A wiki is a collaborative website and authoring tool that allows users to easily add, remove and edit content. Wikipedia, the online open-community encyclopedia, is the largest and perhaps the most well known of these knowledge sharing tools. With the benefits that wikis provide the use and popularity of these tools is exploding.
- Anyone (registered or unregistered, if unrestricted) can add, edit or delete content.
- Tracking tools within wikis allow you to easily keep up on what been changed and by whom.
- Earlier versions of a page can be viewed and reinstated when needed.
- And users do not need to know HTML in order to apply styles to text or add and edit content. In most cases simple syntax structure is used.
As the use of wikis has grown over the last few years, libraries all over the country have begun to use them to collaborate and share knowledge. Among their applications are pathfinder or subject guide wikis, book review wikis, ALA conference wikis and even library best practices wikis.
Discovery Resources:
Use these resources to learn more aboout wikis:
- Wiki, wiki, wiki - from PLCMC's own Core Compentency blog
- Wiki’s: A Beginner’s Look – an excellent short slide presentation that offers a short introduction and examples. [Silent; no audio required.]
- What is a Wiki? – Library Success wiki presentation
- Using Wikis to Create Online Communities – a good overview of what a wiki is and how it can be used in libraries.
Discovery Exercise:
1. For this discovery exercise, you are asked to take a look at some library wikis and blog about your finding. Here are a few examples to investigate:
- http://www.scrldwiki.org/index.php/Stevens_County Created by the Stevens County [WA] Rural Library District
- SJCPL Subject Guides – a pathfinder wiki developed by the St. Joseph County Public Library system
- Book Lovers Wiki - developed by the Princeton Public Library
- Library Success: A best practices wiki
- ALA 2006 New Orleans wiki – an example of a wiki created to support a specific event
- The Bull Run Library wiki - a public library wiki and also a Learning 2.0 participant
2. So what's in a wiki? Find out by doing some exploring on your own.
3. Create a blog post about your findings. What did you find interesting? What applications within libraries might work well with a wiki?
#17 Playing with a wiki
Now that you know what they are, play with a wiki a little bit. We have created our very own wiki sandbox for you to play in at http://spokpl20.pbwiki.com/
FYI, Spokane Public Library is investigating a wiki to manage SPLASH and the Intranet content. Watch Weekly News for more information on this project.
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