InformationWeek

February 21, 2000

Developments:
The Online Watercooler
Got a Wiki? It's an informal set of linked Web pages that can become a forum for the spontaneous exchange of ideas.

By John Tibbetts and Barbara Bernstein

John Tibbetts and Barbara Bernstein ou've got your code archive, your design reviews, your internal Web site, and for sure you've got a torrent of E-mail. But do you have a Wiki?

A Wiki (from "wiki-wiki," Hawaiian for "quick") is an informal set of linked Web pages with completely open access. Visitors can hit the edit button and add to, change, comment on, or even delete any of the content. Best of all, Wiki enthusiasts say, users can insert a link at any point and create a new page to spin off a thread of their own.

Wikis tend to be organic, anarchic, and a good gauge of where people's interests lie. Pages with provocative or useful content attract a nourishing influx of new thoughts; unappealing pages wither.

Wikis are the brainchild of the indefatigably creative Ward Cunningham, one of the gurus of the Patterns movement, which identifies recurring software tasks and provides reusable approaches. The Wiki concept reflects Cunningham's interest in finding ways to capture and reapply accumulated wisdom.

The genesis of this idea lies in Apple Computer's popular HyperCard technology, built around the metaphor of index-card-sized chunks of information linked in various ways to chart diverse trains of thought. Cunningham worked through the 1980s on "stacking" these cards in ways that were increasingly free-form and collaborative; Wikis extend that notion to the Web. "It's the Internet equivalent of chatting around the watercooler," says Cunningham, whose current thoughts on Wikis are on view at c2.com.

The insight that teams need tools for working collaboratively and sharing ideas has been successfully commercialized by Lotus Notes and other groupware products. But while Notes is slick, strait-laced, and controlled, Wikis are free-form and unruly. A Wiki makes its own shape and sets its own rules as it evolves. How can you have a truly spontaneous exchange of ideas, Wiki proponents ask, if structures and connections have been set up ahead of time?

We work with a development team that has begun experimenting with this tool, using an implementation called DevWiki, written by Rus Heywood (www.devtools.org). Heywood says "Wiki is the ultimate solution in communal, asynchronous communication" and can play a key role in distributed development projects. It fills a gap, he says, between E-mails, which get quick attention but then disappear into the recesses of the in-box, and internal Web sites, which display information that has reached a stable point but do not support ongoing discussion.

Not every company will find this electronic whiteboard suitable; Cunningham says only about half of all Wikis jell. But if your team is large, compartmentalized, or geographically dispersed, and if you have voluble developers, Wiki may be a good way to share discoveries and work together on establishing best practices.

Here are some possible uses:

As a common knowledge store. Use Wikis to collect facts, links, tips, instructions, and recommendations. For example, a programmer who has discovered a great workaround can post it on the Wiki instead of sending an E-mail; not only does the information stay accessible, but it collects accretions and turns into a topical mini "site."

As an incubator for new ideas. If a Wiki has developed the right spirit, people will feel free to air half-formed notions and see if anybody picks up on them. When an embryonic idea hits home, the page lengthens rapidly.

For editorial review. Newly drafted technical documents can spend a brief "comments period" on a Wiki to give all interested parties a chance to point out what's incorrect, what's unclear, and what's been left out. Here, as with other evolving assets, someone will have to evaluate the comments, create a definitive version, and move the whole thing to the next stage of permanence--Web site, print, online help file, etc.

Perhaps the most interesting aspect of a self-shaping vehicle like the Wiki is that it provides a living mirror of your company. A smart team can use the Wiki as an analytic tool and as a bulletin board. A well-used Wiki that has achieved critical mass will elicit new ideas, identify dead ends, reveal what topics attract people's energies, and help build consensus or at least uncover disagreements. What's more, your team doesn't just fill in the message, it creates the messenger.

John Tibbetts and Barbara Bernstein are partners in Kinexis, a San Francisco consulting firm.

You can visit their Web site at www.kinexis.com.

Back to the Columnist page
Send Us Your Feedback
Top of the Page