Private Team Wikis

Competition Team Organization
#1

Has anyone used a website or wiki to organize file, notes, documentation etc. for their team? We have Google Applications for Education (Gmail, Drive, etc) but I’m wondering if there is something more browseable.

Being able to nest “folders” or the equivalent in a hierarchically is a must. As well, it shouldn’t be made public. Free is nice too.

Wikispaces.com for education doesn’t seem to allow me to create this hierarchy.

Do other teams do something like this? Do teams use spiral-bound notebooks instead?

Thanks for any input,

#2

4513 used google drive. While it works well it does become somewhat of a mess after a year or two and can become a hassle if people are naming their stuff “essay” or “jkhsdf” instead of something like “chairmans essay 2017 v2.1” or something else descriptive.

Its also not fun when you have to migrate these files from one drive to another and then to a different one from the first two cause the district freaks out over it, but i would assume that wouldnt be as much as an issue for you guys.

#3

1257 uses a Google Drive, but DocuWiki might work for you (a wiki-alike that supports “namespaces”, similar to native folders.)

#4

3223 uses atlassian confluence. If you keep your team’s code public on github, you can apply for an open source license, which is free for up to 2000 users.

#5

We use Google Drive for document sharing, but we also do have a private Wiki, that, as far as I know, I’m the only one that contributes to it, so it’s of limited use and acts as an over the top notepad for my use.

EDIT: I should clarify that our wiki runs MediaWiki. I use it to keep notes on teams we’re competing with/against and track their progress.

#6

Google Drive here. I like the Wiki idea though.

#7

1511 uses a Google Drive for most of our share documents like parts list, BOM, etc. Also we use it for storage of general procedures and other leadership oriented material.

We have a wiki as well that acts as a engineering design notebook for us that is open for all teams to review. Some years are better documented than others based on how into it the students are.
http://www.penfieldrobotics.com/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page

We use MediaWiki.org for the Wiki design on our web server.

We also keep our code up on our web server in a SVN repo. We take the final code from that and share it our website. http://penfieldrobotics.com/resources/robotcode.php

#8

We use Shoutwiki, which provides free MediaWiki hosting to educational institutions.

#9

We use Google Sites for our Internal Website.

You can nest pages to your hearts content.

#10

Team 1640 has a Wiki style website. I don’t know how they made it work, but it is of course the nice and familiar layout. They have lots of info on their previous robots and their swerve drives, which have only gotten cooler.

http://team1640.com/wiki/index.php?title=FRC_Team_1640

#11

Pretty sure they use mediawiki.

Source: Powered By MediaWiki button on the bottom right of every single page.

#12

Only you will be able to determine if a team wiki will solve whatever problem you’re facing. I assume, however, that you’re trying to create a repository of shared knowledge for your team.

Some things you may not have considered, but are important for a wiki to succeed for any team: who will edit the wiki? How often will it be edited? Who is responsible for the edits on topic X? Who is responsible to remind the person who is responsible for edits on topic X? My point is that for a wiki to be successful, you’ll need to maintain it – which means that you will need to incorporate it into your team’s workflow.

Other solutions include Google Drive, OneNote, a website with private content available by login (typically WordPress/Drupal), or a Slack Channel with whatever resources you post.

#13

Thanks for the suggestion, this looks perfect.

#14