Thread Subject: default tab on the wiki

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From: Jim Tobias
Date: Tue, Oct 17 2006 5:15 AM
Subject: default tab on the wiki

Hi Jared,

For all pages in the wiki, is it possible to default to the Discuss tab
rather than the Edit tab? This might encourage new users.

***********
Jim Tobias
Inclusive Technologies
= EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
+1.732.441.0831 v/tty
skype jimtobias
www.inclusive.com

From: Bailey Bruce
Date: Tue, Oct 17 2006 6:30 AM
Subject: Re: default tab on the wiki

> For all pages in the wiki, is it possible to default
> to the Discuss tab rather than the Edit tab?

I am curious as to the technical answer to this question, but I am less
than certain it is a good idea.

> This might encourage new users.

I am skeptical that this will be true, for the following two reasons:

(1) Please correct me if I am wrong, but it seems to be the associated
discuss pages have exactly the same behavior as the main article page.
That is, they don't act and look like traditional message boards (which
would be preferable in my opinion, but that is a wholly separate issue).

(2) I find no compelling evidence that the committee members are more
familiar with message boards than they are with wikii. (Is that the
plural form?)

So, even if defaulting to the Discuss tab is possible, I don't think
there is much to be gained. There is also the whole counter argument to
making the teitac wiki behavior different from other mediawikkies.

Gregg is encouraging the subcommittee he chairs to post sequential
comments, so that no significant discussion is lost. I have some mixed
feelings about this since such a technique is somewhat contrary to the
wiki concept and is why the interface provide the discuss tab. On the
other hand, the technique works well on the WCAG 2.0 wiki and very much
encourages participation.

From: Jessica M. Brodey
Date: Tue, Oct 17 2006 7:35 AM
Subject: Re: default tab on the wiki

The problem is the users would not see the content when they first arrived,
and that would be quite confusing - they would just see the big discuss box
and would not understand what to do or what to discuss.

Jessica

-----Original Message-----
From: = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
[mailto: = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = ] On Behalf Of Jim Tobias
Sent: Tuesday, October 17, 2006 7:11 AM
To: 'TEITAC Communications Task Force'
Subject: [teitac-tools] default tab on the wiki

Hi Jared,

For all pages in the wiki, is it possible to default to the Discuss tab
rather than the Edit tab? This might encourage new users.

***********
Jim Tobias
Inclusive Technologies
= EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
+1.732.441.0831 v/tty
skype jimtobias
www.inclusive.com

From: Jim Tobias
Date: Tue, Oct 17 2006 7:45 AM
Subject: Re: default tab on the wiki

What content wouldn't they be seeing? That's the problem -- there is none.
At least on a discussion page the text looks less authoritative -- it's
clearly a bunch of opinions. If all discussion pages are seeded with an
appropriate first 1-2 paragraphs, it looks more inviting.

***********
Jim Tobias
Inclusive Technologies
= EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
+1.732.441.0831 v/tty
skype jimtobias
www.inclusive.com


> -----Original Message-----
> From: Jessica M. Brodey [mailto: = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = ]
> Sent: Tuesday, October 17, 2006 9:30 AM
> To: 'TEITAC Communications Task Force'
> Subject: Re: [teitac-tools] default tab on the wiki
>
> The problem is the users would not see the content when they
> first arrived, and that would be quite confusing - they would
> just see the big discuss box and would not understand what to
> do or what to discuss.
>
> Jessica
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
> [mailto: = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = ] On Behalf Of Jim Tobias
> Sent: Tuesday, October 17, 2006 7:11 AM
> To: 'TEITAC Communications Task Force'
> Subject: [teitac-tools] default tab on the wiki
>
> Hi Jared,
>
> For all pages in the wiki, is it possible to default to the
> Discuss tab rather than the Edit tab? This might encourage new users.
>
> ***********
> Jim Tobias
> Inclusive Technologies
> = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
> +1.732.441.0831 v/tty
> skype jimtobias
> www.inclusive.com
>
>

From: Jessica M. Brodey
Date: Tue, Oct 17 2006 7:50 AM
Subject: Re: default tab on the wiki

<What content wouldn't they be seeing? That's the problem -- there is none.
<At least on a discussion page the text looks less authoritative -- it's
<clearly a bunch of opinions. If all discussion pages are seeded with an
<appropriate first 1-2 paragraphs, it looks more inviting.

Maybe I'm missing something . . . at present when I click on the "Discuss"
tab, I get a blank page with just a box on it for entering text. I assumed
that once text was entered, it would appear more like an AOL chat, and none
of the content from the document would appear there - in order to see the
actual content from the document we would be discussing, we would have to go
back and click on the main tab. Or, are you asking Jared to add an
additional tab at the end of each row so that people from the main page can
click edit or click discuss? I don't think that is changing the default
setting - I think that is an editing change in the content of the document.

From: Bailey Bruce
Date: Tue, Oct 17 2006 7:55 AM
Subject: Re: default tab on the wiki

> At least on a discussion page the text looks less
> authoritative -- it's clearly a bunch of opinions.

Do you have any examples of this put to practice? Perhaps a wikipedia
discussion page? Does the search facility return hits on discussion
pages? From what I can tell, the media Wiki Talk: pages get their
formatting because of the understanding among users. The mechanics of
Editing on the Talk: pages is exactly the same as the main article
pages. (Someone please correct me if I am wrong here!) If Jared just
make the Discussion tab the default tab, nothing has changed but one
more-or-less arbitrary text label! It doesn't solve the challenge of
promoting contributions.

I agree with Jessica that putting comments in the discussion tab hides
them, which is why you want the discuss tab to be the default. I do not
understand the problem with promoting a proactive of having less formal
areas of the main pages.

From: Gregg Vanderheiden
Date: Tue, Oct 17 2006 8:05 AM
Subject: Re: default tab on the wiki

Someone suggested putting summary, resource or consensus stuff at the top of
a page with a running discussion on the bottom below a "=DISCUSSION="
heading.


Gregg

-- ------------------------------
Gregg C Vanderheiden Ph.D.
Professor - Ind. Engr. & BioMed Engr.
Director - Trace R & D Center
University of Wisconsin-Madison
The Player for my DSS sound file is at http://tinyurl.com/dho6b


> -----Original Message-----
> From: = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
> [mailto: = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = ] On Behalf Of
> Bailey Bruce
> Sent: Tuesday, October 17, 2006 8:53 AM
> To: TEITAC Communications Task Force
> Subject: Re: [teitac-tools] default tab on the wiki
>
> > At least on a discussion page the text looks less authoritative --
> > it's clearly a bunch of opinions.
>
> Do you have any examples of this put to practice? Perhaps a
> wikipedia discussion page? Does the search facility return
> hits on discussion pages? From what I can tell, the media
> Wiki Talk: pages get their formatting because of the
> understanding among users. The mechanics of Editing on the
> Talk: pages is exactly the same as the main article pages.
> (Someone please correct me if I am wrong here!) If Jared
> just make the Discussion tab the default tab, nothing has
> changed but one more-or-less arbitrary text label! It
> doesn't solve the challenge of promoting contributions.
>
> I agree with Jessica that putting comments in the discussion
> tab hides them, which is why you want the discuss tab to be
> the default. I do not understand the problem with promoting
> a proactive of having less formal areas of the main pages.
>
>

From: Jessica M. Brodey
Date: Tue, Oct 17 2006 8:10 AM
Subject: Re: default tab on the wiki

Do you have any examples of this put to practice? Perhaps a wikipedia
discussion page? Does the search facility return hits on discussion
pages? From what I can tell, the media Wiki Talk: pages get their
formatting because of the understanding among users. The mechanics of
Editing on the Talk: pages is exactly the same as the main article
pages. (Someone please correct me if I am wrong here!) If Jared just
make the Discussion tab the default tab, nothing has changed but one
more-or-less arbitrary text label! It doesn't solve the challenge of
promoting contributions.

I agree with Jessica that putting comments in the discussion tab hides
them, which is why you want the discuss tab to be the default. I do not
understand the problem with promoting a proactive of having less formal
areas of the main pages.

> Can we perhaps discuss one of the documents to see what it would look
like? Right now, I'm having trouble seeing how this would work out - I'm
concerned that the content will get lost in the discussion, making it
extremely inaccessible to first-time users visiting the web page just
looking for content.

From: Jared Smith
Date: Tue, Oct 17 2006 8:55 AM
Subject: Re: default tab on the wiki

On 10/17/06, Jim Tobias < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = > wrote:
> Hi Jared,
>
> For all pages in the wiki, is it possible to default to the Discuss tab
> rather than the Edit tab? This might encourage new users.

I have to side with Bruce here. I don't think anything is gained by
making "discuss this document" the default. By default, it's just a
blank page. I think it would be better to have the viewers see the
actual content and documents first, then they can add discussion if
they want to. Where that discussion occurs does not matter a whole
lot. On some of our task force pages, we've added the discussion right
to the document. The same has happened on many of the Theme pages. The
discussion page can be used if users want (and probably should be for
more formal documents). And of course this is the primary purpose of
the mailing lists.

An example of how the discussion page could/should be used is at
http://teitac.org/wiki/Announcement_10.13.2006

We can promote discussion of a document by linking to the discussing
page from within the document itself (Talk:Document Name) and adding
some initial content to that page. If the nature of the discussion
page is such that it is not supporting discussion and the mailing
lists aren't working, a threaded forum could be set up for
subcommittee use, though this is one more level of
usernames/passwords.

I guess I'd rather just see how things fall into place before forcing
a new convention upon users in the hopes that it will work better.

Jared

From: Jim Tobias
Date: Tue, Oct 17 2006 11:45 AM
Subject: Re: default tab on the wiki

I'm getting such a headache over this that I'm about to propose something
else. To wit: although the wiki is great for co-editing a document, it's
not great for stimulating and managing discussion among tentative or
inexperienced users. The tool for that is a blog or forum. Either would be
fine with me. In the interest of simplicity, I think we should auto-enroll
via the listservs, so people don't have to complete yet another cycle of
signup-get email -log in. Go ahead, tell me to soak my head.

***********
Jim Tobias
Inclusive Technologies
= EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
+1.732.441.0831 v/tty
skype jimtobias
www.inclusive.com


> -----Original Message-----
> From: Jessica M. Brodey [mailto: = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = ]
> Sent: Tuesday, October 17, 2006 9:30 AM
> To: 'TEITAC Communications Task Force'
> Subject: Re: [teitac-tools] default tab on the wiki
>
> The problem is the users would not see the content when they
> first arrived, and that would be quite confusing - they would
> just see the big discuss box and would not understand what to
> do or what to discuss.
>
> Jessica
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
> [mailto: = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = ] On Behalf Of Jim Tobias
> Sent: Tuesday, October 17, 2006 7:11 AM
> To: 'TEITAC Communications Task Force'
> Subject: [teitac-tools] default tab on the wiki
>
> Hi Jared,
>
> For all pages in the wiki, is it possible to default to the
> Discuss tab rather than the Edit tab? This might encourage new users.
>
> ***********
> Jim Tobias
> Inclusive Technologies
> = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
> +1.732.441.0831 v/tty
> skype jimtobias
> www.inclusive.com
>
>

From: Andi Snow-Weaver
Date: Tue, Oct 17 2006 12:15 PM
Subject: Re: default tab on the wiki

Jared wrote:

"I have to side with Bruce here. I don't think anything is gained by
making "discuss this document" the default."

I agree that the discuss page doesn't help much. You still have to "edit"
it. And if people are comfortable editing a wiki page, they can just edit
the page.

For Web and Software, I have set up pages with the current provisions
grouped for discussion as was recommended on the mailing list. I was
thinking of soliciting volunteers to "own" or "manage" these pages. Those
who are comfortable with editing the wiki can put their comments right on
the wiki page, prefaced by their name. I will encourage this by providing
an example on each page. Those who don't want to learn to edit wiki pages,
can send their comments on the mailing list. The managers can periodically
consolidate both the wiki and mailing list comments into a summary of the
positions we are consensing on or clustering around. The comments that are
posted to the Wiki would always be archived in the history, right? If
that's not usable, we could always send all of the original comments to the
mailing list for archival, once the positions are summarized, with a link
from the summary to the document in the mailing list archive.

Jared wrote:

"I guess I'd rather just see how things fall into place before forcing
a new convention upon users in the hopes that it will work better."

I agree. In the spirit of user centered design, let's use the tools for a
while and adjust as necessary based on user feedback.

I am also going to offer to the Web and Software subcommittee members that
I will provide some training on wikis if they are interested.

BTW, I asked Curtis Chong about the convention of using greater than (>) or
less than (<) symbols to mark content that is from another posting that you
are responding to. I was worried that this is not very friendly for screen
reader users. He recommends using double quotes instead so I plan to start
doing mine that way (see above).

Andi

From: Jim Tobias
Date: Tue, Oct 17 2006 12:30 PM
Subject: Re: default tab on the wiki

again, it's not the technology that does this. it's the fact that it's
labeled a discussion page and seeded with a discussion. the article tab
looks like an article for the same reason.

***********
Jim Tobias
Inclusive Technologies
= EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
+1.732.441.0831 v/tty
skype jimtobias
www.inclusive.com


> -----Original Message-----
> From: Bailey Bruce [mailto: = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = ]
> Sent: Tuesday, October 17, 2006 9:53 AM
> To: TEITAC Communications Task Force
> Subject: Re: [teitac-tools] default tab on the wiki
>
> > At least on a discussion page the text looks less authoritative --
> > it's clearly a bunch of opinions.
>
> Do you have any examples of this put to practice? Perhaps a
> wikipedia discussion page? Does the search facility return
> hits on discussion pages? From what I can tell, the media
> Wiki Talk: pages get their formatting because of the
> understanding among users. The mechanics of Editing on the
> Talk: pages is exactly the same as the main article pages.
> (Someone please correct me if I am wrong here!) If Jared
> just make the Discussion tab the default tab, nothing has
> changed but one more-or-less arbitrary text label! It
> doesn't solve the challenge of promoting contributions.
>
> I agree with Jessica that putting comments in the discussion
> tab hides them, which is why you want the discuss tab to be
> the default. I do not understand the problem with promoting
> a proactive of having less formal areas of the main pages.
>
>

From: Gregg Vanderheiden
Date: Tue, Oct 17 2006 12:40 PM
Subject: Re: default tab on the wiki

How about we put at the very top of the page a link to the discussion that
says something like


"Discussion on XYZ"

That way people who go to the page immediately see the link to the
discussion page (rather than having to notice the tab - which is less
obvious)

Or we can use Blog software.
Using a single tool has the advantages and disadvantages of the Universal
Remote Control. All there but sometimes easier to understand if separate.

Have we given up on threaded email discussion? People are very familiar
with this. Only problem of course is that unless you practice very tight
subject line discipline - the threads can be a mess or misleading.


Gregg

-- ------------------------------
Gregg C Vanderheiden Ph.D.
Professor - Ind. Engr. & BioMed Engr.
Director - Trace R & D Center
University of Wisconsin-Madison
The Player for my DSS sound file is at http://tinyurl.com/dho6b


> -----Original Message-----
> From: = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
> [mailto: = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = ] On Behalf Of
> Andi Snow-Weaver
> Sent: Tuesday, October 17, 2006 10:52 AM
> To: TEITAC Communications Task Force
> Subject: Re: [teitac-tools] default tab on the wiki
>
> Jared wrote:
>
> "I have to side with Bruce here. I don't think anything is
> gained by making "discuss this document" the default."
>
> I agree that the discuss page doesn't help much. You still
> have to "edit"
> it. And if people are comfortable editing a wiki page, they
> can just edit the page.
>
> For Web and Software, I have set up pages with the current
> provisions grouped for discussion as was recommended on the
> mailing list. I was thinking of soliciting volunteers to
> "own" or "manage" these pages. Those who are comfortable with
> editing the wiki can put their comments right on the wiki
> page, prefaced by their name. I will encourage this by
> providing an example on each page. Those who don't want to
> learn to edit wiki pages, can send their comments on the
> mailing list. The managers can periodically consolidate both
> the wiki and mailing list comments into a summary of the
> positions we are consensing on or clustering around. The
> comments that are posted to the Wiki would always be archived
> in the history, right? If that's not usable, we could always
> send all of the original comments to the mailing list for
> archival, once the positions are summarized, with a link from
> the summary to the document in the mailing list archive.
>
> Jared wrote:
>
> "I guess I'd rather just see how things fall into place
> before forcing a new convention upon users in the hopes that
> it will work better."
>
> I agree. In the spirit of user centered design, let's use the
> tools for a while and adjust as necessary based on user feedback.
>
> I am also going to offer to the Web and Software subcommittee
> members that I will provide some training on wikis if they
> are interested.
>
> BTW, I asked Curtis Chong about the convention of using
> greater than (>) or less than (<) symbols to mark content
> that is from another posting that you are responding to. I
> was worried that this is not very friendly for screen reader
> users. He recommends using double quotes instead so I plan to
> start doing mine that way (see above).
>
> Andi
>
>
>
>

From: Bailey Bruce
Date: Tue, Oct 17 2006 1:00 PM
Subject: Re: default tab on the wiki

> again, it's not the technology that does this. it's the fact
> that it's labeled a discussion page and seeded with a
> discussion. the article tab looks like an article for the
> same reason.

Right, so there's no reason that the content of default article pages
cannot look like a discussion.

BTW teitac.org is down. Jared is on it. It is the same parent DNS
issue as before, so not much can be done.

From: terry.weaver@gsa.gov
Date: Tue, Oct 17 2006 8:05 PM
Subject: Re: default tab on the wiki

I think that all of these communication modes having an inherent adoption
lag for those of us who are not wiki / forum/ blog users. I am a big fan
of listservs - I prefer to have messages pushed to me and, since I don't
have the ability to respond immediately, I can usually trace the
conversation thread to get to the current state of dialogue.

I am trying to understand the wiki and right now, my favorite page is the
one that lists all pages. It is interesting to me that most of the
dialogue is happening on the listservs - very little of what I see in the
emails is making its way to the wiki.





"Jim Tobias" < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = >
Sent by: = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
10/17/2006 12:47 PM
Please respond to
"TEITAC Communications Task Force" < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = >


To
"'TEITAC Communications Task Force'" < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = >
cc

Subject
Re: [teitac-tools] default tab on the wiki






I'm getting such a headache over this that I'm about to propose something
else. To wit: although the wiki is great for co-editing a document, it's
not great for stimulating and managing discussion among tentative or
inexperienced users. The tool for that is a blog or forum. Either would
be
fine with me. In the interest of simplicity, I think we should
auto-enroll
via the listservs, so people don't have to complete yet another cycle of
signup-get email -log in. Go ahead, tell me to soak my head.

***********
Jim Tobias
Inclusive Technologies
= EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
+1.732.441.0831 v/tty
skype jimtobias
www.inclusive.com


> -----Original Message-----
> From: Jessica M. Brodey [mailto: = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = ]
> Sent: Tuesday, October 17, 2006 9:30 AM
> To: 'TEITAC Communications Task Force'
> Subject: Re: [teitac-tools] default tab on the wiki
>
> The problem is the users would not see the content when they
> first arrived, and that would be quite confusing - they would
> just see the big discuss box and would not understand what to
> do or what to discuss.
>
> Jessica
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
> [mailto: = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = ] On Behalf Of Jim Tobias
> Sent: Tuesday, October 17, 2006 7:11 AM
> To: 'TEITAC Communications Task Force'
> Subject: [teitac-tools] default tab on the wiki
>
> Hi Jared,
>
> For all pages in the wiki, is it possible to default to the
> Discuss tab rather than the Edit tab? This might encourage new users.
>
> ***********
> Jim Tobias
> Inclusive Technologies
> = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
> +1.732.441.0831 v/tty
> skype jimtobias
> www.inclusive.com
>
>

From: Jared Smith
Date: Tue, Oct 17 2006 8:24 PM
Subject: Re: default tab on the wiki

On 10/17/06, = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = wrote:
>
>
> I am trying to understand the wiki and right now, my favorite page is the
> one that lists all pages. It is interesting to me that most of the dialogue
> is happening on the listservs - very little of what I see in the emails is
> making its way to the wiki.


At this point, I think that is how things should probably be working.

I envision the wiki as fulfilling the following roles:
1. Collaboration tool for development of more formal guideline documents.
2. Content management system for these documents and other supporting
materials (existing documentation, research, thoughts & ideas, and such.
3. Management system for the sub-committees - listing of work scope and
goals, announcements, to-do lists, meeting agendas and notes, etc.

I envision nearly all of the discussion going on in the e-mail lists. The
wiki does not need to mirror everything or even much of what happens on the
lists. But when the wiki can capture the more formal advancements and
thoughts generated on the mailing lists, it should be used for such.

The wiki should be thought of as a collaborative system for generating
documents. Discussion pages within the wiki should center around the
creation and integrity those documents ("I made this change and here's why?"
or "The wording on this is not clear."). I hope this is making sense. The
wiki is not really a very good communication tool, but it's very good for
more formal documentation, as well as collaborative brainstorming and
sharing of information.

Jared

From: Jessica M. Brodey
Date: Wed, Oct 18 2006 9:10 PM
Subject: Re: default tab on the wiki

"At this point, I think that is how things should probably be working.

I envision the wiki as fulfilling the following roles:
1. Collaboration tool for development of more formal guideline documents.
2. Content management system for these documents and other supporting
materials (existing documentation, research, thoughts & ideas, and such.
3. Management system for the sub-committees - listing of work scope and
goals, announcements, to-do lists, meeting agendas and notes, etc.

I envision nearly all of the discussion going on in the e-mail lists. The
wiki does not need to mirror everything or even much of what happens on the
lists. But when the wiki can capture the more formal advancements and
thoughts generated on the mailing lists, it should be used for such.

The wiki should be thought of as a collaborative system for generating
documents. Discussion pages within the wiki should center around the
creation and integrity those documents ("I made this change and here's why?"
or "The wording on this is not clear."). I hope this is making sense. The
wiki is not really a very good communication tool, but it's very good for
more formal documentation, as well as collaborative brainstorming and
sharing of information."

I'd like to second what Jared just articulated.



Jessica