This Is Your Life 2.0

What exactly is a wiki?

Wikis are basically simple websites that do the coding for you. Since wikis use a simplified coding language, you don’t have to be a webmaster to create a online site – anyone can create a wiki.

Probably the most famous use of a wiki tool is Wikipedia . It was created as a free, online, collaborative encyclopaedia.  Users can quickly and easily contribute to update the site content.  That’s right… you could update a wikipedia article.

But unless you are an expert on the 9 th century Viking invasions or the internal combustion engine , you are more likely to use wikis to collaborate on smaller-scale projects. Because they’re available online and  editable to anyone who has the right permissions, they’re perfect for group projects, taking class notes and sharing thoughts, organizing events, or even for using all the great features of a website – hypertext linking, media sharing, easy page organization – to write a paper that will blow your prof’s socks off.

There are lots of free wiki sites out there and most are pretty easy to use. There are occasional issues with cutting and pasting from a program like MS Word and sometimes the “back end” – where the magic takes place – does things you don’t want it to do. 99% of the time, wikis are the fastest, cheapest and simplest

way to publish online.

1. Go to PBWiki.
2. Quickly review the features advertised on the home page.
3. Watch this short demo: http://pbwiki.com/content/viewdemo . It’s made for teachers, but it shows you the features of the wiki.
4. Click “ Personal ” from the menu.
5. Review the features available for personal wikis. Note item “Store and share files and documents”. A wiki allows you to upload other kinds of files (“documents, videos, spreadsheets, Powerpoints, or any kind of document imaginable”). It can act as a back-up file system for projects!
6. Click “Try it Now!”
7. Create your wiki. Use an email address you can access right away. For this project, why not make it a study wiki? Choose one class or your whole program. Create a wiki name that reflects what you will be putting into the wiki. Choose “for individuals” and make it a 2.0 wiki.
8. Go to your email account and confirm your registration.
9. When you’re on your wiki page, click “edit” to change the pre-loaded message.
10. Type a brief outline of what you’re going to put into the wiki.
11. Think about organization. Is this wiki for all your classes or just one? What are some logical sections?
12. On the right menu, click “create a folder” and make folders for each of your sections.
13. Click “create a page”. Type in the name of your first page (Class Notes? Term paper ideas?) and then click “more options”. Find the option to “Put this page in a folder” and choose the matching folder. Repeat this process, making one page for each of your sections. Make sure you put the pages into the correct folders.
14. Now we’ll edit the sidebar – it will act as the menu for the wiki. Click “Edit the sidebar”.
15. Type in the names of your folders or important files.
16. Highlight the first one and click the “link” tool button (the globe with the chain underneath). The default is “PKWiki page” – the correct choice here. On the second item, select the corresponding page, and click “OK”. Repeat for everything you want to access from any page in the wiki. Remember, your folders are available from the folders menu.
17. Click on one of your folders. You can see the page you created inside. Note the “upload files” button – use it to upload papers, pdf files of research articles, whatever makes sense in that folder. They’ll be available from any computer!
18. Go ahead and populate your wiki. If you use a laptop in class, type your notes right into the wiki pages. Don’t forget to “save” on a regular basis, though.

Wiki Info from Leap website

WIki Basics from e-Learning at UBC

Top 10 Organizational Wiki Tips (and how to use them)

This lesson was created for the Digital Media Project, a joint project of UBC School of Library, Archival and Information Studies and the Irving K Barber Learning Centre.