Sphene Community Tools

I was analysing existing wikis to get ideas from them, and I concluded that what I am looking for is an "enterprise wiki" (not like Twiki, wich is a raw wiki with complex API and not user friendly).
I need to achieve an easy to use "collaborative system" for small to mid size organization. We have many small teams and an overload of e-mails, many concurrent projects, and lack of communication.
So I created a list of what I need:
1- get an unique communication way, wich Sph's Wiki is great.
2- Make it easy to organize and granular (again, SW has done a great job, I am just trying to find a "dashboard" solution)
3- Set permission by users for groups of pages, and not only snips
4- Improve functionality with collaboration tools (like "rendered widgets" in an "include page:" fashion way - maybe middlewares?)

So, my goal is to achieve an open source collaboration tool for our company, and I think it may fit many organizations.

What do you think, guys? Is it Sphene a community tool for it?

i actually always considered complex APIs and non-userfriendly administration very enterprisey .. ;)

Anderson Santos said @ 2007-08-13 20:17:45:

I need to achieve an easy to use "collaborative system" for small to mid size organization. We have many small teams and an overload of e-mails, many concurrent projects, and lack of communication.

sounds like an interesting project.. and very useful

Anderson Santos said @ 2007-08-13 20:17:45:

2- Make it easy to organize and granular (again, SW has done a great job, I am just trying to find a "dashboard" solution)

i'm still trying to get my head around what features would be needed for such a dashboard ;) when i'm having a bit more time i look deeper into it and reread your posts about it a few times :)

Anderson Santos said @ 2007-08-13 20:17:45:

3- Set permission by users for groups of pages, and not only snips

permissions are already inherited by sub snips .. so if you set permissions for \MyCompany/Marketing - they will also apply to \MyCompany/Marketing/\SomeProject (if.. it doesn't have permissions on it's own) - and of course.. they also apply for \MyCompany/Marketing/\SomeProject/\SomethingWeird .. etc.

The only problem with this is .. that permissions are not granular enough .. You can't tell that only 5 specific people (or a group of people) can modify a snip..
- The question is though ... if this couldn't be solved by creating separate 'Group's (and .. therefore.. separate wiki "namespaces") for each division - then you can say that all members of the group can edit snips .. - it probably depends if you need (any?) interaction between division - wiki snips ..

Anderson Santos said @ 2007-08-13 20:17:45:

4- Improve functionality with collaboration tools (like "rendered widgets" in an "include page:" fashion way - maybe middlewares?)

i guess what you mean are macros ? - ie. you want some "extension point" where you can hook into the wiki to render your own output using python code ?

have looked at the existing macros -> WikiDocumentation it shouldn't be hard to allow adding custom macros to the wiki ..

When we were using TWiki, I decided never use it again, lol. That's why I want something extensible but NEVER complex or confusing.

Herbert Poul said @ 2007-08-13 20:36:31:

sounds like an interesting project.. and very useful

I am reading a lot of "wikinomics" articles and I am still starting to define what will be useful for the companies I work for. But in every one, I feel a lack of one integrate collaborative tool.

Herbert Poul said @ 2007-08-13 20:36:31:

i'm still trying to get my head around what features would be needed for such a dashboard ;) when i'm having a bit more time i look deeper into it and reread your posts about it a few times :)

Don't worry, I am still learning what I mean by Dashboard without SocialText's meaning. Everyday it becomes easier and clearer then I thought =P

Herbert Poul said @ 2007-08-13 20:36:31:

permissions are already inherited by sub snips .. so if you set permissions for \MyCompany/Marketing - they will also apply to \MyCompany/Marketing/\SomeProject (if.. it doesn't have permissions on it's own) - and of course.. they also apply for \MyCompany/Marketing/\SomeProject/\SomethingWeird .. etc.

The only problem with this is .. that permissions are not granular enough ..

Good, so we just have to find a granular solution =D

Herbert Poul said @ 2007-08-13 20:36:31:

i guess what you mean are macros ? - ie. you want some "extension point" where you can hook into the wiki to render your own output using python code ?

Yes, it just wasn't clear enough for me how the 3rd party macro can be implemented, but if this work, I have my solution (or at least when the API is ready =P )


Cheers,

Anderson

i guess the same solution we're discussing board permissions could be useful for the wiki as well .. it's pretty much the same thing anyway ..

Anderson Santos said @ 2007-08-13 21:01:19:

Yes, it just wasn't clear enough for me how the 3rd party macro can be implemented, but if this work, I have my solution (or at least when the API is ready =P )

do you have examples on what you need ? macros have a few limitations right now..
e.g. they can only receive simple parameters and cannot have content .. - you can have {img url=xxxx} but not {code}xxxx{/code} or similar :)

and of course, everyone who can edit a wiki snip can edit/add/delete these macros from the body ..