Re: [Fwd: Re: really attracting developers]

[Nikolaus Waxweiler]

> For example, the applications database, the automated documentation and
> pretty much anything that's more structured than a text file.  Wikis can
> be bodged into doing those jobs, but that's not optimal.

I already said that the automatically generated doc isn't going in the  
wiki. And why should a wiki not be appropriate for an app db?

> Etoile has not released yet, I don't know Beep and http://amarok.kde.org/
> looks confusing and hard to read here.

What does the release or popularity of a project have to do with using a  
wiki as the homepage? The Amarok wiki looks fine to me. What exactly is  
your problem with it?

> 'spamming can be limited' = can't be avoided?

If the current system of manual activation of accounts is replaced with an  
automatic method, yes. Well, even then there's a small chance, but you can  
always revert changes.

> 'if the software is kept up to date' - but can we keep the software
> up to date?

I'd like to think so. Updating is probably done by the hoster of  
gnustep.org afaik, you just have to tell them. Besides, nothing gets lost  
in a wiki :) Well, unless the SQLd blows up or someone deletes everything  
with some SQL injection. The hoster might have backups, though.

> Agreed, but I think that's more down to misdirection by posters to
> this list suggesting that the wiki will be the main site;

If it doesn't become the homepage, at least have it become the foundation,  
no? I don't care either way as long as gnustep.org becomes a better place.

> and that
> the limited access for most people to the non-wiki-website is almost
> as frustrating as access to the wiki site is for me.  (The wiki is
> broken as it does not allow me to log in, seems to require cookies
> but doesn't document that or support p3p, doesn't allow offline
> working, and so on...)

Which browser are you using? What keeps you from accepting cookies just  
for the wiki if you know it requires them?

I have never heard of P3P so I neither know nor care, but you can easily  
copy the wiki text to some file and edit it offline :) Same way you'd edit  
anything else offline.

> IMO, the biggest problem of the wiki is bitrot - if no-one has time soon
> to do the big updates of www that it needs, it sits there.  But if no-one
> has time to do the big update of mediawiki that it needs, someone breaks
> in and announces the closure of the project :-/

So it's not bitrot but vandalism :P. Not that grave -- just revert it..

> What word have you redacted with [[better]]?  Are you quoting something?

That was a reference to how a wiki (here: Mediawiki) facilitates pointers  
to [[other article]]s on the same wiki. Well, I tried.

> Really, posting guides to gnustep.org (except as archive copies) is
> a poor substitute for getting articles about gnustep out there in the
> wider world.  I'm puzzled why you think it should force the whole web
> site into using a wiki.

What do you mean by "archive copies"? Stuff you can easily print out? I  
already stated that I have no problem with that per se -- it's just that  
with writing a texinfo article, the author has to update it himself and  
whatnot. If he loses interest in that or just vanishes or something,  
someone else has to take over and blablabla. It's just easier to update  
information about moving targets when having them all in a central place  
where more than one person can edit them.

Also, the whole web already uses Wikipedia, so there's nothing wrong about  
that :O.


I'm not convinced.