Possible Revival of FIRSTwiki?

[KeatonM]

FIRSTWiki would be a useful resource, however, as was stated, it hasn't been updated!

I'd love to help volunteer with FIRSTWiki, especially if I'm not the only one, haha.

[Hallry]

Originally Posted by KeatonM

FIRSTWiki would be a useful resource, however, as was stated, it hasn't been updated!

I'd love to help volunteer with FIRSTWiki, especially if I'm not the only one, haha.

Exactly why I created this thread. . Thanks for offering your help!

[Chris is me]

Originally Posted by Tristan Lall

[*]The wiki is licenced under GFDL 1.2. That's a big pain, because it forces redistributors to provide a copy of the licence with the derivative work—not so bad for a licence dedicated to books, but inconvenient for short excerpts. Creative Commons CC-BY-SA-3.0 is a better alternative. (Unfortunately, FIRSTWiki missed the deadline to convert from GFDL 1.2 to CC-BY-SA 3.0; for complicated reasons, that option is no longer available, without the consent of all past authors whose work would be built upon.) Consider requiring all new content to be dual-licenced like Wikipedia does: both GFDL and CC-BY-SA.

This is a pain in the $@#$@#$@#, so I'd think honestly at this point it would be easier to start a new wiki (keep the old content for reference), with all contributions under CC-BY-SA. Articles can't be copied over from the old wiki but they could be used as reference when writing new ones.

[*]Borrow the better parts of Wikipedia's style guides, and some useful templates. (They really are the best resource for wiki-based formatting, despite all the internal squabbling that goes on there.)

Internal squabbling? In a large project? Perish the thought!

Wikipedia (and Meta-Wiki) have very useful guides, templates, and tools.

[*]Since the fundamental unit of this site is a team's page, establish specific stylistic guidelines for that, to allow a clean, consistent appearance.

A large custom template substituted into all team pages as the page is created would be helpful.

[*]Have enough administrators active so that the wiki doesn't go dormant.

Hey, I have some experience! I could do that.

[Duke461]

461 has kept up with their page pretty well. We essentially took everything on our website, and copied and pasted nicely with some wiki formatting, of course. If you click edit, you can see the code for it. This should serve as a decent template for making a page.
Hope this helps,
-Duke461

P.S. To the OP (or any whom it may concern), i am willing to help make other teams pages better, be an admin, or do whatever you need. PM me if you do.

[Hallry]

Originally Posted by Duke461

P.S. To the OP (or any whom it may concern), i am willing to help make other teams pages better, be an admin, or do whatever you need. PM me if you do.

I have already emailed Max (who runs the site) asking for his help and seeing if he would give a few people (including myself) admin powers to further update and clean out the wiki.

[dag0620]

Well I'm on board to help out.

I've only dabbled in wiki editing, so although I could conquer a page or two, I am in no way qualified to be an admin or organize it (and it seems the OP has that under control).

Let me know where you need work-force and I am glad to go help out.

[Boydean]

Aha! This makes me excited. Last year, I believe, some of us (myself and Tanner from 1261) here on CD tried to get revive it, but it was short lived.

I will be more then willing to help out clearing spam, and doing general admin work. Although, the type of knowledge I can contribute to actual articles is limited since I've been out of FIRST long enough to where my concrete knowledge has become more like sand.

EDIT: thread from last year if anyone is interested: http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...ight=firstwiki

[rachelholladay]

I try to keep my team's page semi-updated. I could help get some info on team down south in our region.

Sounds great! I'd love to help! This could be a fun summer project! As previously stated, maybe a new wiki entirely could be made. The way the current one is set up, it seems to just have a team name, team logo, some robots, and team results in different years. Maybe we could have the option to link pages to team websites. That would be way easier if a team had a lot on their team website, and not enough time to copy it over. As for the rest of the site, there should be pages with tutorials, sponsors, an area where teams discuss good/bad ideas, and what worked/didn't work. Pages with lists of "most valuable tool", "best drivetrain design", etc. Like resource pages that teams could learn from, written by other teams.

Just my ideas.

[Tommy F.]

After thinking about updating my team's wiki page, I decided to start doing so. (It hasn't been updated since our rookie year)

While I was adding links to the awards' wiki pages, I noticed how outdated some of the awards/regional pages were.

Sounds like a lot of work, but I'll be willing to help update the wiki.

[Hallry]

Originally Posted by SuperNerd256

Maybe we could have the option to link pages to team websites....As for the rest of the site, there should be pages with tutorials, sponsors, an area where teams discuss good/bad ideas, and what worked/didn't work. Pages with lists of "most valuable tool", "best drivetrain design", etc. Like resource pages that teams could learn from, written by other teams.

Some team pages on the wiki do of links to their official websites, if they use a certain template (which we could make uniform), look at my team's for example: http://firstwiki.net/index.php/1676.
And in that second part, you basically just described Chief Delphi . I think all the discussion and stuff like that should stay here, this is a forum after all. I feel like the wiki should be just info about teams and FIRST and such, not discussion. (Also, just me $0.02, but I feel like we should just revive this wiki instead of starting a whole entire new one, why reinvent the wheel?)

Originally Posted by 7h0m54

While I was adding links to the awards' wiki pages, I noticed how outdated some of the awards/regional pages were.

I noticed that too, it's going to take some real time and effort to revise those pages and create some new ones, but still, isn't that easier than forming a completely brand new wiki?

[Grim Tuesday]

I would love to help with this! But even more than having it as a simple database of teams, it would be nice to have interesting things like motor information (and even qualitiative stuff, like when to use which motor), as well as things like "how to wire a robot" style.

[Tommy F.]

Originally Posted by Hallry

I noticed that too, it's going to take some real time and effort to revise those pages and create some new ones, but still, isn't that easier than forming a completely brand new wiki?

Yes, definitely. There's like a million things on the wiki already, starting over would take up a lot of time and work. I've already started editing simple things I know

By the way, does anyone have the power or know-how to change something in the Regional Index? The St. Louis Regional (http://www.firstwiki.net/index.php/St._Louis_Regional) is definitely not in the Southeast. I already edited the Index of Regionals (http://www.firstwiki.net/index.php/Index_of_Regionals) and moved the St. Louis Regional to the midwest where it should be.

[Duke461]

Originally Posted by 7h0m54

Yes, definitely. There's like a million things on the wiki already, starting over would take up a lot of time and work. I've already started editing simple things I know

By the way, does anyone have the power or know-how to change something in the Regional Index? The St. Louis Regional (http://www.firstwiki.net/index.php/St._Louis_Regional) is definitely not in the Southeast. I already edited the Index of Regionals (http://www.firstwiki.net/index.php/Index_of_Regionals) and moved the St. Louis Regional to the midwest where it should be.

You have to first go to the index of regionals page, and then edit it.

[Tommy F.]

Originally Posted by Duke461

You have to first go to the index of regionals page, and then edit it.

I did, that's why I'm confused.