permaculture

["Lawrence F. London, Jr." <lfl@intrex.net>]

webmaster@pfaf.org wrote:


> > > > From: webmaster@pfaf.org
> > > >
> > > >         http://82.138.219.137/mediawiki/index.php/Main_Page
> > > > a semantically marked up wiki with the pfaf and a few other datasets in.

> As Lawrence says its running on my machine at home which gets switched 
> off some of the time, and will not have been on for much of last week. 
> This week should have more connectivity.
>
> I'm currently looking for a different host running MySQL 4.1 and PHP 5.0.

What about ibiblio?

> A lot is going to depend on the level of coding you want to engage with 
> you could
> a. Write everything yourself using php/mysql.
>         +ve very configurable
>         -ve lots of development time needed, in depth knowledge required

Why not host the PA project (niels, Diana, others) on ibiblio using a).

> c. Use and modify mature programs like mediawiki
>         +ve easy to get up and running fast
>         -ve may limit methods of contribution/look and feel

And append c) to it for image uploads, galleries (PM Wiki will work for this 
also).
Also append a Blog to it for journal entries, Wiki for peer-reviewed content 
input.
Php BB is only one of many webforum packages available; not overly neat, 
feature-robust
or well organized but it does work OK for a community.
See this page in a Japanese Woodworking forum; it uses Php BB and is hosted 
by ibiblio.
http://www.ibiblio.org/japanwood/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=5&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=15&sid=73d53c5df9bf347fd27ee00d6670a55f
Image and text uploads are easy.

Gardeners, check out that fern-lined stone bridge at wood's edge :-)

I think it would be worthwhile for the PC community to come to some sort of consensus about putting something online 
they can call their own and make it happen asap, i.e. all of Rich's following comments, a) through h) and maybe more.
A central collection point for links, documents, ideas to be discussed and 
images should happen soon; time is flying;
its a lot of work for one person to keep his own links, info and image collection up to date soa group effort is needed 
and would fill the needs of many.

> Interaction
> -----------
>
> Its worth thinking about how people want to contribute
>
> a) Adding comments.
> 	This is what I've used on the pfaf site. Basically people can add a 
> short comment to any page on the site. I've found this to be very 
> successful and we are getting about 10 contributions a day. Its the 
> simplest way for people to interact and does not have any learning 
> curve. It may be necessary to moderate comments to prevent spam.
>
> b) Adding images.
> 	This should not be too difficult to implement. Basically all you need 
> to do is handle a file upload, save the image in a file and use a table 
> to store the file location and meta data. Some checking of images may be 
> necessary.
>
> c) Adding other documents. (PD F's, word docs)
> 	Much like images. May work well for PC designers who are likely to be 
> producing documents in other formats.
>
> d) Adding links.
> 	I guess this would be popular: I'm always getting email requests for 
> links to be added. Works much like a comment although you need to check 
> for valid URL's and spam prevention measures.
> I've a quasi released link submission system at
>         http://www.pfaf.org/links/addlink.php
> which has some form of tagging. I'm hoping to build a distruted links 
> system whenever I get the time.
>
> e) Discussion forum.
> 	Actually integrating a discussion forum into the association website, 
> rather than as an external site would be a good step. The most popular 
> system is PHP-BB which I personally dislike. I don't like to look and 
> feel, all the silly emoticons, the administrative interface and the way 
> email notification works.
>
> f) tagging
> 	In some ways this is very simple to do. All that is needed is a table 
> to hold the tags and the objects they relate to in. I'm not a big fan of 
> delicious and flicker, they seem to me to be rather closed systems. By 
> that I mean there is a community of taggers working in the same 
> environment, to get the most out of it you need to become part of that 
> comunity. For permaculture we all ready have a community and I feel 
> overall we should work towards strengthening that community and not 
> create a separated sub community. Hence more distributed systems feal 
> more appropriate to me.
>
> g) blogs
> 	Content is king and I'd love to see some permaculture blogs. There is 
> plenty of scope for a space for opinion pieces and regular new content 
> could help gain repeated visitors and get some debates going. It would 
> be great to see something like a "permaculture site of the week" similar 
> to Scott's Botanical Links of the day
>           http://www.ou.edu/cas/botany-micro/bot-linx/
> A bit of work to find people willing to write some quasi-regular pieces, 
> install and configure the latest software and your away.
>
> h) Wiki's.
> 	A very big conceptual jump to the rest. To make a wiki work you need at 
> least 5 active contributers. There is a small learning curve for use the 
> system, both technologically and sociologically which way deter some 
> participants. There are only a handful of permaculturalists who have a 
> fair understanding of the wiki concept, although this could grow.