The work continues

I've been adding pages to the wiki. Personnel and "Important Documents."

Training with co-workers went well. So far, their contributions vary from person to person, but we seem to be rather quickly finding a common language for the wiki. They've also provided some good input for systems of organization.

pushin' on

The wiki is up and running. I'm now just adding to it daily from the files in the clients system. Next week I'm going to present the wiki to a handful of employees and let them being adding to it, so I have started putting together a very simple presentation regarding the nuts-and-bolts of how to create and edit documents, as well as document and file name formatting.

Success

Previously, there were some issues with the IT staff getting a wiki set up. After working through some security concerns, we were finally able to install a wiki engine to get an in-house wiki up and running.

After shopping around various engines, I selected dokuwiki. It is fully functional, and is very simple to use, both from an administrative point of view as well as for users. On the user front, just a few minutes of training can have anyone comfortable w/ word processing able to create and edit pages. This is especially important, as the client hopes to have a small number of people using the wiki.

I spent the morning transferring pages on Important People from an html format to the wiki, so now the thing is starting to take shape.

The next step will be to add users and ensure that security settings are all lined up so that particular people have varying degrees of access to the wiki.

IT issues

The timeline is in a good place. I've got four separate xml files that feed into different bands of the timeline now. It's all hosted on an internal server, which allows working links to a local database, and also keeps the entire thing secure.

I've also created a temporary fix for the Important People situation. I have not yet been able to create a wiki that is acceptable for the scope of this project. Security is the hurdle here. There is a requirement on the part of the client to host everything on a local server, without the possibility for outside access in any form. This is currently problematic, as the IT personnel have not been able to find a way to allow any sort of wiki software to work on more than one actual machine. So right now, I have a system in place where I can build a wiki using python-based software, but my machine is the only one that can access it. Very frustrating.

My work-around is a bunch of single html files on the local server that can act as a basic website for the Important People. It's a temporary fix, and it could work in a pinch, but it loses much of the bells and whistles of a more fully-functional wiki, especially w/r/t edit histories. I expect that finding a way to work around the limitations of my IT problem will take up the better part of the rest of this project.

Progress and snags

I've been instructed to hold off on the wiki until I can get the timeline up and running. That's what I've spent the last week doing. First I took 14 separate timelines that the company had created, mostly in MS Word, and concatenated them into one master timeline in an Excel file. After cleaning it up and creating some master categories for each entry in the timeline, I used an open-source program from Simile (Simile Timeline) to create a basic structure for the timeline.

This timeline is a dynamic, web-based tool, that allows users to scroll through dates, and click on different points to reveal information. An example of one such timeline is here.

The timeline was to have five major bands, one for each of the categories I created. Each of those was to scroll in tandem with the other four. Each point on the timeline reveals more information with a mouse click; most have links to other documents.

Building the XML files to fill in the information was easy. The more difficult work involved ensuring the data was only available on the firm's local network, so that people outside the company couldn't access it. Also problematic has been fixing little details (ether colors, label sizes, etc.) for the client. It's an ongoing process. At present it looks to be 90% finished, but as is said, once you're 90% finished, you're halfway done.

The snag referenced in the title refers to the wiki itself. Now that it has become clear to both client and myself alike, it is apparent that using PBWorks to host the wiki is unacceptable. The client needs the entire wiki to be hosted from the local network, so I'm beginning a new search to find a better alternative.

Continuing w/ important people

It's slow-going, but I'm inputting bios for various people. I'm going to have to start creating links to significant documents, organizations, events, etc. that are mentioned w/in these bios, and I expect that will go slowly as well, but at least a structure is beginning to materialize.

Once again, this will get easier once there are several people editing these documents.

slogging

I've started a "project" via PBWorks. I'm focusing right now on key players in the case. It is slow going, trying to get a handle on what information should be included for every person.

I expect that, as this project continues, it will grow exponentially. Especially as others are able to add information to pages, as well as adding pages. Either way, I hope to have a template in place by the end of November for people, to make it as simple to edit as possible.

Data

I have received the raw data to be used in the creation of the wiki. It is a dataset of 122,351 files in 1,056 folders, containing 12.7 GB of information. On first view, it appears that much of the data is in pdf format; these documents contain much of the actual information that will be used in the wiki itself.

Presently, I am organizing the data into events, people, and things, and am making a spreadsheet highlighting and linking up important bits. I am also making a timeline of all important events, per new instructions by the project manager.

pbworks

I'm going with PBWorks as the tool to create this wiki. They have the security necessary to be able to create this wiki on our servers, so that it isn't available to the world, and a user interface that is easy to navigate, so that if this project gets passed on to other people, it will be relatively easy to keep up.

Introduction

This blog will serve as a record of my work to fulfill the capstone requirements toward a degree at UT's School of Information. My project involves building a wiki for a consulting firm to better facilitate information among employees regarding a particular project.

Because of the sensitive nature of the information involved, the posts on this blog might be vague. I will attempt to keep said posts from being maddeningly so.