OK I will talk to the locals here, and set up a web conference to discuss the problem.
Wayne: I also have the gut feeling that the lack of GUI, RTE or WYSIWYG (what ever we're going to call it - lack of easy editor) is simply an excuse... Personally I am stuck. Those around me say they need easy editing before they take part, but then I want teachers confident with traditional editing so they can engage in Wikipedia et al.. easy editing will delay that goal. Randy: I have have a few years experience with Wikispaces, and although it is arguably not as 'powerful' as MediaWiki it is a mistake to ignore the numbers of teachers prolifically using it - and very collaboratively. What are the differences between WS and WE? There are many powerful things in WE's favor - Print to PDF, Collaborative video editing, add free, section editing.. but WS has ease of use, more time on the Net, widget and 3rd party media support, better RSS, loyal user base... Wayne: What about a separate server like you say, that has the FCK that we could use to create the code that we could copy past or even import somehow to main Wikied.. so instead of using OO we use FCK separately. There would be no risk then.. On Wed, Apr 30, 2008 at 3:29 PM, David McQuillan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > The current open-office export is not really a good solution, because > inevitably if you're doing something slightly more complicated than plain > text, the export needs some tweaking before it is usable, and to do the > tweaking you need to know how to edit in media-wiki text. > > D > > >>> "Leigh Blackall" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> 04/30/08 1:20 PM >>> > I think the difficulties I face have already been covered by David > McQuillin. > > You see, from CoL and WikiEd admin perspective, they only need 10% of the > world's teachers to engage for it to be sustainable. But, for Otago > Polytech, we need at least 10% of OUR teachers engaged for our efforts in > Wikied to be sustainable. > > As yet, we have seen very little collaboration on Wikied. Neither the > wider > network or our own local network has collaborated on resource development > or > sharing to any siginificant measure. We have several individual teachers > using Wikied, but the promise of reduced workloads through collaboration > has > not yet come. This is because we don't yet have enough local or global > people ready or willing to use the platform who are also willing to work > with our topics. If we did have more local people working on Wikied then > we > know that collaboration on a local scale would be effective. > > Sadly, I am seeing a number of people I teach about Bogs and wikis > electing > to use Wikispaces because they perceive it as easier for them AND for the > colleagues they need to convince to work the wiki way. > > If Wikied was as easy as Wikispaces, this drain would not be happening. > Wikied offers add free, peer sustained, educational focus. But, as Dave > has > said, the difficulty to edit is too bigger barrier. Open Office might be a > solution, but then I would have to ask our IT Support to use and support > Open Office. As it is now, those who use OO have to install it themselves > - > most don't use OO. > > It must be web based, it must be as easy as possible. > > I love the trad editing in MediaWiki. The fact that I know it means I can > easily participate on many many other MediaWiki projects. But, we can't > ignore that Wikispaces enjoys the biggest participation from teachers (for > better or for worse). We could, if we dropped our barrier, help bring > those > teachers into MediaWiki and then pass them into Wikipedia et al. > > Hope that explains our local situation. > > On Wed, Apr 30, 2008 at 12:19 PM, mackiwg <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > > > Leigh and (other RTE friends) > > > > Late May early June we will start with the implementation of a major > > overall of our current server infrastructure. > > > > Basically the thinking is to set-up two servers (with failover > > capability) and have the third server helping out with processing > > power on the generation of pdfs but also a test bed for things like > > the FCK editor. What I'm saying is that we will certainly test the > > technology and see if it works for us -- but may take a little time. > > > > Given the large distance education community that uses WE -- dropping > > the pedagogical templates is like taking one step forward to make > > initial editing easier, and two steps back on pedagogy for > > asynchronous learning. > > > > I'm also thinking about a left brain solution -- We may be able to do > > a few smart tricks using Open Office and have the best of two worlds. > > The ability to work in a word processing environment and easily upload > > content to WE, including the pedagogical templates plus the ability to > > work off line. That said -- this is speculative at this stage -- but > > have been playing with a few tweaks using Open Office macros and Jim's > > wizardry in customising the mediawiki XML filter that OO uses for the > > export. It should be too hard to have a "save as WE" option that does > > an ftp thing to the server, > > > > Leigh -- for a moment, lets play pretend. Assuming rich text editing > > is sorted, for example, in the next month. How would your life and > > work be different? > > > > Lets see how best to solve the challenges -- understanding the > > difficulties you face will help us choose the right strategy for the > > long term. > > > > Cheers > > Wayne > > > > > > > > On Apr 29, 4:26 pm, "Randy Fisher" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > What seems to be clear here, is that it's only a matter of time before > > an > > > easier-to-use GUI becomes available to WikiEd. And, yes, it will help > > grow > > > our community. > > > > > > It seems to me though, better and more useable technology is only part > > of > > > the equation - reaching out to others in other communities (the survey > > > results give an indication of appopriate folks) is just as important > to > > > making the WE value proposition scalable and sustainable. > > > > > > - Randy > > > > > > > > > > > > On Tue, Apr 29, 2008 at 4:04 PM, mackiwg <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > > > > > I had a chat with Erik a week or three ago -- I understand that FCK > > > > have really made excellent progress. > > > > > > > I think that there are still issues on how best to integrate our > > > > pedagogical templates -- but we should certainly watch the space. > > > > > > > Cheers > > > > W > > > > > > > On Apr 29, 3:52 pm, "Leigh Blackall" <leighblack...@'gmail.com> > wrote: > > > > > Apparently the new version of FCK works well on MediaWiki.. anyone > > know > > > > > better? > > > > > > > > -- > > > > > -- > > > > > Leigh Blackall > > > > > +64(0)21736539 > > > > > skype - leigh_blackall > > > > > SL - Leroy Goalposthttp://learnonline.wordpress.com > > > > > > -- > > > ________________ > > > Randy Fisher - Improving Performance in Ecosystems - with Measurable > > Resultshttp://www.wikieducator.org/User:Wikirandy > > > > > > + 1 604.684.2275 > > > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > > > > > Skype: wikirandy > > > > > > > > -- > -- > Leigh Blackall > +64(0)21736539 > skype - leigh_blackall > SL - Leroy Goalpost > http://learnonline.wordpress.com > > > > > > > -- -- Leigh Blackall +64(0)21736539 skype - leigh_blackall SL - Leroy Goalpost http://learnonline.wordpress.com --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "WikiEducator" group. 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