Wikis

A wiki is a type of website that allows users to easily add, remove, or otherwise edit and change some available content, sometimes without the need for registration. This ease of interaction and operation makes a wiki an effective tool for collaborative authoring. A wiki (originally called Quickweb) is an editable website that does not require users to know HTML. Most have a system to record changes so that at any time, a page can be reverted to any of its previous states.

Source: http://www.wikipedia.org

The Faculty of Business and Economics Intranet currently incorporates a wiki application known as Twiki. This can be used by Faculty staff for documentation, meeting minutes and agendas and other collaborative work. The URL is http://intranet.buseco.monash.edu.au/twiki/. Registration for access or your own wiki space can be arranged via the Faculty's Technology Services Group. It would be worthwhile to login and have a look ways other Faculty staff are utilising the system.

There are many choices when it comes to wikis, but WikiSpaces is one of these free services. They allow anyone to create a new account for free and start editing in minutes. Open www.wikispaces.com in your web browser and fill in the “Join Now” section to create an account. Your new account will let you edit other wikis (where you have permission) and, if you complete part 4, have your own wiki space.

If you chose a space name then you will be able to access your new wiki from anywhere on the internet by entering http://yourspacename.wikispaces.com. Your home page will initially look something like the following:

Wherever you see the button  this means that you have permission to edit the page content. Press this button and use the text editor to create your own message.

Pressing the “save” button will take you out of edit and return you to the normal view.

Wikis are not restricted to one page, they can utilise many pages linked together with hyperlinks. Press the “New Page” button and enter a name for the page.

To create a hyperlink, select the text you want as the link and press the hyperlink icon: . The “Add Link” window will give you the link options in a standard Microsoft dialogue. If you are linking to an internal wiki page, select the page from the dropdown box, otherwise enter a URL for an external link.

Save the message to return to the normal view.

Wikispaces.com also has some great video tutorials showing how to use some more advanced features of your wiki.