Dear Moodle Lounge People,
One of my clients is looking for a wiki for their company documentation and are considering moodle's wiki module.
They don't do any teaching or have any online courses but rather, they are a technical company of about 40 software developers with a need to document their process and procedures and collaboratively write and use their own documentation.
I have been asked to investigate the use of the Moodle's wiki module for this purpose and soon found my way to docs.moodle.org. I recognised this as running upon mediawiki rather than Moddle's wiki module and naturally wondered why the Moodle community was using Mediawiki rather than their own Moodle wiki module for their online colaborative documentation?
Is the reason purely historical and predates the existence of the Moodle module?
Or, it may be a matter of "horses for courses" in that Mediwiki is more suitable for online colaborative documentation because it was explicitly designed for that purpose where as Moodle has a different target audience?
At any rate it would be great to hear from the moodle community whether you people would recommend moodle's wiki module over Mediawiki in a purely collaborative documentation environment rather than an online learning environment ?
What advantages or disadvantages are there in using one over the other?
I have also noticed that there is a new version of the wiki module. How does this fit into a decision in using Moodle's wiki module over mediawiki ?
Your musing and opinions would be most welcome!
Cheers!
Rob
Why Mediawiki Instead of Moodles Wiki Module for docs.moodle.org ?
by Rob Coates -
Number of replies: 16
In reply to Rob Coates
Re: Why Mediawiki Instead of Moodles Wiki Module for docs.moodle.org ?
by Brian Lockwood -
Having used moodle wiki in 1.94 Moodle I wonder if it is a bit limited compared to media wiki.
I have trouble with orphaned pages etc. Anyway, in the spirit of your question, this is a musing rather than a comment from an expert on wikis.
I have trouble with orphaned pages etc. Anyway, in the spirit of your question, this is a musing rather than a comment from an expert on wikis.
In reply to Rob Coates
Re: Why Mediawiki Instead of Moodles Wiki Module for docs.moodle.org ?
by Don Hinkelman -
A long time ago, our wiki expert from Spain, Ludo, explained that the Moodle wiki is best for an in-class, more controlled wiki activity. Metacourse and site wikis are also possible.
Our school choose to use mediawiki because many teachers do not use Moodle. Also, I became familiar with mediawiki by using Moodle Docs.
Our school choose to use mediawiki because many teachers do not use Moodle. Also, I became familiar with mediawiki by using Moodle Docs.
In reply to Rob Coates
Re: Why Mediawiki Instead of Moodles Wiki Module for docs.moodle.org ?
by Martin Dougiamas -
Mediawiki is designed to be out in the open, on the web, used by thousands of people collaboratively editing many thousands of pages.
Moodle's wiki is designed to be used inside a learning management system as part of courses, and includes functionality for groups, grading and so on. It's meant for smaller numbers of pages.
That's why we don't use the Moodle wiki for our documentation.
Moodle's wiki is designed to be used inside a learning management system as part of courses, and includes functionality for groups, grading and so on. It's meant for smaller numbers of pages.
That's why we don't use the Moodle wiki for our documentation.
In reply to Martin Dougiamas
Re: Why Mediawiki Instead of Moodles Wiki Module for docs.moodle.org ?
by Marc Grober -
Martin,
That argument is a bit lame....
MediaWIki can be set up to afford whatever access one wants to provide and can and has been used by few people editing few pages in a secure environment and the incremental "cost" other than as noted below is arguably nominal.
I think the question is that given the breadth of functionality that is available with a product like mediawiki, why isn't moodle using it in moodle, as well as in moodle.org, and I think the real answer lies closer to the tack addressed with respect to forum code..... no one wants to take on constructing the interface necessary to fully employ such products as moodle "modules" especially to provide the added functionality you mention (though I daresay there might be quite a few willing to give up the nonsensical idea of grading or rating forum entries for the added functionality of a powerhouse like mediawiki, and of course there are lots of folks who do some nominal integration with mediawiki at least vis-a-vis authentication
Building and supporting a teacher interface that would allow course based forums, groups, etc in mediawiki is clearly not trivial, but that doesn't mean that it might not result in a greater long term cost/benefit return....
That argument is a bit lame....
MediaWIki can be set up to afford whatever access one wants to provide and can and has been used by few people editing few pages in a secure environment and the incremental "cost" other than as noted below is arguably nominal.
I think the question is that given the breadth of functionality that is available with a product like mediawiki, why isn't moodle using it in moodle, as well as in moodle.org, and I think the real answer lies closer to the tack addressed with respect to forum code..... no one wants to take on constructing the interface necessary to fully employ such products as moodle "modules" especially to provide the added functionality you mention (though I daresay there might be quite a few willing to give up the nonsensical idea of grading or rating forum entries for the added functionality of a powerhouse like mediawiki, and of course there are lots of folks who do some nominal integration with mediawiki at least vis-a-vis authentication
Building and supporting a teacher interface that would allow course based forums, groups, etc in mediawiki is clearly not trivial, but that doesn't mean that it might not result in a greater long term cost/benefit return....
In reply to Marc Grober
Re: Why Mediawiki Instead of Moodles Wiki Module for docs.moodle.org ?
by Martin Dougiamas -
Er, Marc, if you read this thread it was about why Moodle's wiki wasn't being used for docs.moodle.org, not the other way around.
I really like Mediawiki, and I too would like to see Moodle's wiki be as easy and powerful. So would the Spanish team who are working on a new wiki, no doubt.
You can't simply write off the extra features of groups, grading etc, though. Those were all added after much feedback over the years from Moodlers who needed those features.
Perhaps a Wave module will make all this moot in future.
I really like Mediawiki, and I too would like to see Moodle's wiki be as easy and powerful. So would the Spanish team who are working on a new wiki, no doubt.
You can't simply write off the extra features of groups, grading etc, though. Those were all added after much feedback over the years from Moodlers who needed those features.
Perhaps a Wave module will make all this moot in future.
In reply to Martin Dougiamas
Google Wave (was: Why Mediawiki Instead of Moodles Wiki Module for docs.moodle.org ?)
by Alexandre Enkerli -
Martin mused:
Hmmm, Wave....
I'm glad other people are thinking about the potential for Google Wave. I had a "drift-off moment" when I first learnt about Wave: I was imagining the possibilities.
Using Wave in the classroom could be quite effective. Some instructors use wikis in the classroom, letting learners work collaboratively on lecture notes in realtime. But wikis aren't really meant for this kind of realtime collaboration. Something like SubEthaEdit would potentially make more sense but Wave shows even more promise. Even the simple fact that you can "play back" the changes can lead to interesting possibilities. The ease with which "bots" can be built should also lead to creative uses (realtime automated feedback?). The possibility to embed and repurpose content is also the kind of thing we may need.
Personally, I have a hard time waiting for Wave. And if it ends up not delivering, for whatever reason, the ideas are out there for somebody else to take on.
Maybe I'm overenthusiastic. Wave doesn't solve all sorts of problems just by itself. It just seems to fit well with our approaches to teaching.
Perhaps a Wave module will make all this moot in future.
Hmmm, Wave....
I'm glad other people are thinking about the potential for Google Wave. I had a "drift-off moment" when I first learnt about Wave: I was imagining the possibilities.
Using Wave in the classroom could be quite effective. Some instructors use wikis in the classroom, letting learners work collaboratively on lecture notes in realtime. But wikis aren't really meant for this kind of realtime collaboration. Something like SubEthaEdit would potentially make more sense but Wave shows even more promise. Even the simple fact that you can "play back" the changes can lead to interesting possibilities. The ease with which "bots" can be built should also lead to creative uses (realtime automated feedback?). The possibility to embed and repurpose content is also the kind of thing we may need.
Personally, I have a hard time waiting for Wave. And if it ends up not delivering, for whatever reason, the ideas are out there for somebody else to take on.
Maybe I'm overenthusiastic. Wave doesn't solve all sorts of problems just by itself. It just seems to fit well with our approaches to teaching.
In reply to Martin Dougiamas
Re: Why Mediawiki Instead of Moodles Wiki Module for docs.moodle.org ?
by Marc Grober -
Er, Martin, its really the same issue.....
And I agree that it would be a loss to lose some of the features in the moodle wiki..... but as you know, erfurtwiki on Moodle really has not been kept current for some time ..... I certainly don't want to second guess Marc on this (i.e. dfwiki->nWiki vs an attempt to integrate mediawiki to afford same Moodle features as currently available in Moodle take on erfurtwiki....
but, other than perm features (student, group, teacher, etc) I think just about anything else could be managed elsewise (you can now add a grade element in new GB for anything.....)
bottom line is that many installations (including Moodle.org) end up running 2 wikis, 2 forums, etc. and I am not saying that is necessarily bad, but that decisions were made not to integrate apps like mediawiki and users will therefore have to continue to weigh use of a non-Moodle wiki when the feature set required demands it.....
I think wikis make a great way to present things like college policies, manuals, etc and I would have to argue that an institution looking at doing same would be well advised to use mediawiki even though they would prefer Moodle wiki
And I agree that it would be a loss to lose some of the features in the moodle wiki..... but as you know, erfurtwiki on Moodle really has not been kept current for some time ..... I certainly don't want to second guess Marc on this (i.e. dfwiki->nWiki vs an attempt to integrate mediawiki to afford same Moodle features as currently available in Moodle take on erfurtwiki....
but, other than perm features (student, group, teacher, etc) I think just about anything else could be managed elsewise (you can now add a grade element in new GB for anything.....)
bottom line is that many installations (including Moodle.org) end up running 2 wikis, 2 forums, etc. and I am not saying that is necessarily bad, but that decisions were made not to integrate apps like mediawiki and users will therefore have to continue to weigh use of a non-Moodle wiki when the feature set required demands it.....
I think wikis make a great way to present things like college policies, manuals, etc and I would have to argue that an institution looking at doing same would be well advised to use mediawiki even though they would prefer Moodle wiki
In reply to Marc Grober
Re: Why Mediawiki Instead of Moodles Wiki Module for docs.moodle.org ?
by Martin Dougiamas -
I don't think we disagree that the Moodle activity modules all need significant work! Our roadmap looks busy for 2.0, 2.1 and beyond. I have great hopes for Wiki 2.0 in particular, let's hope that works out.
Just to add a point of reference, various people have looked at Mediawiki (because we all prefer it!) with a view to using it as Moodle's internal wiki, but it's just too hard a project. Mediawiki was just not written to be plugged in to another system, so it would require a huge amount of work.
And as another interesting read, here is the first discussion about wikis that led to Erfurt Wiki being chosen in 2003. Wikipedia was not popular then and Mediawiki was not really an obvious option.
Just to add a point of reference, various people have looked at Mediawiki (because we all prefer it!) with a view to using it as Moodle's internal wiki, but it's just too hard a project. Mediawiki was just not written to be plugged in to another system, so it would require a huge amount of work.
And as another interesting read, here is the first discussion about wikis that led to Erfurt Wiki being chosen in 2003. Wikipedia was not popular then and Mediawiki was not really an obvious option.
In reply to Marc Grober
Re: Why Mediawiki Instead of Moodles Wiki Module for docs.moodle.org ?
by Michael Penney -
Authentication is relatively trivial compared to authorization - linking authorization between two apps that provide for it in different ways is usually very difficult.
Having worked on the integration of similar products (Salesforce, Drupal, Postnuke, Gallery) I can tell you from long experience that integration of two roles based applications is absolutely non-trivial - sometimes it makes sense/saves time/money, often it doesn't.
Often simply doing the research to determine if an function would be better added by writing a new module vs. integrating an external app takes more time than writing a new module.
There are tools for linking authentication and authorization between complex independent applications without hacking the applications: Shibboleth & LDAP are one common method, however these also are not trivial to setup & configure
. Oauth is one used in the GoogleApps integration, again non-trivial (and subsequently broken for a while when Google switched they way they implement Oauth). Good example of the way integrations introduce dependencies between formerly independent applications (also ran into this problem with the Gallery integration when Gallery changed their auth API, thus breaking the integration when Gallery was updated).
What would be required actually make an interface to integrate multiple independent applications into Moodle, without requiring Shibboleth/LDAP server setup, would be to add something like an internal authentication/authorization application within Moodle - integrated applications would ping this internal role/capability manager in much the same way they would normally ping a Shib and/or LDAP server. Native support for Oauth would be nice (there is code in the GoogleApps integration) but still does require close cooperation between the application developers, agreeing on implementation standards, etc, but also fraught with support issues where users modify the administrative interface of mediawiki or app x and break the integration, where they update app x and that breaks the integration, app x changes/updates it's Oauth library, etc. Big job.
In any event Martin's answer really is spot on - a wiki in Moodle's main purpose is to teach students to use wikis effectively rather than to be the ultimate wiki. As such a Moodle wiki will need to have many tools not generally useful in standard wikis, and there will be dozens- hundreds of wiki applications that will have tools not found in Moodle's wiki. Making it likely that for creating a public information site like wikipedia or docs.moodle there will likely to be many applications better suited than Moodle's teaching focused wiki if an organization has the resources to support multiple web applications. Ideally anyone who learns to use a wiki in Moodle would be able to effectively use wiki syntax, understand distributed collaboration, know about revision history/reversion, etc. whether they are using mediawiki, confluence, jotspot, tikiwiki, etc.
Having worked on the integration of similar products (Salesforce, Drupal, Postnuke, Gallery) I can tell you from long experience that integration of two roles based applications is absolutely non-trivial - sometimes it makes sense/saves time/money, often it doesn't.
Often simply doing the research to determine if an function would be better added by writing a new module vs. integrating an external app takes more time than writing a new module.
There are tools for linking authentication and authorization between complex independent applications without hacking the applications: Shibboleth & LDAP are one common method, however these also are not trivial to setup & configure
What would be required actually make an interface to integrate multiple independent applications into Moodle, without requiring Shibboleth/LDAP server setup, would be to add something like an internal authentication/authorization application within Moodle - integrated applications would ping this internal role/capability manager in much the same way they would normally ping a Shib and/or LDAP server. Native support for Oauth would be nice (there is code in the GoogleApps integration) but still does require close cooperation between the application developers, agreeing on implementation standards, etc, but also fraught with support issues where users modify the administrative interface of mediawiki or app x and break the integration, where they update app x and that breaks the integration, app x changes/updates it's Oauth library, etc. Big job.
In any event Martin's answer really is spot on - a wiki in Moodle's main purpose is to teach students to use wikis effectively rather than to be the ultimate wiki. As such a Moodle wiki will need to have many tools not generally useful in standard wikis, and there will be dozens- hundreds of wiki applications that will have tools not found in Moodle's wiki. Making it likely that for creating a public information site like wikipedia or docs.moodle there will likely to be many applications better suited than Moodle's teaching focused wiki if an organization has the resources to support multiple web applications. Ideally anyone who learns to use a wiki in Moodle would be able to effectively use wiki syntax, understand distributed collaboration, know about revision history/reversion, etc. whether they are using mediawiki, confluence, jotspot, tikiwiki, etc.
In reply to Michael Penney
Re: Why Mediawiki Instead of Moodles Wiki Module for docs.moodle.org ?
by moodle bs -
A big crock of Moodle Partner BS.
"Moodle's main purpose is to teach students to use wikis effectively..."
I suppose the purpose of the forum module is to teach students to use forums effectively and the chat module is just to teach them to use chats...Raising the BS Flag.
Moodle.org uses the mediawiki because the Moodle wiki sucks...period...just like the moodle blog sucks and the moodle survey sucks. Moodle has them just so it can advertise having them....anyone who uses them knows they suck.
"Moodle's main purpose is to teach students to use wikis effectively..."
I suppose the purpose of the forum module is to teach students to use forums effectively and the chat module is just to teach them to use chats...Raising the BS Flag.
Moodle.org uses the mediawiki because the Moodle wiki sucks...period...just like the moodle blog sucks and the moodle survey sucks. Moodle has them just so it can advertise having them....anyone who uses them knows they suck.
In reply to moodle bs
Re: Why Mediawiki Instead of Moodles Wiki Module for docs.moodle.org ?
by Don Hinkelman -
Dear "Moodle BS",
I also think the Moodle wiki has problems. And I appreciate your willingness to criticize a module on these public forums. However, because you have chosen to hide behind a pseudonym and because you used inflamatory words which do not contribute to constructive discussion, I choose not to listen your words.
I recommend this posting be open for a few more days to give time for you to apologize. Then your post and my post should be deleted.
Please use your real name. It is more courageous, more ethical, and more constructive in generating change.
Thank you for participating in this tough road to build a good educational LMS,
Don Hinkelman
Sapporo Gakuin University
Hokkaido, Japan
I also think the Moodle wiki has problems. And I appreciate your willingness to criticize a module on these public forums. However, because you have chosen to hide behind a pseudonym and because you used inflamatory words which do not contribute to constructive discussion, I choose not to listen your words.
I recommend this posting be open for a few more days to give time for you to apologize. Then your post and my post should be deleted.
Please use your real name. It is more courageous, more ethical, and more constructive in generating change.
Thank you for participating in this tough road to build a good educational LMS,
Don Hinkelman
Sapporo Gakuin University
Hokkaido, Japan
In reply to moodle bs
Re: Why Mediawiki Instead of Moodles Wiki Module for docs.moodle.org ?
by Marc Grober -
Oh dear me! But I think the comment was refreshingly to the point (my attempts at explaining the issue having been arguably brushed aside).
Are we going to give the old heave ho to anyone who doesn't offer up their birth name with three pieces of ID? And is the whole world going to act like Victorian Americans and get their shorts in a twist because someone wrote "BS" , which I always understood meant "banal silliness" or said "suck", as on suck lemons ???
My advice would be to have a bourbon (and I am emphatically not suggesting relations with a member of the french aristocracy) and a laugh, because as you note there is more here than mere truthiness - must be something in the water bs is drinking....
Are we going to give the old heave ho to anyone who doesn't offer up their birth name with three pieces of ID? And is the whole world going to act like Victorian Americans and get their shorts in a twist because someone wrote "BS" , which I always understood meant "banal silliness" or said "suck", as on suck lemons ???
My advice would be to have a bourbon (and I am emphatically not suggesting relations with a member of the french aristocracy) and a laugh, because as you note there is more here than mere truthiness - must be something in the water bs is drinking....
In reply to Marc Grober
Re: Why Mediawiki Instead of Moodles Wiki Module for docs.moodle.org ?
by ben reynolds -
My American knickers are not in a twist, Mr. Marc.
But I think Don has a point. We should not suffer trolls gladly.
But I think Don has a point. We should not suffer trolls gladly.
In reply to Marc Grober
Re: Why Mediawiki Instead of Moodles Wiki Module for docs.moodle.org ?
by John Andrewartha -
It does sound a bit like a student airing there view. If you compare the Wiki, blogs, discussion board and chat in Moodle against the ones available in the social network. They do indeed suck. Could we consider that BS is providing customer feedback?
John
John
In reply to John Andrewartha
Re: Why Mediawiki Instead of Moodles Wiki Module for docs.moodle.org ?
by Martin Dougiamas -
It's not constructive feedback though.
Ideal constructive feedback would be explanations of the actual problems with suggested solutions and tracker issues.
Ideal constructive feedback would be explanations of the actual problems with suggested solutions and tracker issues.
In reply to Rob Coates
Re: Why Mediawiki Instead of Moodles Wiki Module for docs.moodle.org ?
by Helen Foster -
As this question has been asked more than once previously, I've added it to Moodle.org FAQ together with some of the answers in this thread.