The How To Classification Pages
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These pages were created in response to requests to build a better interface to all the many contribs that various people have posted over the last 5 years. It's supposed to make it easier to get an idea of what's out there, not judge how good they are, or who made them first, etc. The community is going to have to answer questions like that - the aim here is just to list them all. If we find multiple different How Tos for the same procedure, we should list them all.
History (correct me if I misremember, guys :-)
The basic idea for this list was suggested by Ian Wells, who put together a Classification list from the one at e-smith.org and other spots. Hsing-Foo built the original page in an earlier wiki we were trying out, and we put some How tos into it. When we moved to the present wiki, we moved them over and started building the list.
Contributors
- Hsing-Foo Wang
- Ian Wells
- Ron McNew
Nomenclature
(from an email from Ian Wells)
Classification Page = The Long List
Topic Page = the page reached from the long list, for example the Hardware Page
Meta-data page = the page that describes an actual How To.
(also there is a Feedback Page)
The Classification Page
This page was built as told above, and has had a few items added since. There are obvious problems with this approach, for instance overlapping categories, and missing categories that don't fit into the namespace very well - it would make a very bad database design. Fortunately, we are not aiming at architectural purity, but at ease-of use, and if a Meta-data page ends up needing to be linked to from multiple Topic Pages, it's ok.
Topic Page
Built from a template - has three sections:
- Local Resources - for wiki pages hosted at Contribs.org. These can be linked to directly (without an intervening meta-data page, but of course the info should still be put into the wiki how to document.
- External Resources - for standard web pages, whether hosted by contribs, or elsewhere. We're trying to add a short description after each link (eventually)
- Additional Information - links to related external sites, for background or explanation of the topic.
The Meta-data page
Built from a template - besides meta-data (who, what, when), we're trying to provide a summary to help people decide if they want to go further. Otherwise, it has a link to the How to, and the How to itself in an iframe. It has seven sections:
- Title
- Meta-data (includes top Nav Bar)
- About this How To
- The How To itself
- The bottom Nav Bar
- Link to Feed Back wiki page
- List of wiki pages that link to this page
Feedback Page
Built from a template - basically a blank wiki page for each How to, to try and encourage feedback. I hope we can replace this one day with a Forum Thread link and iframe.
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