July 03, 2005
Installing a Purple Numbered Kwiki
Kwiki-Purple, a project to implement most of the featurs of PurpleWiki in the Kwiki wiki framework, is far enough along to be worthy of some experimentation. I've put up some installation instructions. (PQO)
The latest trick is a networked shared supplier and indexer of purple numbers (the sequence) that allows content on a kwiki on one server to be transcluded on another server. It's a bit slow, but is fun, interesting, and possibility revealing. (PQP)
June 28, 2005
Kwiki Fun
While at YAPC::NA Ingy shanghaied me into being his lovely assistant during a tutorial on building Kwiki plugins: he talked while I made a new plugin from scratch. In an hour and a half we got the basics of a folksonomy tagging keyword system call Kwiki-Keywords hacked out. (PQC)
Last night we had a Kwiki hackathon in my room for about seven hours. In that time we had fun and: (PQD)
- Discovered how to make core Kwiki work on windows via the svn install (PQE)
- Finished up Kwiki-Keywords and stuck it on CPAN and the YAPC::NA wiki (PQF)
- Added Atom feed support to Kwiki-FetchRSS (PQG)
- Fixed some bugs in Kwiki-PageStats and Kwiki-Raw (PQH)
- Apparently found some sweet spot that stabilized Kwiki-Purple enough for me to be willing to turn my Purple Kwiki back on (PQI)
- Started work on a Kwiki-Blog (not to CPAN yet) package that uses Kwiki-Keywords (PQJ)
Now sleepy. (PQK)
June 15, 2005
Demo Kwiki Back Up
Some time ago I shut down my Kwiki where I was demonstrating my various plugins because it wasn't working correctly. (POS)
I've just fixed most of the things, so now it is back up. (POT)
The Kwiki-Purple test wiki remains down until I feel smart. (POU)
April 05, 2005
Kwiki-Trackback
There's no reason why blogs should have all the trackbacking fun. I've just finished a trackback plugin for Kwiki that lets any Kwiki page be the recipient of a trackback ping. (PHE)
It's always been the case that it is the connections between things that matter as much or more than the things themselves. (PHF)
The plugin is available at CPAN. It is running at this wiki, which should be getting a ping from this blog entry when I save it. (PHG)
March 21, 2005
Why Wiki?
A regular unanswered question (for myself and others) of "what do you do?", some conversations with Lee LeFever about social design and community, and recent updates at work have given me a chance to think a bit about the question and stir some ideas. (PG6)
At work I'm primarily a developer, but I tend to think of my vocation as a builder of augmenting, computer-based tools for personal and collaborative work. I go to the trouble of making that mouthful of a statement to distinguish between types of activities that computers do and types of activities that people do. (PG7)
Computers have two types of applications, those that automate and those that augment (21Q, 22J). An augmenting application assists a person in performing some activity which cannot or is not automated. Only activities which can be formally described in theory can be automated. As such there are many tasks, especially those related to human discourse, which cannot be automated; they can, however, be augmented. (PG8)
At a fundamental level computers are tools for creating representations (22L). An augmenting application supporting discourse is engaged in representing and transmitting information. The application is used as tool to evaluate, craft and remodel information (22K). (PG9)
Most of my development effort in the last few years has been with wikis (first PurpleWiki, and now Kwiki and Socialtext) and purple numbers. Purple numbers may eventually change the universe of information handling, but that's a discussion for another day. (PGB)
Wikis are a type of augmenting discourse tool optimized for a particular set of behaviors. Under ideal(tm) conditions they provide an easy path to participation in evolving communication. They do this by being straightforward to learn, quick to respond, and accessible in a distributed fashion. They support changing content and provide an easy way to create and explore connections between things. How something fits in to the larger picture is a large part of how we infer meaning. (PGC)
I think there are three primary audiences for wikis: the individual who hopes to use the wiki as an outboard brain or memory; the nascent group that hopes to discover and solidify the community that lies as potential in their loose connections; and the existing community that hopes to support a shared goal or perform some action. (PGD)
Those three categories could be used to describe any set of people, but a wiki is not the perfect tool for every task. There are multiple types of discourse and multiple tools to support them. Some are better at certain aspects than others, none are really good enough (we have a long long way to go, but each day and in every way we are becoming better and better). (PGE)
Blogs have become a central tool in the distribution of narrative discourse. With a blog there is usually a single author or small group expressing outwardly in a gesture that leads, over time, to the distribution of language and understanding outside the immediate clan. Very often the initial discourse is not fully refined but is rather some author's speculation: a seed that may lead to more knowledge later, as a separate piece of content. As has been said many times, the connections in the network of blogs is often loose and distributed. (PGF)
Email continues to be a primary tool for discussion within a clan. The members of an email group have already discovered some bit of shared language or understanding that has brought them together. Email discussion can reinforce and solidify language, providing stability from which action can be performed. (PGG)
With both blogs and email, content tends to be relatively static. Typos may be corrected in a blog entry and email threads may carry on forever but there is little in the way of refinement of the content. This is where wikis step in: they are good tools for summarizing, annotating and connecting information. These are the actions of a knowledge enhancement system. (PGH)
Wikis do not match all the requirements for a knowledge enhancement system, but experience has demonstrated that this is good. Wikis are here now, today, helping people to do good work generating and supporting communities, developing and creating shared language, and refining information into new knowledge. Their simplicity makes them available. (PGI)
When I chose to join up with Socialtext back in September, it was an attractive choice because the people there believe in two things: people matter more than tools; and tools should help people do what they want to do, not get in the way. (PGK)
Socialtext, in its various incarnations, is based on wiki but integrates concepts from email and blogs to allow the action and narration those systems support. The latest release is a fine improvement: it enhances email integration, adds support for backlinks (placing information in context, leading to deeper understanding) and for PC Forum 2005 we've created a special prototype of Eventspace, running under mod perl for improved response time. (PGL)
Architecting these sorts of tools may not solve poverty and hunger, or alleviate suffering in the aftermath of a ? disaster, but the tools can augment people actively doing that work. I happen to be good at making the tools go, so that's where I look to fit myself into the puzzle. (PGM)
Related writings: (PGN)
March 02, 2005
Kwiki-Yahoo
Ross laid his usual effective bait this morning about how the newly minted Yahoo API needed a Kwiki Plugin: Voila! (PF9)
It's a bit of hack, but following release early and often maybe it will get a change to improve. It should show up on CPAN soon. (PFA)
February 28, 2005
Kwiki::Purple on CPAN
I've finally put Kwiki::Purple on CPAN, along with a few other new or refreshed Kwiki Plugins. (PF0)
Kwiki-Purple is not yet done, but is far enough along where other people could play with it. If you want to give it a go have a look at (PF1)
http://www.burningchrome.com/pwiki/index.cgi?KwikiPurpleInstall (PF2)
To help with Kwiki-Purple development, I put together a Kwiki-Test module. Traditionally Kwiki Plugins are rather lacking in tests, I hope Kwiki-Test helps change that. tdd++ (PF3)
February 16, 2005
At Least Two Pieces of Good News about Views: Mountains and Purple
Two nice things have happened today: (PEG)
On the walk back from the grocery I found a good place from which to get my eyes on Mt. Rainier. This has been a long running problem for me. First the weather is usually cloudy, so none of the mountains (Cascades or Olympics) are in view. Second, in the neighborhood, views to the east are fairly plentiful, but narrow. Rainier is to the Southeast, usually outside the angle of view while tromping around the streets. (PEH)
Today things are different. Very clear day. And I found a good spot for a view. Somewhere I walk past often, but usually with my back facing the view. At the northwest corner of a nearby playfield if I site across the center line of the soccer field and look a bit right there's the mountain. And when I say there, I mean THERE. On a day like today it is stunningly huge. Nails me to the spot in some kind of religious ecstasy. (PEI)
Meanwhile, back inside, where my view is the brick wall of next door, I've finally cut a usable version of Kwiki::Purple with support for good linking and internal to the wiki TransClusion. See it: http://www.burningchrome.com/pwiki/ (PEJ)
This is the culmination of a huge amount of work and experimentation, and I'm sure there will be much more to come. Thanks again to Brian Ingerson, Matthew O'Connor and Eugene Eric Kim. (PEK)
I hope to get it to CPAN asap. (PEL)
January 21, 2005
Kwiki Backlinks
This week has been a Kwiki bonanza. Kwiki-Backlinks has now gone to CPAN and is running on the home Kwiki and my demo wiki. (PE1)
This plugin is much more exciting than those earlier in the week because it demonstrates a way to add hooks to any production in the parser. Using the same model purple input and output becomes something less than a nightmare. (PE2)
Thanks to Brian Ingerson for help making it go, and thanks to Matthew O'Connor for demonstrating, in PurpleWiki, using parser viewers for arbitrary actions. (PE3)
January 20, 2005
More Kwiki, Technorati this time
I've sent yet another Kwiki plugin to CPAN: Kwiki-Technorati, along with updates to Kwiki-Soap, Kwiki-Soap-Google and Kwiki-FetchRSS?. (PDX)
Kwiki-Technorati lets you pull the technorati cosmos of a url into the page. (PDY)
Demo'd on my demo kwiki. (PDZ)
Kwiki-Backlinks are coming soon, using some techniques that will make Kwiki-Purple possible. (PE0)
January 14, 2005
Kwiki-FetchRSS
Another Kwiki plugin released to CPAN. This time based on work by Alex Goller. (PDL)
Kwiki-FetchRSS? provides a handy way to include an RSS feed within a Kwiki page, with just headlines, or description text as well. (PDM)
It's on the demo wiki too, which now has a fancy new theme. (PDN)
