Wiki Websites in the Classroom

1
Wiki Websites in the Classroom

• Peter Beens
• pbeens_at_gmail.com
• Presented at the ACSE Summer Institute,
  University of Waterloo, August 2007
• Originally presented at Computer Science and
  Information Technology Symposium,
• Atlanta, June 2007

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Introduction
3
Overview

• How I Got Here
• What is a Wiki?
• Why Did I Wiki?
• Popular Wikis
• Wiki Options
• Non-Wiki Options
• MediaWiki Overview
• WikiSpaces Overview

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Overview Cont'd

• My Wiki Experiences
• wiki.beens.org
• wiki.acse.net
• Wikispaces
• My Alternative Experiences
• Google Docs/Groups
• Flickr

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How I Got Here

• Webmaster for www.acse.net
• Too much work to maintain, and the website did
  not get updated as much as it should
• Discussed idea of converting website to wiki
• Idea of group collaboration sounded inviting
• Used WikiMedia
• Converted website to wiki
• A few members have taken ownership of certain
  pages

cont'd...
6
How I Got Here (2)

• Presentation of ACSE Wiki at ACSE Summer
  Institute, 2005
• Created a wiki for my students
• Collaborative Editing
• Group projects
• Website Reviews
• Peer helping and review
• Promotes literacy initiatives
• In-class Wiki Experimentation
• Experimenting with Alternatives

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What is a Wiki?

• Answers.com
• Wiki websites are designed to enable users to
  make additions or edit any page of the site. They
  often have a common vocabulary, and consider
  themselves a "Wiki" community.
• Techweb.com
• A Web site that can be quickly edited by its
  visitors with simple formatting rules.
• Source http//www.answers.com/topic/wiki

cont'd...
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What is a Wiki? cont'd

• Wiki also refers to the collaborative software
  used to create such a website.

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Activity Introductions

• Do activity 1 at
• http//tinyurl.com/29qs45

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Why Wiki?

• Wiki comes from the Hawaiian phrase wiki wiki
  (or wikiwiki) meaning quick

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Why an ACSE Wiki?

• To lesson the burden on the webmaster
• To make it more of a community website
• To allow for quicker edits
• To let the ACSE community determine the needs and
  direction of the website
• Note ACSE Association for Computer Studies
  Educators, a province-wide professional
  association dedicated to supporting computer
  studies education in Ontario.

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Some Famous Wikis
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Wikipedia
http//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page
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Wiktionary
http//en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Main_Page
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Wikibooks
http//en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Main_Page
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Wikiversity
http//en.wikiversity.org/wiki/WikiversityMain_Pa
ge
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Wikinews
http//en.wikinews.org/wiki/Main_Page
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Wikiquote
http//en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Main_Page
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Rolling Your Own Wiki
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MediaWiki

• ...is the standard. It is used by all the major
  Wiki websites
• Requires
• Web Server (such as Apache)
• PHP Version 5 or later
• SQL
• Is a Sourceforge project (which means free)

http//www.mediawiki.org/wiki/MediaWiki
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Configuring MediaWiki

• Configuration details available at
• http//www.mediawiki.org/wiki/ManualInstallation
  
• Or follow the basic steps on the next few pages

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MediaWiki Setup

• Download MediaWiki tarball (mediawiki-1.9.3.tar
  .gz is current version) (
• Uncompress and upload to web accessible folder
  (/wiki suggested)
• Create SQL database (may need web host
  assistance)
• Set /config permissions to enable writing

cont'd...
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MediaWiki Setup (2)

• Visit /wiki folder for first-time configuration
  answer questions
• Move config/LocalSettings.php to root wiki folder
• Reset config folder permissions
• Make additional configuration changes applicable
  to your site

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Additional Setup
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Restricting Edit Access

• Make the following changes in LocalSettings.php

http//meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Setting_user_rights
_in_MediaWikiConfiguring_access_restrictions_to_y
our_wiki
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Allowing Uploads

• Change configuration See http//meta.wikimedia.or
  g/wiki/Uploading_files
• Set Images folder permission to 777

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Changing the Default Picture

• Default picture is in \skins\common\images folder
• Upload new picture into this folder (can be
  .jpg, ,gif, or .png)
• Edit the following line to point to your uploaded
  picture

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Some MediaWiki Features
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Built-in Table of Contents
Contents can be hidden!
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Built-in Search Engine
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Syndication Feeds

• The SpecialRecentchanges page contains both RSS
  and Atom syndication feeds.
• Subscribe to this page with your favourite news
  reader. (example Google Reader)

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Basic Editing
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Headings
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Subheadings
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Bold and Italics
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Bulleted Lists
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Numeric Lists
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External Link
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Internal Link
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Activity Basic Editing with MediaWiki

• Do activity 2 at
• http//tinyurl.com/29qs45

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Miscellaneous
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Wiki Sandbox

• The de facto location on Wiki sites where you can
  experiment with the editor.
• This page is not standard with MediaWiki, and
  must be created manually.

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NPOV

• Neutral Point of View
• A major policy rule for all projects in the
  Wikipedia family
• NPOV adopted for ACSE and classroom Wiki

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Some Minor Limitations

• Default configuration allows anyone to edit
  website
• Changes in Watch List pages are not emailed to
  you
• Editing can be difficult (for instance, there is
  no file or image browser)
• No built-in editor help file (must create one)

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Hosting On Your Own Server
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XAMPP

• To host a MediaWiki website in your classroom on
  a local server, one easy way is to use XAMPP.

http//www.apachefriends.org/en/xampp.html
cont'd...
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XAMPP (2)

• Includes
• Apache Web Server
• MySQL
• PHP
• Perl
• Easy to Install Configure
• Available for Windows, Mac OS X (Beta), Linux,
  Solaris (Beta)
• Free

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My Experiences
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ACSE
http//wiki.acse.net/index.php/Main_Page
cont'd...
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ACSE (2)
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wiki.beens.org
cont'd...
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wiki.beens.org Website Reviews
cont'd...
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wiki.beens.org Website Reviews (2)
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Alternatives to MediaWiki
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Alternative 1 Wikispaces

• Free for K-12 educators
• Wiki source for 1.5 million sourceforge projects
• WYSIWYG editor
• Check out this link to get started
• http//www.wikispaces.com/helpTeachers
• Go to this website to create your own education
  space (free of ads)
• http//www.wikispaces.com/t/x/teachers100K

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Wikispaces FAQ

• What is Wikispaces?
• How can I learn how to use Wikispaces?
• I hear you offer free Plus spaces (which are free
  with no advertising) to K-12 (primary and
  secondary) teachers. How do I sign up?
• I am already using Wikispaces and am a K-12
  teacher. Can I take advantage of the free Plus
  space offer?
• Is there an easy way to create accounts for all
  of my students?
• Do I qualify for the free Plus spaces for K-12
  education offer?
• Where can I see some examples of other teachers
  using Wikispaces?

http//www.wikispaces.com/helpTeachers
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Activity Basic Editing with Wikispaces

• Do activity 3 at
• http//tinyurl.com/29qs45

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Activity Wiki Activities

• Do activity 4 at
• http//tinyurl.com/29qs45

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Alternative 2 Google Docs

• Requires a Google account (if you have a Gmail
  account, you have a Google account but not
  necessarily vice-versa)
• Powerful WYSIWYG editor (better than Wikispaces)

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Questions?
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Support Material
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FTPd Folders Files
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\config Set Permission to 777
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Run /config/index.php
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Move LocalSettings.php to Root Wiki Folder
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Reset \config Permissions