Re: [Nix-dev] Wiki is dead

[Vladimír Čunát]

On 02/20/2016 12:52 AM, zimbatm wrote:
> It's a great staging area for content where people can edit without
> asking for permission. [...]

What are the advantages in comparison to standard pull requests with
discussion underneath? We already have lots of infrastructure advantages
in there, such as merging changes at once with documentation for them,
auto-mention bot, etc.




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Re: [Nix-dev] Wiki is dead

[zimbatm]

After mulling with the topic for a while, I think that we should really try
to make that wiki working actually.

It's a great staging area for content where people can edit without asking
for permission. The issue right now is with our methodology. Maintainers
should start subscribing to the change-feed and monitor the changes that
way. We can also use the Talk pages to discuss about the content of
specific pages. It would be good to assign an owner that can feel free to
make broader changes. I know the wiki has a bad rep but it's mainly because
of it's content than the actual tool.

It wouldn't be too hard provided we manage to keep the spammers at bay.
Speaking of spammers, I keep seeing new users appearing in the changefeed.
What if we used github as an authentication source ? I'm sure they already
do a great job at filtering-out the spammers.

Anyways, I would be interested in helping out cleaning the content and
potentially become one of the owners of it.

On Tue, 16 Feb 2016 at 17:28 Profpatsch  wrote:

> On 16-02-14 09:15pm, zimbatm wrote:
> > But before I invest more time, do you think it's a path worth pursuing ?
> > Also what would be required for this to be considered "ready" ?
>
> Wow, that’s great!
>
> What are your thoughts on converting it to a nixos (and nix) cookbook,
> akin to the Python Cookbook (
> http://shop.oreilly.com/product/9780596001674.do)
> or the (freely accessible) Puppet Cookbook (http://www.puppetcookbook.com/
> )?
>
> --
> Proudly written in Mutt with Vim on NixOS.
> Q: Why is this email five sentences or less?
> A: http://five.sentenc.es
> May take up to five days to read your message. If it’s urgent, call me.
>
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Re: [Nix-dev] Wiki is dead

[Profpatsch]

On 16-02-14 09:15pm, zimbatm wrote:
> But before I invest more time, do you think it's a path worth pursuing ?
> Also what would be required for this to be considered "ready" ?

Wow, that’s great!

What are your thoughts on converting it to a nixos (and nix) cookbook,
akin to the Python Cookbook (http://shop.oreilly.com/product/9780596001674.do)
or the (freely accessible) Puppet Cookbook (http://www.puppetcookbook.com/)?

-- 
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Re: [Nix-dev] Wiki is dead

[Matthias Beyer]

I once created a wiki template based on jekyll and zurb foundation[0].

It should be possible to host this with gh-pages.

As far as I can remember, this is almost ready for use, though I'm not a web-dev
and it might have some ugly points in the interface, though the underlying code
should work.

I developed this after the discussion on killing the wiki in Nov. 2015. I
proposed this here, AFAICR, though there was no "lets do this" in here, so I
apandoned this project.

[0]: https://github.com/wiki-template/wiki.template

PS: Of course my wiki-template is not shaped in the nixos-website style.

On 14-02-2016 21:15:12, zimbatm wrote:
> Thanks Eelco !
> 
> Check this out: http://nixos-wiki-test.zimbatm.com/Main_Page/

-- 
Mit freundlichen Grüßen,
Kind regards,
Matthias Beyer

Proudly sent with mutt.
Happily signed with gnupg.


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Re: [Nix-dev] Wiki is dead

[zimbatm]

Also we are not alone with the spam :)

[22:37]  alad: I forgot to ask, how do you guys fight against spam
on the wiki ?
[22:38]  zimbatm: there was a recent spam wave, so we've restricted
mediawiki API access, add a more difficult captcha, and enabled some
extensions like spamregex

On Mon, 15 Feb 2016 at 22:42 zimbatm  wrote:

> Alright, let me know how I can help.
>
> Personally I am looking forward to much more scoped discussions like how
> to improve a specific page.
>
> On Mon, 15 Feb 2016 at 22:30 Rok Garbas  wrote:
>
>> Hi Zimbatm and Peter,
>>
>> On Mon, Feb 15, 2016 at 1:41 PM, Peter Simons  wrote:
>>
>>> Hi Zimbatm,
>>>
>>>  > Is the consensus really to kill the wiki or is it just because it's
>>>  > in a bad state?
>>>
>>> I suppose Rok is our local kill-the-wiki champion who can give you the
>>> authoritative answer to this question, but FWIW my impression was that
>>> our Wiki is in a rather poor state. Yes, there is useful information in
>>> it, but unfortunately there is a lot of bad and/or outdated information,
>>> too, and that mixture seems to do more harm than good.
>>>
>>> Now, I don't believe that this kind of chaotic state is a necessary
>>> trait of wikis per-se. The Arch Linux Wiki, for example, is generally
>>> considered awesome and it contains a wealth of detailed technical
>>> information that -- unlike our wiki -- looks extremely polished and well
>>> maintained. So the underlying problem is clearly not the wiki format.
>>> The difference between NixOS and Arch Linux seems to be that some Arch
>>> enthusiast actually enjoy working on the wiki and spent time maintaining
>>> it, whereas NixOS developers apparently don't do that. Whatever the
>>> reasons are, the wiki gene appears to be underrepresented in our crowd.
>>>
>>> Several people have made various initiatives to help improving the wiki,
>>> but curiously enough none of those initiatives actually improved the
>>> *contents*. Nix contributors clearly enjoy making the wiki prettier,
>>> writing fancy CSS configurations, rendering the stuff in sophisticated
>>> web development environments from various markup languages, etc., but
>>> still despite all that effort put into the presentation and management
>>> of the content, the content itself invariably remains the same.
>>>
>>> Therefore, it is my perception that those initiatives will ultimately
>>> not result in a better wiki because changing the wiki infrastructure
>>> will not address the problem that we lack people who enjoy working on
>>> the contents.
>>>
>>
>> As Peter already mentioned (and also 2 mailing posts after this)
>> everybody worries about the tools.
>> what actually matters is the content and nobody is working on it.
>>
>> Current wiki content needs to be reviewed page by page and moved into
>> nixpkgs repository _alongside_ our manual.
>> That way we can actually start requesting updates to
>> tutorials/docs/manual/... as part of the pull requests.
>>
>> Of-course writing all above is easier then doing it.
>>
>> There are 546 wiki pages and in next days I will look into reviewing them
>> one by one, and for those I need input I will create a ticket and cc
>> interested parties to commend where/how should be (re)written.
>> Once initial review of the pages is done and tickets created, help will
>> be needed to review and improve the actual content.
>>
>>
>> --
>> Rok Garbas
>> http://www.garbas.si
>> r...@garbas.si
>> ___
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>> nix-dev@lists.science.uu.nl
>> http://lists.science.uu.nl/mailman/listinfo/nix-dev
>>
>
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Re: [Nix-dev] Wiki is dead

[zimbatm]

Alright, let me know how I can help.

Personally I am looking forward to much more scoped discussions like how to
improve a specific page.

On Mon, 15 Feb 2016 at 22:30 Rok Garbas  wrote:

> Hi Zimbatm and Peter,
>
> On Mon, Feb 15, 2016 at 1:41 PM, Peter Simons  wrote:
>
>> Hi Zimbatm,
>>
>>  > Is the consensus really to kill the wiki or is it just because it's
>>  > in a bad state?
>>
>> I suppose Rok is our local kill-the-wiki champion who can give you the
>> authoritative answer to this question, but FWIW my impression was that
>> our Wiki is in a rather poor state. Yes, there is useful information in
>> it, but unfortunately there is a lot of bad and/or outdated information,
>> too, and that mixture seems to do more harm than good.
>>
>> Now, I don't believe that this kind of chaotic state is a necessary
>> trait of wikis per-se. The Arch Linux Wiki, for example, is generally
>> considered awesome and it contains a wealth of detailed technical
>> information that -- unlike our wiki -- looks extremely polished and well
>> maintained. So the underlying problem is clearly not the wiki format.
>> The difference between NixOS and Arch Linux seems to be that some Arch
>> enthusiast actually enjoy working on the wiki and spent time maintaining
>> it, whereas NixOS developers apparently don't do that. Whatever the
>> reasons are, the wiki gene appears to be underrepresented in our crowd.
>>
>> Several people have made various initiatives to help improving the wiki,
>> but curiously enough none of those initiatives actually improved the
>> *contents*. Nix contributors clearly enjoy making the wiki prettier,
>> writing fancy CSS configurations, rendering the stuff in sophisticated
>> web development environments from various markup languages, etc., but
>> still despite all that effort put into the presentation and management
>> of the content, the content itself invariably remains the same.
>>
>> Therefore, it is my perception that those initiatives will ultimately
>> not result in a better wiki because changing the wiki infrastructure
>> will not address the problem that we lack people who enjoy working on
>> the contents.
>>
>
> As Peter already mentioned (and also 2 mailing posts after this) everybody
> worries about the tools.
> what actually matters is the content and nobody is working on it.
>
> Current wiki content needs to be reviewed page by page and moved into
> nixpkgs repository _alongside_ our manual.
> That way we can actually start requesting updates to
> tutorials/docs/manual/... as part of the pull requests.
>
> Of-course writing all above is easier then doing it.
>
> There are 546 wiki pages and in next days I will look into reviewing them
> one by one, and for those I need input I will create a ticket and cc
> interested parties to commend where/how should be (re)written.
> Once initial review of the pages is done and tickets created, help will be
> needed to review and improve the actual content.
>
>
> --
> Rok Garbas
> http://www.garbas.si
> r...@garbas.si
> ___
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Re: [Nix-dev] Wiki is dead

[Rok Garbas]

Hi Zimbatm and Peter,

On Mon, Feb 15, 2016 at 1:41 PM, Peter Simons  wrote:

> Hi Zimbatm,
>
>  > Is the consensus really to kill the wiki or is it just because it's
>  > in a bad state?
>
> I suppose Rok is our local kill-the-wiki champion who can give you the
> authoritative answer to this question, but FWIW my impression was that
> our Wiki is in a rather poor state. Yes, there is useful information in
> it, but unfortunately there is a lot of bad and/or outdated information,
> too, and that mixture seems to do more harm than good.
>
> Now, I don't believe that this kind of chaotic state is a necessary
> trait of wikis per-se. The Arch Linux Wiki, for example, is generally
> considered awesome and it contains a wealth of detailed technical
> information that -- unlike our wiki -- looks extremely polished and well
> maintained. So the underlying problem is clearly not the wiki format.
> The difference between NixOS and Arch Linux seems to be that some Arch
> enthusiast actually enjoy working on the wiki and spent time maintaining
> it, whereas NixOS developers apparently don't do that. Whatever the
> reasons are, the wiki gene appears to be underrepresented in our crowd.
>
> Several people have made various initiatives to help improving the wiki,
> but curiously enough none of those initiatives actually improved the
> *contents*. Nix contributors clearly enjoy making the wiki prettier,
> writing fancy CSS configurations, rendering the stuff in sophisticated
> web development environments from various markup languages, etc., but
> still despite all that effort put into the presentation and management
> of the content, the content itself invariably remains the same.
>
> Therefore, it is my perception that those initiatives will ultimately
> not result in a better wiki because changing the wiki infrastructure
> will not address the problem that we lack people who enjoy working on
> the contents.
>

As Peter already mentioned (and also 2 mailing posts after this) everybody
worries about the tools.
what actually matters is the content and nobody is working on it.

Current wiki content needs to be reviewed page by page and moved into
nixpkgs repository _alongside_ our manual.
That way we can actually start requesting updates to
tutorials/docs/manual/... as part of the pull requests.

Of-course writing all above is easier then doing it.

There are 546 wiki pages and in next days I will look into reviewing them
one by one, and for those I need input I will create a ticket and cc
interested parties to commend where/how should be (re)written.
Once initial review of the pages is done and tickets created, help will be
needed to review and improve the actual content.


-- 
Rok Garbas
http://www.garbas.si
r...@garbas.si
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Re: [Nix-dev] Wiki is dead

[zimbatm]

@Peter: haha, point taken :)

So I went on #archlinux and asked a few questions on their wiki (transcript
below). It might seem obvious but basically it works because somebody close
to the core is owning the wiki.

--
[21:29]  over at #nixos we are wondering how arch manages to have
such an awesome wiki. how do you manage it, is somebody owning the wiki ?
[21:30]  zimbatm: pierre manages the technical side of the wiki, and
you have like 3 people watching over the daily happenings
[21:30]  zimbatm: otherwise it's just community maintained
[21:30]  don't forget the goat blood and the virgins
[21:30]  ^ yeah, important factor
[21:30]  do you have meetings about the content of the wiki ?
[21:31]  lol
[21:31]  The meetings are the Talk pages
[21:31]  zimbatm: vast majority is in public discussions in articles,
or on "maintenance" pages like ArchWiki:Requests
[21:31]  yeah, what pid1 said
[21:32]  of course, you also have wiki-related discussions here, in
arch-general, on the forums, ...
[21:32]  Most changes are discussed there, and sometimes changes are
staged on an individual's page
[21:32]  I must say I'm impressed, arch wiki is always my go to
for linux issues
[21:33]  do you know if pierre one of the arch founder or core
contributors ?
[21:33]  i think we're having issues with ownership, most people
don't trust changing the wiki willy-nilly
[21:33]  zimbatm: well, arch gets the upstream issues before most
others, issues on old versions are typically deleted after some time
[21:34]  zimbatm: pierre is an arch developer, there are also some
wiki admins who are trusted users or involved in the forums, but most of
them focus on the actual wiki
[21:35]  zimbatm: It does help that the Arch wiki has a decent number
of people who watch the "Recent Changes" feed and watch for obvious
foolishness
[21:35]  okay. thanks a lot for clearing my questions. I agree,
somebody needs to take care and make sure the content is good and well
structured
[21:36]  yeah, nixos is like 100time smaller too
[21:38]  zimbatm: I'd start by keeping the scope small, i.e., focused
on distribution-specific tools
[21:38]  zimbatm: the developers should be able to help with that, too

On Mon, 15 Feb 2016 at 16:50 Marcus Brinkmann <
marcus.brinkm...@ruhr-uni-bochum.de> wrote:

> I feel like contributing a few points in a Wiki's defense, given the
> general negativity towards it, but I am not on a crusade :)
>
> In general, Wikipedia/MediaWiki works because it scales massively and
> provides excellent tools to detect and cope with vandalism.  The git
> workflow should scale very well, too, but under heavy parallel writes
> (at a Wikipedia level, not something I would expect for NixOS), the
> interactive nature of conflict resolution is going to be smoother than a
> git pull/push scenario (think about multiple users pounding on a page
> within seconds).
>
> The NixOS project is simply too small to have a well-maintained wiki at
> this point, which needs a certain critical mass.  But I think eventually
> things will tip in favor of the wiki, and NixOS' wiki will be as great
> as Arch and Gentoo (also an excellent wiki, and a much smaller community
> than Arch).  I also think that thematically NixOS will have much in
> common with these two wikis (the issues in maintaining these systems are
> similar).  So, I would look at Arch and Gentoo Wikis not as contrasting
> examples, but as a projection of the NixOS wiki in the future.  If you
> like the Wiki there, you would move away from that goal by not having a
> wiki.  I think that if you look at the early versions of those wikis,
> you will find them to be similar to what NixOS wiki looks today.
>
> A causal user, and even most developers, will not bother checking out a
> whole git repository to fix an issue in a single wiki page.  Wikis are
> optimized for low barrier of entry.
>
> Also, a MediaWiki installation will be easier to adapt, exetend and
> integrate with other tools in NixOS rather than for example the
> suggested github pages, which will always be limited by what github
> provides.
>
> I think that book-like manuals serve different purposes from a wiki.  I
> think both are needed.  Github pages may very well be suited to provide
> a good book-experience.
>
>
> On 02/15/2016 05:33 PM, Michael Alan Dorman wrote:
> >> Several people have made various initiatives to help improving the wiki,
> >> but curiously enough none of those initiatives actually improved the
> >> *contents*. Nix contributors clearly enjoy making the wiki prettier,
> >> writing fancy CSS configurations, rendering the stuff in sophisticated
> >> web development environments from various markup languages, etc., but
> >> still despite all that effort put into the presentation and management
> >> of the content, the content itself invariably remains the same.
> >>
> >> Therefore, it is my perception that those initiatives will ultimately
> >> not result in a better wiki because changing the wiki infrastructure
> >> will 

[Nix-dev] Wiki is dead

[Thomas Bereknyei]

I often find myself on the Arch wiki and porting the content to apply to my
NixOS setup. Perhaps that would be a systematic way to start, consider it a
port. Take some of the most commonly used Arch wiki pages and make NixOS
versions. It would also establish a structure to the wiki.

>But I think eventually
>things will tip in favor of the wiki, and >NixOS' wiki will be as great
>as Arch and Gentoo (also an excellent >wiki, and a much smaller community
>than Arch).  I also think that >thematically NixOS will have much in
>common with these two wikis (the >issues in maintaining these systems are
>similar).  So, I would look at Arch and >Gentoo Wikis not as contrasting
>examples, but as a projection of the >NixOS wiki in the future.
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Re: [Nix-dev] Wiki is dead

[Marcus Brinkmann]

I feel like contributing a few points in a Wiki's defense, given the
general negativity towards it, but I am not on a crusade :)

In general, Wikipedia/MediaWiki works because it scales massively and
provides excellent tools to detect and cope with vandalism.  The git
workflow should scale very well, too, but under heavy parallel writes
(at a Wikipedia level, not something I would expect for NixOS), the
interactive nature of conflict resolution is going to be smoother than a
git pull/push scenario (think about multiple users pounding on a page
within seconds).

The NixOS project is simply too small to have a well-maintained wiki at
this point, which needs a certain critical mass.  But I think eventually
things will tip in favor of the wiki, and NixOS' wiki will be as great
as Arch and Gentoo (also an excellent wiki, and a much smaller community
than Arch).  I also think that thematically NixOS will have much in
common with these two wikis (the issues in maintaining these systems are
similar).  So, I would look at Arch and Gentoo Wikis not as contrasting
examples, but as a projection of the NixOS wiki in the future.  If you
like the Wiki there, you would move away from that goal by not having a
wiki.  I think that if you look at the early versions of those wikis,
you will find them to be similar to what NixOS wiki looks today.

A causal user, and even most developers, will not bother checking out a
whole git repository to fix an issue in a single wiki page.  Wikis are
optimized for low barrier of entry.

Also, a MediaWiki installation will be easier to adapt, exetend and
integrate with other tools in NixOS rather than for example the
suggested github pages, which will always be limited by what github
provides.

I think that book-like manuals serve different purposes from a wiki.  I
think both are needed.  Github pages may very well be suited to provide
a good book-experience.


On 02/15/2016 05:33 PM, Michael Alan Dorman wrote:
>> Several people have made various initiatives to help improving the wiki,
>> but curiously enough none of those initiatives actually improved the
>> *contents*. Nix contributors clearly enjoy making the wiki prettier,
>> writing fancy CSS configurations, rendering the stuff in sophisticated
>> web development environments from various markup languages, etc., but
>> still despite all that effort put into the presentation and management
>> of the content, the content itself invariably remains the same.
>>
>> Therefore, it is my perception that those initiatives will ultimately
>> not result in a better wiki because changing the wiki infrastructure
>> will not address the problem that we lack people who enjoy working on
>> the contents.
> 
> I wonder if people focus on the aesthetics simply because the platform
> makes trying to effect change in those areas relatively achievable?
> 
> I can only speak for myself, obviously, but I find MediaWiki to be
> cumbersome to work with---I find the formatting to be far less intuitive
> than most of the alternatives (off the top of your head, is bold two
> apostrophes or three?)---and having to create and edit (much less
> reorganize and refactor) content via a web interface seems like so much
> overhead that, ultimately, even small edits feel like too much effort.
> 
> This exact situation crops in my $DAYJOB as well, where we use MediaWiki
> to try and organize internal documentation---and most of it gets put up
> (which is, compared to everything else, relatively low cost), but then
> the cost of modifying in all but trivial ways is high enough that people
> would rather start over than do significant edits...and then the high
> cost of reorganizing and refactoring means that we end up with duplicate
> content, etc.
> 
> It makes me sad just to think about.  Honestly, I cannot comprehend how
> Wikipedia even works, given the relatively horribleness of the tools
> MediaWiki provides.
> 
> Would I contribute more (AKA: at all) to what amounts to a github pages
> sort of thing?  Certainly there's no guarantees, but it would make it
> far more probable, because the cost would be more in line with, say,
> cleaning up a nix expression or some such: oh, I see an issue, let me
> update my clone, make my edit, fire off a PR.  That's a workflow that I
> manage quite happily and easily.
> 
> Mike.
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Re: [Nix-dev] Wiki is dead

[Michael Alan Dorman]

> Several people have made various initiatives to help improving the wiki,
> but curiously enough none of those initiatives actually improved the
> *contents*. Nix contributors clearly enjoy making the wiki prettier,
> writing fancy CSS configurations, rendering the stuff in sophisticated
> web development environments from various markup languages, etc., but
> still despite all that effort put into the presentation and management
> of the content, the content itself invariably remains the same.
> 
> Therefore, it is my perception that those initiatives will ultimately
> not result in a better wiki because changing the wiki infrastructure
> will not address the problem that we lack people who enjoy working on
> the contents.

I wonder if people focus on the aesthetics simply because the platform
makes trying to effect change in those areas relatively achievable?

I can only speak for myself, obviously, but I find MediaWiki to be
cumbersome to work with---I find the formatting to be far less intuitive
than most of the alternatives (off the top of your head, is bold two
apostrophes or three?)---and having to create and edit (much less
reorganize and refactor) content via a web interface seems like so much
overhead that, ultimately, even small edits feel like too much effort.

This exact situation crops in my $DAYJOB as well, where we use MediaWiki
to try and organize internal documentation---and most of it gets put up
(which is, compared to everything else, relatively low cost), but then
the cost of modifying in all but trivial ways is high enough that people
would rather start over than do significant edits...and then the high
cost of reorganizing and refactoring means that we end up with duplicate
content, etc.

It makes me sad just to think about.  Honestly, I cannot comprehend how
Wikipedia even works, given the relatively horribleness of the tools
MediaWiki provides.

Would I contribute more (AKA: at all) to what amounts to a github pages
sort of thing?  Certainly there's no guarantees, but it would make it
far more probable, because the cost would be more in line with, say,
cleaning up a nix expression or some such: oh, I see an issue, let me
update my clone, make my edit, fire off a PR.  That's a workflow that I
manage quite happily and easily.

Mike.
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Re: [Nix-dev] Wiki is dead

[Mateusz Czaplinski]

>From a newbie's perspective, I want to say two things:

1. From watching the "kill the wiki" presentation (as well as the later
discussions), I believe it was actually meant as a provocative/dramatical
(in a good way - as in "thought-provoking"/"wake-up call") way of saying
"we ought to improve the official docs/manual to be good enough, that wiki
should not be necessary", not as "let's just kill the wiki now and it will
magically improve the situation" that it seems to be understood as by some.

2. Without the wiki, *I wouldn't be able to start using Nix & NixOS*. I
really, really mean it! The tutorial and manual are very useful, but
they're missing some practical info, or sometimes it's hard to find (I
mentioned some specific points in an earlier thread). Being a newbie, I was
saved by the wiki from being stuck many times already.

With that said, personally I believe migrating the wiki to a repo would be
acceptable if needed as a way to kill spam. Also, I believe github has some
wiki features too, that can be enabled for a repo, so those could possibly
be considered too (or is that already what is proposed here by @zimbatm?).

Thanks & Best Regards,
/Mateusz.

On Mon, Feb 15, 2016 at 1:41 PM, Peter Simons  wrote:

> Hi Zimbatm,
>
>  > Is the consensus really to kill the wiki or is it just because it's
>  > in a bad state?
>
> I suppose Rok is our local kill-the-wiki champion who can give you the
> authoritative answer to this question, but FWIW my impression was that
> our Wiki is in a rather poor state. Yes, there is useful information in
> it, but unfortunately there is a lot of bad and/or outdated information,
> too, and that mixture seems to do more harm than good.
>
> Now, I don't believe that this kind of chaotic state is a necessary
> trait of wikis per-se. The Arch Linux Wiki, for example, is generally
> considered awesome and it contains a wealth of detailed technical
> information that -- unlike our wiki -- looks extremely polished and well
> maintained. So the underlying problem is clearly not the wiki format.
> The difference between NixOS and Arch Linux seems to be that some Arch
> enthusiast actually enjoy working on the wiki and spent time maintaining
> it, whereas NixOS developers apparently don't do that. Whatever the
> reasons are, the wiki gene appears to be underrepresented in our crowd.
>
> Several people have made various initiatives to help improving the wiki,
> but curiously enough none of those initiatives actually improved the
> *contents*. Nix contributors clearly enjoy making the wiki prettier,
> writing fancy CSS configurations, rendering the stuff in sophisticated
> web development environments from various markup languages, etc., but
> still despite all that effort put into the presentation and management
> of the content, the content itself invariably remains the same.
>
> Therefore, it is my perception that those initiatives will ultimately
> not result in a better wiki because changing the wiki infrastructure
> will not address the problem that we lack people who enjoy working on
> the contents.
>
> Best regards,
> Peter
>
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Re: [Nix-dev] Wiki is dead

[Peter Simons]

Hi Zimbatm,

 > Is the consensus really to kill the wiki or is it just because it's
 > in a bad state?

I suppose Rok is our local kill-the-wiki champion who can give you the
authoritative answer to this question, but FWIW my impression was that
our Wiki is in a rather poor state. Yes, there is useful information in
it, but unfortunately there is a lot of bad and/or outdated information,
too, and that mixture seems to do more harm than good.

Now, I don't believe that this kind of chaotic state is a necessary
trait of wikis per-se. The Arch Linux Wiki, for example, is generally
considered awesome and it contains a wealth of detailed technical
information that -- unlike our wiki -- looks extremely polished and well
maintained. So the underlying problem is clearly not the wiki format.
The difference between NixOS and Arch Linux seems to be that some Arch
enthusiast actually enjoy working on the wiki and spent time maintaining
it, whereas NixOS developers apparently don't do that. Whatever the
reasons are, the wiki gene appears to be underrepresented in our crowd.

Several people have made various initiatives to help improving the wiki,
but curiously enough none of those initiatives actually improved the
*contents*. Nix contributors clearly enjoy making the wiki prettier,
writing fancy CSS configurations, rendering the stuff in sophisticated
web development environments from various markup languages, etc., but
still despite all that effort put into the presentation and management
of the content, the content itself invariably remains the same.

Therefore, it is my perception that those initiatives will ultimately
not result in a better wiki because changing the wiki infrastructure
will not address the problem that we lack people who enjoy working on
the contents.

Best regards,
Peter

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Re: [Nix-dev] Wiki is dead

[zimbatm]

Sorry if I'm re-digging an old bone. Is the consensus really to kill the
wiki or is it just because it's in a bad state ? It still seems like it's
holding valuable information and can also serve as a staging area after
some cleanup.

Anyways if there is no interest, no worries, I'll just be contributing in
some other ways :)

On Sun, 14 Feb 2016 at 21:19 Arseniy Seroka  wrote:

> There was a huge discussion about wiki's future [1].
>
> [1] http://lists.science.uu.nl/pipermail/nix-dev/2015-November/018645.html
>
> 2016-02-15 0:15 GMT+03:00 zimbatm :
>
>> Thanks Eelco !
>>
>> Check this out: http://nixos-wiki-test.zimbatm.com/Main_Page/
>>
>> It's a conversion to Markdown, a Jekyll template with the nixos-homepage
>> css, all hosted on github. The idea is that people can still edit the wiki
>> but have to submit a PR to introduce changes. It's a bit more work for us
>> but it also means that we can keep the spammers at bay and monitor the
>> quality of the submissions.
>>
>> Obviously it's not perfect, this is just a prototype. There are issues
>> with the links, navigation and some pages are missing. There also questions
>> as how to integrate with the rest of nixos.org.
>>
>> The nice thing about that approach is that we can re-run the import any
>> time until it's ready.
>> But before I invest more time, do you think it's a path worth pursuing ?
>> Also what would be required for this to be considered "ready" ?
>>
>> Link to repo: https://github.com/zimbatm/nixos-wiki-test/
>>
>>
>> On Fri, 12 Feb 2016 at 14:26 Eelco Dolstra 
>> wrote:
>>
>>> Hi,
>>>
>>> On 10/02/16 18:52, zimbatm wrote:
>>>
>>> > Is it possible to get a dump using dumpBackup.php ?
>>> > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help:Export
>>>
>>> I've put a dump at https://nixos.org/~eelco/wiki-20160212.xml.gz.
>>>
>>> --
>>> Eelco Dolstra | LogicBlox, Inc. | http://nixos.org/~eelco/
>>>
>>
>> ___
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>> http://lists.science.uu.nl/mailman/listinfo/nix-dev
>>
>>
>
>
> --
> Sincerely,
> Arseniy Seroka
>
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Re: [Nix-dev] Wiki is dead

[zimbatm]

Thanks Eelco !

Check this out: http://nixos-wiki-test.zimbatm.com/Main_Page/

It's a conversion to Markdown, a Jekyll template with the nixos-homepage
css, all hosted on github. The idea is that people can still edit the wiki
but have to submit a PR to introduce changes. It's a bit more work for us
but it also means that we can keep the spammers at bay and monitor the
quality of the submissions.

Obviously it's not perfect, this is just a prototype. There are issues with
the links, navigation and some pages are missing. There also questions as
how to integrate with the rest of nixos.org.

The nice thing about that approach is that we can re-run the import any
time until it's ready.
But before I invest more time, do you think it's a path worth pursuing ?
Also what would be required for this to be considered "ready" ?

Link to repo: https://github.com/zimbatm/nixos-wiki-test/


On Fri, 12 Feb 2016 at 14:26 Eelco Dolstra 
wrote:

> Hi,
>
> On 10/02/16 18:52, zimbatm wrote:
>
> > Is it possible to get a dump using dumpBackup.php ?
> > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help:Export
>
> I've put a dump at https://nixos.org/~eelco/wiki-20160212.xml.gz.
>
> --
> Eelco Dolstra | LogicBlox, Inc. | http://nixos.org/~eelco/
>
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Re: [Nix-dev] Wiki is dead

[Arseniy Seroka]

There was a huge discussion about wiki's future [1].

[1] http://lists.science.uu.nl/pipermail/nix-dev/2015-November/018645.html

2016-02-15 0:15 GMT+03:00 zimbatm :

> Thanks Eelco !
>
> Check this out: http://nixos-wiki-test.zimbatm.com/Main_Page/
>
> It's a conversion to Markdown, a Jekyll template with the nixos-homepage
> css, all hosted on github. The idea is that people can still edit the wiki
> but have to submit a PR to introduce changes. It's a bit more work for us
> but it also means that we can keep the spammers at bay and monitor the
> quality of the submissions.
>
> Obviously it's not perfect, this is just a prototype. There are issues
> with the links, navigation and some pages are missing. There also questions
> as how to integrate with the rest of nixos.org.
>
> The nice thing about that approach is that we can re-run the import any
> time until it's ready.
> But before I invest more time, do you think it's a path worth pursuing ?
> Also what would be required for this to be considered "ready" ?
>
> Link to repo: https://github.com/zimbatm/nixos-wiki-test/
>
>
> On Fri, 12 Feb 2016 at 14:26 Eelco Dolstra 
> wrote:
>
>> Hi,
>>
>> On 10/02/16 18:52, zimbatm wrote:
>>
>> > Is it possible to get a dump using dumpBackup.php ?
>> > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help:Export
>>
>> I've put a dump at https://nixos.org/~eelco/wiki-20160212.xml.gz.
>>
>> --
>> Eelco Dolstra | LogicBlox, Inc. | http://nixos.org/~eelco/
>>
>
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> http://lists.science.uu.nl/mailman/listinfo/nix-dev
>
>


-- 
Sincerely,
Arseniy Seroka
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Re: [Nix-dev] Wiki is dead

[Eelco Dolstra]

Hi,

On 10/02/16 18:52, zimbatm wrote:

> Is it possible to get a dump using dumpBackup.php ?
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help:Export

I've put a dump at https://nixos.org/~eelco/wiki-20160212.xml.gz.

-- 
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Re: [Nix-dev] Wiki is dead

[Vladimír Čunát]

On 02/10/2016 02:34 PM, Arseniy Seroka wrote:
> Unavailable from Russian and from Netherlands.

I forgot to add that I found the 404 yesterday and only confirmed today
that it wasn't a short blackout...




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Re: [Nix-dev] Wiki is dead

[Arseniy Seroka]

Unavailable from Russian and from Netherlands.

2016-02-10 16:25 GMT+03:00 Vladimír Čunát :

> Wiki is dead (404). Is that intentional?
>
> --Vladimir
>
>
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-- 
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Arseniy Seroka
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[Nix-dev] Wiki is dead

[Vladimír Čunát]

Wiki is dead (404). Is that intentional?

--Vladimir



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Re: [Nix-dev] Wiki is dead

[Domen Kožar]

Thanks!

On Wed, Feb 10, 2016 at 4:49 PM, Eelco Dolstra 
wrote:

> Hi,
>
> On 10/02/16 14:40, Domen Kožar wrote:
>
> > It was taken down due to spam bots, I hope Eelco finds time to make it
> read-only
> > instead of unavailable.
>
> The wiki is back in read-only mode. I deleted the spam accounts / pages.
>
> --
> Eelco Dolstra | LogicBlox, Inc. | http://nixos.org/~eelco/
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Re: [Nix-dev] Wiki is dead

[Eelco Dolstra]

Hi,

On 10/02/16 14:40, Domen Kožar wrote:

> It was taken down due to spam bots, I hope Eelco finds time to make it 
> read-only
> instead of unavailable.

The wiki is back in read-only mode. I deleted the spam accounts / pages.

-- 
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Re: [Nix-dev] Wiki is dead

[zimbatm]

Is it possible to get a dump using dumpBackup.php ?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help:Export

I would like to try something out now that the wiki is read-only.

On Wed, 10 Feb 2016 at 16:50 Domen Kožar  wrote:

> Thanks!
>
> On Wed, Feb 10, 2016 at 4:49 PM, Eelco Dolstra <
> eelco.dols...@logicblox.com> wrote:
>
>> Hi,
>>
>> On 10/02/16 14:40, Domen Kožar wrote:
>>
>> > It was taken down due to spam bots, I hope Eelco finds time to make it
>> read-only
>> > instead of unavailable.
>>
>> The wiki is back in read-only mode. I deleted the spam accounts / pages.
>>
>> --
>> Eelco Dolstra | LogicBlox, Inc. | http://nixos.org/~eelco/
>> ___
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>
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