Wiki Terminology - A Brief Guide

Here are some terms that we use when discussing what we do on this web site using a wiki. Some phrases are unique to Binghamton University. We've selected terms which are easily confused with others, and which may be important for our particular site.

Acceptable Use Policy - The rules which govern good behavior on Binghamton University Networks. Found here

Advocacy - may be a tricky thing, especially when using State owned property or resources. Too much advocacy violates the Neutral Point of View (NPOV) part of the Wiki Way

Advocacy, Clear and Persistent - when a wikizen advocates some view point in a clear and persistent manner, such behavior may be grounds for banishment from the wiki (when this annoys too many wikizens)

Article - See Wiki Article

Author - a wikizen who writes or edits a wikipage. There is rarely just one author of a given wikipage or article. On a wiki authorship of a page can quickly become undetermined.

Banned or Blocked (User/IP) - the wikiczar may block some users from the wiki (keeping them from editting or creating new pages), as a last resort when their behavior violates wiki etiquette

Category - a group of wiki articles

Controversial - not necessarily a bad thing

Copyright - Important. Individuals are responsible for their behaviour here and should not upload or add copyrighted content to this wiki site.

Creative Commons - an organization that discusses copyright, GFD (Gnu Free Documentation licensing), public domain and other such related matters.

Customization - ways this wiki (the Wikizoo) has been set up or modified to meet our particular needs and expectations

Discussion (Tab) - every Wiki Article will have a Discussion or Talk page associated with it where the content of the page/article can be discussed

Draft - every wiki article is constantly a draft

Edit Tab (view) - what a wikizen will see, or what they should click to see and begin editting a wikipage

Editor - can be a person (see Wiki editor), or the page/view that is visable in a person's browser when they choose to edit or create a wiki article

Experimental - no backups

Mediawiki - the software (see http://www.mediawiki.org )

Neutral Point of View (NPOV) - lack of advocacy for a strong opinion, lack of ethusiasm about promoting a self-serving agenda or business

Official (Page/Article) - statement that reflect the opinion and have been sanctioned by heads of official entities at Binghamton University.

Open (wiki) - (as we speak of openess here) while not allowing anonymous edits, this wiki is quite open in that anyone who is allowed to use our public computing facilities, is also allowed to use this wiki fully, without restrictions.

Request for deletion - if a page on this site offends you, you may ask the Wikiczar to delete it.

Restricted - restricting the viewability of pages is discouraged though this functionality is being investigated.

Roadmap - during the development of software, folks will frequently refer to a roadmap, which is the planned course for development. This terminology is aptly applied to projects and elaborate articles on a wiki.

Sandbox - a page all wikizens are encouraged to experiment with (especially when they are new to wikis).

Special Page - a set of pages that cannot be editted that are useful references for navigating the wiki site.

Stub - an obviously and intentionally unfinshed wiki article

Talk page

Unofficial (Page/Article) - See the General Disclaimer. All wikipages are 'unofficial'.

User page - a page in the User namespace. User pages are not private, nor are they owned by the particular user (wikizen). Any wikizen can edit or read any User page, though editting a User page that is not your own may be viewed by the Wikiczar as inappropriate conduct.

User Talk page - This is also the Discussion part of a User's (wikizen's) User page. A wikizen will be alerted each time they log in whether they have new changes to their discussion page. It's expected that this an appropriate means of communicating with another wikizen. Communications here are also not private (as anyone in the world can read them). It is polite and best to include your user name and a time stamp whenever you edit another's User Talk page (though all recent changes are logged in the History of the Discussion page ... i.e. no anonymous edits ever occur).

Wanted Pages - Pages that have been named on an existing page (within double brackets) that haven't been written yet (See also Request for deletion, for unwanted pages)

Watchlist - a small set of wikipages that you'd like to keep track of

Wiki Article - a wiki page that's intended to be public

Wiki Sockpuppet - someone using an id to hide their actual identity

Wikiczar - not a web master, or tech guru, somebody who thinks he's in control of the wikizoo

Wikieditor - everyone at BU can be an editor of wiki pages, there's no one Chief Editor

Wikilink - the easy way to type the address of a wiki page using s in a wiki page

Wikimedia - the set of successful project that have been promoted by the Wikia Organization

Wikipage - any page apprearing on the wikisite (private or public)

Wikipedia - one of the wikimedia projects

Wikisyntax - a bit like html though wikizens think it's easier. what you see as the contents of the Edit Tab

Wikizen - the more polite way to refer to a user of the wiki.

Wikizoo - this wiki site

Wikizoo Group - a set of templates (see Template Page that have been created to promote faster adoption of the wiki site by faculty and staff.