Editing Alternate wiki-implementations

'''Wiki code''' enables the [[Content Wiki]] and [[Opinion Wiki]].  Choices we make about it will guide the [[Consumerium Software License]] and likely also the [[software development process]] - probably in ways we can't easily change or undo later.  With so many '''alternate wiki implementations''' out there, it is important to sort through the advantages and disadvantages of each.

This starts by considering the [[wikitext standard]] that our present text is in:  Currently 3 out of 20 of our registered users are registered [[MediaWiki]] developers, which makes our percentage of developers among users '''15%''', which is likely the highest figure any public MediaWiki installation can boost so that is an good incentive to try to adapt MediaWiki for our use over other wikis.  However they might just be here ''because'' we are using MediaWiki, so, it is important to make clear that one of the things the [[R&D Wiki]] is doing is ''choosing'' what technology best fits our [[hardware requirements]] later.

Also, a good [[software development process]] ''requires'' shifting to a ''new'' development base when moving from [[R&D]] to [[production code]] - most studies show that it is very very bad to use the same platform and the same libraries, for instance, as one used in the R&D phase, in real production.

So, there is ample reason to believe that we might move off [[MediaWiki]] later, or reserve it only for R&D use.  There are three leading candidates, and a few dark horses listed afterwards.  It seems likely that we'd ask those who want to be [[Consumerium developers]] to work on [[wikitext standard]]s and on soliciting and forwarding [[end user feedback]] better, starting with our own [[MediaWiki modifications]] requests.  Consumerium users should not have to do anything but list these here.  Similar pages for [[TikiWiki modifications]] and [[MoinMoin extensions]] can be created, and which one meets our needs can be more of a competition.  In most cases, the features that must be ''added'' are different for each package, since they start with different feature sets.  

Also [[APC Action Apps]] might become important to integrate, since they have broad use among [[nonprofit]]s.  One might for instance be written to support some common [[barcode]] readers, in cooperation with [[Adbusters]] or another of the [[essential projects]] which recognizes barcodes as being as critical as we think they are.  Maximum cooperation and out-sourcing should be encouraged.

----
<table>
<tr>
<th>[[MediaWiki]]</th><th>[[GetWiki]]</th>
</tr>

<td>
*Not humanly possible for [[end user feedback]] to reach developers reliably
*PHP based
*Proven to perform well under heavy load - but with hard limits
*Most likely basis for [[wikitext standard]]
*Working now for R&D purposes
*Dedicated developers heavily involved in content problems, although they are in general [[Wikipedia]] content problems
*Readable documentation, thanks to the above
*A higher ratio of developers (15% of registered users) registered in [[consumerium]]
*supports [[MySQL]] only
*already converted into the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TomeRaider TomeRaider format] for off-line browsing on many [[handheld device]]s
</td>
<td>
GetWiki is a [[fork]] of MediaWiki
* Auto-import of Wikipedia articles via [[XML]] using [[PHP programming language|PHP]]'s [[Expat]] Library
* Improved use of [[Cascading Style Sheets|CSS]] styles (colours, positioning)
* Cleaner output to the browser, [[PHP programming language|PHP]] code underneath
* Well-formed [[XHTML]], replacing deprecated [[HTML]] 4.0 versions
* More integrated and effective use of [[Cascading Style Sheets|CSS2]], beyond font colours
* More intuitive User Preferences page
* Clearer labeling and checkbox placements
* Fixed user login retention and other fixes
* Better use of [[license|licensing]] notices on pages
* Image [[Wikinfo:Image use policy|thumbnail]] display

* Better organization of [[function]]s and classes, filenames and [[variable]]s
* More comprehensive [[sysop|administrator]] tools

</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th>[[TikiWiki]]</th><th>[[MoinMoin]]</th>
</tr>
<td>
*Not humanly possible for [[end user feedback]] to reach developers at all - form for describing [[wiki feature request]] incomprehensible even to a [[usability guru]]
*PHP based
*meets ''many'' standards ([[CSS]], [[XHTML]], [[RDF]]
*Relies on [[pear.php.net]], [[smarty.php.net]]
*email/forums (and integration) built-in
*Group management built-in
*chat support intended
*Visualization of wiki-links
*Polls built in
*Many developers doing lots of detail work on CM and CMS
*supports Postgres, Oracle, Sybase and [[SQLite]] (built in PHP 5.0!) databases not just MySQL - strategic to integrate with some [[essential projects]]
*developers [[eat their own dog food]] = run current beta as their live site for all development, so any problem is immediately obvious to every developer
</td>

<td>
*[[End user feedback]] directly solicited in a public wiki
*[[Python]] language, useful for possible future development of advanced [[UI]] and [[Consumer Agent]]-program(s) on mobile platforms
*excellent architecture making extensibility very simple - [[Market Model]] separating [[ActionMarket]], [[ProcessorMarket]], [[SkinMarket]] and [[ParserMarket]] - each of which runs in strict [[Request and Offer form]].
*thanks to [[ParserMarket]], it's easy to write parsers to meet [[wikitext standard]] or read [[MediaWiki]] or [[TikiWiki]] formats
*no mindless/wrong [[virtual community]] rhetoric to cause misfeatures - just a good tool
*[[troll]] in the logo
*no need for *any* SQL - relies on [[Unix file system]] only - fewer glitches, fewer reports (most of which are turned off in the heavy-load wikis anyway)
*thanks to Python, easy [[mobile device code]] integration (11 lines of Python does what 1000 lines of C++ does, according to some [[mobile device vendor]]s)
</td>

</tr>
</table>

Dark horses include [[VeryQuickWiki]] (a [[Java wiki]] very easy to set up and run without problems), [[UseMod]] (only advantage is that it dumps [[XML output]], very very very important until there is a real [[wikitext standard]]), and [[Zope]] (also dumps XML, and is in use at other [[essential projects]] like [http://act.greenpeace.org ACT.Greenpeace.org].  There is finally [[Drupal]] which has many advantages and includes XML output as well.

Also [[Microsoft wiki]] will likely be out eventually, and some [[peer2peer]] options relying perhaps on [[XForms]] later.  [[Microsoft Internet Explorer XML Support]] is an important constraint on which of these features can be used at all.  It may be a wise tradeoff to support only MSIE for certain [[user role]]s, if these are ''always'' taken on by well-equipped well-supported people who can be far more easily supported by relying on IE's XML, than any other method.  By the same argument, if Opera or Netscape does something uniquely well and only two or three people need that capability, requiring those might also make sense for some roles.  For ordinary end users the [[APC Action Apps]] baseline browser capabilities should probably be adopted as Consumerium's own.

----
'''See also:'''
*[[WikkiTikkiTavi]] -- http://tavi.sourceforge.net
*[[TikiWiki]]
*[[Talk:MediaWiki modifications]]
*[[Content Wiki]]
*[[Opinion Wiki]]
*[[The Consumerium Exchange]]
*[http://www.semioticpixels.com/cms/techmatrix.php detailed comparison of integration requirements of various LAMP CMS] including tikiwiki