This is NOT the real front page! this is for messing around! Feel free to discuss at the bottom
Discussion
What does everyone think about emphasizing the editablity of the wiki right up at the top of the front page? I think it's important that people know this is a people-created guide, perhaps?
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It's a good idea. Maybe it can be reworded to be a little more warm though? Maybe: This site is user created: anyone can edit this website! or just putting an exclamation mark in? i don't know...
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Agreed. For instance, I was surprised there was nothing about the May 19 special election on the front page yesterday. I wanted to add something but did not know how to go about doing so.
Proposal: A Realtime "Developing Events" Discussion Area
We need an area to go to when there are unfolding events. Last night there was a helicopter hovering over campus for an hour. I would like to have had a forum to go to where someone posts what is going on (it was the arrests of protesters of fee increases). This discussion area would be for current "developing events" only. Any realtime (currently happening) event could be posted, i.e. concerts, police activity, etc.
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I think this is a good idea. A side question: I noticed Amy Goodman is having an event today in Davis. Is anyone trying to get Amy Goodman to talk about the demonstrations and fee hikes?
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And even better, if added, it should have a auto-time-out option where stuff is deleted after 4 hours of inactivity on a given topic :-) —WesHardaker
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There is this page: Breaking News.
Proposal: Explore/Public Safety
We neet to add a Public Safety category to the front page - with links to all of the pages reqarding this i.e. Police, Fire, Yolo County Court, etc. for both Davis and UCD — SharlaDaly
Perhaps under "Medical Services, Social Services, Spiritual Organizations, Tax Services"?
No, a page where pages for Police depts, fire depts, Yolo County Court, DA's Office, Public Defender, Probation, Jails, Juvenile Hall, etc. and then maybe related pages (i.e. police misconduct, etc.)- you know, public safety.
Yes, sorry I was unclear: I meant just that it would be nicely placed alongside those items. E.g. "Medical Services, Social Services, Spiritual Organizations, Public Safety, Tax Services"
Oh. Yes, that would fit there nicely.
Proposal: Grand Openings
Hello! I suggest that there be a page for "Grand Openings", including the category of businesses. Would someone like to make it? Thanks. —BruceHansen
How about using the events structure to handle that as any given business is only "Grand Opening" for a short period of time? It also seems to lean a LOT toward using the wiki as unpaid advertising rather than a source of information. —JasonAller
I like the idea of time segments, but the Events Board ony lists per day, which is too short of time for many Grand Openings.
The reader would benefit by receiving the discounts and the internet can be of benefit to its users, rather than being used as a medum for pushed marketing.
Also there possibly could be non-business types of Grand Openings? —BruceHansen
Another way to handle it is like the Varsity Theater or the Bistro 33 did. Someone makes a page about the business (either the owner, or a wiki denzine) and the page generates activity on the Recent Changes along the way toward the grand opening. Do you have an upcoming opening in mind, or was this a general thing? — JasonAller
I was initially wanting to highlight the "Grand Opening" for Hometown Chinese Food. I discovered yesterday when talkinng with HCF owner Steve Lee that he had only done the "grand opening' briefly. Generally I think it's a good idea. —BruceHansen
I'm not sure what should be under 'Explore' (or if the word 'Explore' should be changed or how it could be improved). There could be a new general heading under 'Explore' called 'Enterprises' which would include 'Construction'. —BruceHansen
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Right now, there's only a minimal amount of content under construction. If someone wanted to know about construction it would be available via the search tool, but there's no reason to feature it on the main page at this time. —BrentLaabs
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Maybe no 'Construction'. What do you think about "Enterprises'? Clicking on it would show 'Construction' etc.. —BruceHansen
Instead of at the bottom of the Front page there being just a link to a 'title index' there shoud be an index ('site index'?) which includes the headings under 'Explore' etc.. This index would include the contents of the 'title index' and could have a link to the 'title index'. —BruceHansen
Proposal: Simplify the Front Page
Make the page look more like Google. That is all. —RadioNinja
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You mean like the second paragraph, dead center at the top of the page: "If you're new, check out our Introduction."? That, paired with the entire bottom of the page seems to be good to me. The rest is, like other portal sites like Yahoo (and unlike single purpose sites like Google), pretty well aimed at people looking for things related to Davis, i.e., both visitors with a purpose and visitors looking to poke around. — jw
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All I'm saying is it could look simpler. Sites like Ask Jeeves are trying to mirror Google in simplicity. I think the Wiki could go simpler. Do we really need an explore section? Can't we have a page with a site map? Or here's a better idea altogether: Do what LiveJournal does in the way that users viewing the Davis Wiki can customize their viewing options. —RadioNinja
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Customized home pages for users is a wonderful idea. The problem is, if you want it done, you have to do it yourself or convince a specific person to do it. The code for the Wiki is open source if you want to contribute. There's no magic "them" to do things like that. The content of the site, the code of the site... everything here is written by people like you. You could convince the entire Wiki that it's a good idea, but until someone like you actually does it, it's just an idea. Everything on the site is there because somebody thought it was a good idea... and then actually did it. — jw
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Hey, tell you what: I'll come up with the ideas, and YOU guys put it in action! I have the creative side and you guys know all the computer crap.
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Why don't you make YOUR page your own customized start page? You can add in whatever you want. (Or create a subpage under your page that is your start page. -KJM
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How about a front page were you can collapse categories and it saves it using cookies/your account. That way, for those who know their way around can customize things a little more. —mperkel
What do you mean by that? You mean a single search box in the center of the page?
No, no, what I mean is...well, you know how Google is simple? I mean, it's pretty plain and white, but it's professional at the same time. The front page of the Wiki is kind of all around there. It's like, you look two pixels to the left and you're in a new zone. Just make it simple. Have a link for newbies that takes them to a Davis Wiki tutorial page. Hey, someone should create a "Davis Wiki 101" Flash movie! —RadioNinja
Who wants to make a page where people can posts "Looking for roommates" and etc? — JiLiang
The "Getting Started" section may as well not be there, it's buried too far down to be seen or of use for probably nearly everyone's monitor/window size.
Can we get a new featured article? the T-shirt contest ended... —StevenDaubert
search button is needed in the new format. It is one of the most important things on the wiki. —MattHh
*Alcohol should NOT be in the Food And Drink section, but in a Poisons or Drugs section or both. And please do not mention the so-called "French Paradox". I am French and I can tell you this is just a lie of the alcohol industry:
It's like saying "Black top is good for your health because it contains amino acids". It's not because some thing contains some good nutrients that it is good. It can have negative effects on your health because of other elements as it is the case for alcohol. The bad effect far outweigh any "good" effect of alcohol. — Michael777
* Whoah, dude, alcohol is not an evil item. If used in moderation it is a nice additive to any life. Any problem arising from it is through misuse, which can happen for almost anything. Ex: Food, drinks, cars, sleep. Just because you feel strongly about it doesn't make it true. Also, I will thank you not to delete my comments. —JoePomidor
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I do not see any usefulness in helping people get drugs.
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True, you don't. On the other side, I have no problem with listing where to get heroin and meth (and I don't do either, nor do I often drink alcohol). But neither of us is reflective of the community as a whole, and more importantly, this is a classification and filing question, having nothing to do with what either of us think of the content. As a reflection of how the actual community of Davis thinks, alcohol is the "Drink" in Food and Drink. If you wish to change that, feel free — in the real world community of Davis, not on the wiki. If you do change the public view of what alcoholic beverages are called in the community of Davis, it should certainly be relabeled on the Front Page. Until then, it should be where people expect it to be when they are looking for it. —Evan 'JabberWokky' Edwards
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Bah. A drug, broadly speaking, is any chemical substance that, when absorbed into the body of a living organism, alters normal bodily function. You meant to say that you don't see the usefulness in talking about legal drugs you personally disapprove off: Alcohol, coffee (caffeine). Do you mind tea? I like mine very strong. Or sodas, extremely high in sugar with caffeine too. "Normal" cold and flu medicines, some of which certainly affect your function? Who gets to define what's a bad drug? Typically, society, and it seems pretty ok with alcohol and caffeine. -ES
In the real world people drink alcohol, many enjoy it and most consume it safely and responsibly. It's the "drink" (or implied aspect) in "Food / Drink." The wiki's supposed to be useful, at least in some sense.
Archived Data
Is the Davis Wiki archived anywhere? I've done a bunch of historical research in Davis for the 1960s, and there's not a lot of info on the day-to-day happenings. We'd be doing future Davisites a favor by archiving the entire wiki once every three months or so. Just store it somewhere for now, no need to put it online until it's a couple years old. —TedBuehler
The plan is to allow for regular "dumps" of the wiki to be downloaded by folks, and then let those folks archive the data as they wish. This is like what wikipedia does.
The wiki structure is such that you can roll back entries to any date you wish. In theory, you can make a bit of software to "roll back" the entire wiki to a given date (absent the very few manually deleted bits, like malicious postings of social security numbers and the like). —JabberWokky
How do I do this? Can I roll back to, say, Jan 1 2006 and see what In 'n Out burger looked like, for instance? —TedBuehler
Something else to think about, from a long-term archivist point of view, is that there are a few things that change like logos, overall site design, and features that won't always make the "roll back" a perfect fit. A historically-fit archive would have to include the software's history, too (the source code repository).
You'd have to write software to do it to the whole wiki, but the Jan 1 2006 In-and-Out entry was at revision 30, which can be viewed ![[WWW]](http://wikispot.org/wiki/eggheadbeta/img/sycamore-www.png){kind=small}
here. You can also hit the image histories and pull their revisions for that date (just hit the "info" button on entries... the In-and-Out one, for instance, is here). Only admins can remove a revision, and I think that's been done under a dozen times in the history of the wiki. I've never done it, Philip removed somebody's social security number that was maliciously posted, if I recall correctly, but it is very rare. The entire history of the wiki is being preserved with only a few exceptions (the logo and appearance is now being preserved since April 2007). Basically, every edit made is being stored, every entry has a full history, although doing a wiki-wide rollback would require writing software to do so (and as pointed out above, some of the markup has changed over the years, so you'd get *exactly* what was saved, which might not display the same with the current version of the software... for instance, images used to be displayed with thumbnail:filename.jpg). In short, the data is being stored, and getting a rough wiki snapshot would be easy... getting a perfect one is possible post-April 2007, I believe (although you'd need a copy of the software history as well if you wanted to display render bugs correctly). —JabberWokky
Oh, and Ted...this is why it is annoying when you "save, save, save"... each save is creating a new revision in the history of that entry. That's specifically why I suggested to that user that they preview. I didn't suggest it for the heck of it. If it weren't having a negative effect on the readability of the entry histories, I wouldn't care if somebody previewed or saved. It is relatively minor, but confusing the histories is generally a bad idea, especially when new editors are trying to puzzle them out. —JabberWokky
Unless somebody thinks this thread belongs here, it might be a good idea to move it to one of the Wiki Community sections, as it doesn't actually relate to the Front Page —jw
Proposal: Active Updates
I'm thinking of moving Lost Pets, Roommates Wanted, Where Can I ... and other 'active engagement' entries to up by events. Are there any others that would make sense? What about Wiki Community, or is that too 'meta'? I'm trying to bring up and highlight the dynamic, continuously updated and/or back and forth entries that are actually being updated on a semi-regular basis (and hopefully by highlighting them they will benefit directly, and they will encourage readers to figure out that they can edit the wiki). Basically, things similar to events in that checking in on them on a semi-regular basis will bring up new things. —jw
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I think this is a fabulous idea. I am new to the wiki and didn't even know those pages existed, but think they are really helpful. This would make the wiki more engaging. —EmilyHill
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Unless anybody objects, I'll toss out a starting version in the next day or so. —jw
Random Entry
BrianJKenyon has removed the random entry link a couple times. I'm hesitant to readd it again just because it violates my rule of thumb regarding back and forth editing. What do others think? Should it stay or should it go? Brian's had some pretty strong words about it in the changelog: "Random entries serve no purpose and are condescending to readers". Personally I feel it's a nice way to jump into the wiki at a point that you might not have intentionally gone to and discover a new aspect of Davis. Kind of like flipping through a magazine randomly for an article. It's a fairly natural way to read something like a Fodors or a Reader's Digest. If only the wiki were installed in public restrooms around Davis... —Evan 'JabberWokky' Edwards
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FWIW, I agree that it's nice. Not because it's helpful, but because it adds a "friendly" appearance to the page. If I wanted a boring, unfriendly, business like page to go look for information, I'd probably use yahoo's yellow page service or something. —Wes "no nickname" Hardaker
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It was the only dynamic element of the page — one that changes all the time — rather than daily or monthly. And I have on more than one occasion used it. I don't understand why it would offend readers unless it brought up some crazy esoteric aspect of Davis or maybe some user doesn't want his page to randomly show up? Beats me. I'd love for it to return. —RyanMikulovsky
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I've never considered it condescending, and have actually discovered many interesting pages by its suggestion. There are so many strange and interesting facts about Davis, and there's no way I could ever actually get through the 14,000+ Davis Wiki pages (a lack of time, not a lack of wanting to!), but getting a random suggestion of something that I've never heard of is sort of fun. I'd like to see it back. —StaceyEllis
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I like it too — it fits with the wiki's quirkiness. I can't possibly see how it could be condescending. —CovertProfessor
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Brian is an editor with strong opinions.
Once again, they seem to not fit in with those of other editors. I say we thank him for being active and increasing our diversity, and suggest he find a different editorial cause. —DougWalter
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Randomness is predictably nice. I vote to keep it. —IDoNotExist
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I appreciate the Random entry since it often highlights some obscure aspect of the wiki or of Davis in general that one might not have otherwise thought of. I'm sure that many users visit the site looking for specific info, but the random page encourages a little bit of browsing. Besides, I've found that gnoming a random page now and then helps keep the wiki neat and tidy overall. —KevinChin
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I just saw this page after I changed back Bryan's newest revert. My two cents: I personally used and enjoyed the random pages entry when I was new to the Wiki; I spent about 30 minutes rotating through the random pages one evening. It was fun, entertaining, and informative. I like JW's analogy about flipping through a magazine. I hope that feature remains to greet new Wiki-ites. —robinlaughlin
Proposal: Label programs subsidized by ASUCD
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I was just curious if anyone would mind if I went around putting in a Subsidy section on the pages of programs that the ASUCD subsidizes? I got this idea from a CATO article a while back that supported a government regulation that would require subsidized produce to be labeled as so. —hankim
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There's a system used on a few entries (like AAA) so that the tag autocreates a list of all entries marked as being a member (or, in your case, subsidized). If you need help, just ask. Once you see an example or two, it's pretty easy... the hard part is going to all the entries and marking them and then doing the updates next semester or next year. As it is basically informative (regardless of how you stand on that particular program or the usage of student fees in general), it's not likely to be taken poorly. —
Evan 'JabberWokky' Edwards
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What exactly is this tagging system called so that I can look up how to do it?
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It's not really formal... you can call it the "JabberWokky invented a tagging system for a few entries as he helped in the effort to write the Davis Wiki, and it works well in some cases" system. It's a method of using links and macros to link back and create a list that automatically updates. It sounds perfect for what you're looking to do, so I suggested it. If you create an base entry with an intro (something like "Various programs are funded in part or whole by ASUCD funds which are..."), and give me an example program or two, I'll set up the initial format, link the example ones and you can see how it works. —
Evan 'JabberWokky' Edwards
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I started a page called ASUCD Subsidies.
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And I tagged the three valid links so you can see what to add.
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Thanks.
Two minor rewrites of top "About Davis Wiki and Wiki Spot" paragraph
Here is the first change. Basically to note the passing of the five years public mark (which occurred about three months ago, I think), plus to clarify the relationship to Wiki Spot. -jw
Here is the second change. Pulls the link for two year old update into the text itself, and adds a link to Welcome to the wiki, which is a reasonable help entry. This is likely a bit more questionable than the above (at least in my mind), as we now have a link to the Introduction and to a self described primer. Of course, having both an introduction about what the wiki is, and also a primer explaining how to get involved makes sense enough to me to include both. It would probably be a good idea to take a look again at those two entries with an eye toward being clear and simple with links to more help or information (as I type this, I don't think they even cross link). -jw
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I think the link to Welcome to the Wiki is a good idea. So often that link is provided after someone has behaved less than desirably. Maybe some will read it upfront and avoid problems down the line. (wishful thinking?) I also like the note about the wiki having been part of the community for five years. —CovertProfessor
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I like it. —PhilipNeustrom
