be retrieved using HTTP. In this type of wiki system, all the execution required to convert the underlying wiki text into an onscreen formatted display page resides in the client browser. Likewise, the editing tools and functionality reside in the browser. Client-side wiki systems may be little more than a code plugin to a more traditional web browser.

Posted at 09:34AM Jun 12, 2007 by Xuan Zhang in Wikis  | 

Overview of Wiki

A wiki is a website that allows visitors to add, remove, and edit content. Wiki allows for linking among any number of pages. This ease of interaction and operation makes a wiki an effective tool for mass collaborative authoring. Wikipedia, an online encyclopaedia, is one of the best known wiki.

 

Wiki that is editable by the general public have been criticized for their reliability, simply because certain individuals may unkindly introduce false or misleading content. Proponents rely on their community of users who can catch malicious content and correct it. Wiki in general makes a basic assumption of the goodness of people.

Posted at 09:33AM Jun 12, 2007 by Xuan Zhang in Wikis  |