WikiFest
- 2009 Presentations
- WikiFest 2008 Presentations

WikiFest

WikiFest is a conference session devoted to helping you start and grow a successful wiki in your organization. Proposals should showcase a wiki adoption strategy or example, with emphasis on how others can apply your strategy to their own wiki.

Topics to be covered:

Tools - Choose the right wiki software for your needs
Adoption - How to run a pilot, establish a core group of users, and grow usage.
Uses - How does your team use a wiki? How has it helped your productivity?
Obstacles - What are they, and how can you avoid or fix them?

2009 Presentations

To Serve, To Strive and Not to Yield, an Outward Bound Wiki Adventure

Noelle Thurlow - Outward Bound International

This interactive presentation will tell the story of the Outward Bound (OB) International journey towards open sharing and collaboration via Mediawiki. There will be a focus on strategies, including Outward Bound techniques, utilized to promote wiki adoption and sustained use by 40 separately operating Outward Bound non-profit “schools” located in remote regions of the world. Benefits identified from Wiki use for individual users and OB Schools, as well as the larger global organization will be highlighted.

Using a Wiki for Document Control 

Francisco (Pancho) Castano, PE - CEO of Geometrica, Inc. 
Gerardo (Gerry) Mendez - Quality Manager, Geometrica, Inc. 
Linda Day - Principal, Day Creative 

Change happens and successful organizations embrace it as a spark for improvement. Yesterday’s “way we do things” may be ineffective today, or perhaps even damaging. Work methods must be quickly adapted to condition shifts and knowledge gains. A key component of embracing change is document control, which lies at the heart of any business management system.

ISO 9001:2008 requires document control: reviewing, updating and approving documents prior to use; ensuring that relevant versions are available at points of use; identifying necessary updates and making changes; and preventing the use of obsolete documents. Easier said than done — and paper-based systems and typical office software can make it almost impossible: Nearly everyone ends up with obsolete or defective documents stashed in desks, files and email in-boxes. Custom or packaged document-control software is expensive and may not be flexible enough to suit an organization’s needs. In short, controlling documents is a recurring challenge.

Geometrica recently implemented a quality management system using a wiki, and it found that the wiki makes document control straightforward, even enjoyable. This paper describes how Geometrica has used its wiki for document control.

Round Tripping – The Holy Grail of Documentation Wikis – Myth or Promise?

Alan Porter - 4Js Group LLC (US)

More and more companies are using the wiki platform to publish their product and design documentation online. One of the main attractions of taking this approach is the hope that the documentation users will both comment on, and contribute to, the documentation set. In other words that the companies will move from developing documentation based on theory to documentation based on the collective experience of the community. But how do you manage that user generated content? Many are looking towards a solution that will automate the integration of feedback into their source content. This presentation will look at if that goal is feasible, manageable, or even desirable.

Alan Porter has 20 plus years experience in corporate communications, marketing, and content development in both the UK and the USA. Alan is a catalyst for change with a strong track record in developing new ideas, embracing emerging technologies, and introducing operational improvements. He has been involved in the development and adoption of various industry standards, and is a regular speaker at industry conferences, blogger and Twitter addict, who is happy to talk communications to anyone who will listen. He is also a published author with several books, comics and numerous magazine articles to his name. His latest book “WIKI: Grow Your Own for Fun and Profit” will be published by XML Press in 2010.