Wiki

A wiki (/ˈwɪki/ ⓘ WICK-ee) is a form of hypertext publication on the internet which is collaboratively edited and managed by its audience directly through a web browser.

A typical wiki contains multiple pages that can either be edited by the public or limited to use within an organization for maintaining its internal knowledge base.

[1] Wiki engines usually allow content to be written using a lightweight markup language and sometimes edited with the help of a rich-text editor.

In addition to hosting user-authored content, wikis allow those users to interact, hold discussions, and collaborate.

The syntax and features of wiki markup languages for denoting style and structure can vary greatly among implementations.

Some allow the use of HTMLTooltip Hypertext Markup Language and CSSTooltip Cascading Style Sheets,[12] while others prevent the use of these to foster uniformity in appearance.

This is usually implemented, using JavaScript, as an interface which translates formatting instructions chosen from a toolbar into the corresponding wiki markup or HTML.

This is generated and submitted to the server transparently, shielding users from the technical detail of markup editing and making it easier for them to change the content of pages.

This allows authors to revert a page to an older version to rectify a mistake, or counteract a malicious or inappropriate edit to its content.

Similar to the function of a log message in a revision control system, an edit summary is a short piece of text which summarizes and perhaps explains the change, for example "Corrected grammar" or "Fixed table formatting to not extend past page width".

[14] WikiNode networks act as webrings which may be navigated from one node to another to find a wiki which addresses a specific subject.

Beginning with the WikiWikiWeb in 1995, most wikis used camel case to name pages,[15] which is when words in a phrase are capitalized and the spaces between them removed.

"[18][19] Cunningham's system was inspired by his having used Apple's hypertext software HyperCard, which allowed users to create interlinked "stacks" of virtual cards.

[20] HyperCard, however, was single-user, and Cunningham was inspired to build upon the ideas of Vannevar Bush, the inventor of hypertext, by allowing users to "comment on and change one another's text.

[20] Wikipedia became the most famous wiki site[clarification needed], launched in January 2001 and entering the top ten most popular websites in 2007.

[26] Wikis are generally designed with a soft security philosophy in which it is easy to correct mistakes or harmful changes, rather than attempting to prevent them from happening in the first place.

[32] Critics of publicly editable wikis argue that they could be easily tampered with by malicious individuals, or even by well-meaning but unskilled users who introduce errors into the content.

[2][17] High editorial standards in medicine and health sciences articles, in which users typically use peer-reviewed journals or university textbooks as sources, have led to the idea of expert-moderated wikis.

In addition to using the approach of soft security for protecting themselves, larger wikis may employ sophisticated methods, such as bots that automatically identify and revert vandalism.

[3] Some wikis may be subject to external structures of governance which address the behavior of persons with access to the system, for example in academic contexts.

[41] In 2005, the Gartner Group, noting the increasing popularity of wikis, estimated that they would become mainstream collaboration tools in at least 50% of companies by 2009.

[43][44][unreliable source] Wikis have also been used in the academic community for sharing and dissemination of information across institutional and international boundaries.

[45] In those settings, they have been found useful for collaboration on grant writing, strategic planning, departmental documentation, and committee work.

Examples include the Central Intelligence Agency's Intellipedia, designed to share and collect intelligence assessments, DKosopedia, which was used by the American Civil Liberties Union to assist with review of documents about the internment of detainees in Guantánamo Bay;[47] and the wiki of the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, used to post court rules and allow practitioners to comment and ask questions.

Cornell Law School founded a wiki-based legal dictionary called Wex, whose growth has been hampered by restrictions on who can edit.

Such highly localized information might be appropriate for a wiki targeted at local viewers, and could include: A study of several hundred wikis in 2008 showed that a relatively high number of administrators for a given content size is likely to reduce growth;[53] access controls restricting editing to registered users tends to reduce growth; a lack of such access controls tends to fuel new user registration; and that a higher ratio of administrators to regular users has no significant effect on content or population growth.

[3] In the United States, wikis may benefit from Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which protects sites that engage in "Good Samaritan" policing of harmful material, with no requirement on the quality or quantity of such self-policing.

[55] It has also been argued that a wiki's enforcement of certain rules, such as anti-bias, verifiability, reliable sourcing, and no-original-research policies, could pose legal risks.

It remains to be seen whether wikis will be regarded as more akin to an internet service provider, which is generally not held liable due to its lack of control over publications' contents, than a publisher.