Re: Setting up a wiki for GNU Project volunteers?

[Mark Wielaard]

Hi Carlos,

On Tue, Dec 10, 2019 at 01:25:57PM -0500, Carlos O'Donell wrote:
> Wikis are useful software that allows developers to work
> collaboratively and quickly on informal documents that are part of the
> day-to-day running of the packages or project activities.
> 
> This includes documenting such things as:
> - Email thread summaries
> - Status updates
> - Meeting notes
> - Summaries of discussions around best practice activities
> 
> In researching this kind of wiki setup I have discussed the issue with
> various GNU Maintainers and the consensus seems to be that such a
> system should have the following qualities:
> - Based on a VCS e.g. git
> - Uses a supported wiki platform e.g. dokuwiki
> - With a sensible markup e.g. markdown plugin for dokuwiki
> 
> What do people think about setting up a wiki?

Somewhere to put our working documents for the FSF and GNU feedback
and the various GNU Governance discussions would certainly be nice.

Besides the above requirements I would add that it needs to have some
access control, at least to prevent spam.

> Several packages already have wikis like:
> The GNOME Project (https://wiki.gnome.org/)
> The GNU C Library wiki (https://sourceware.org/glibc/wiki/)
> The GNU Debugger wiki (https://sourceware.org/gdb/wiki/)
> The GNU Compiler Collection wiki (https://gcc.gnu.org/wiki)

There is also our sister FSF project LibrePlanet:
https://libreplanet.org/ which is based on MediaWiki

> However, we have no good central community wiki to put document those
> things listed above.
> 
> Does anyone have a strong opinion on which wiki software should be used?
> 
> Selection criteria for a wiki? I'm suggesting dokuwiki + git.

ikiwiki https://ikiwiki.info/ seems nice too.

> Access controls for the wiki? Anyone who volunteers or wants to
> volunteer their time to the GNU Project?

When backed by git (and only manipulated through direct git access)
thena repo on savannah would be ideal for the access control.

> Where could we host a wiki like this without causing confusion with
> official project content?

I don't think it matters a lot. It really depends on what topics we
want it to summarize. If it is just for our FSF and GNU feedback maybe
ask the FSF for gnu.fsf.org :) Otherwise it doesn't really matter, we
just include a banner stating that the documents are summaries and
works in progress for current mailinglist discussions to be used to
form consensus and/or explain positions.

> Lastly, for direct discussion of the GNU Coding Standards and
> Information for GNU Maintainers please see
> https://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/bug-standards. Wiki summaries
> could feed into discussions on bug-standards or bug-standards
> discussion could get summarized into the wiki to build consensus for
> particular changes.

That is a nice idea too.

Cheers,

Mark