From FIRSTwiki

Contents 1 Undecided issues 2 Decided issues 2.1 Administrators 2.1.1 Number 2.1.2 Choosing 2.2 Motto 2.3 Dedicated Server 2.4 Domain 2.5 FLL Links on Main Page

Undecided issues

Decided issues

Administrators

Number

How many admins should we have? I don't think there should be a set proportion, rather, anyone who is qualified and showed good editing skills should be admin. --Max 15:55, 2 Jun 2004 (EDT)

I agree. And I trust (for the time being) that too many won't be selected. However, there should be a Webmaster who is the only one(s?) with ALL privleges, and in a disagreement is top. --Astronouth7303 16:11, 2 Jun 2004 (EDT)

Well, I would be this "webmaster" now, and my only privelege above other sysops is appointing sysops (Not including DB and code access :) ). I don't have any actual power above other sysops unless people give it to me by listening to me above others, which i don't think is a good idea. --Max 17:12, 3 Jun 2004 (EDT)

Choosing

How should administrators be picked? I can think of three basic systems:

• Requests then discussion by community
• Nominations then discussion by community
• Picking by current administrators

Note that I am the only one who can currently actually give someone administrator priveleges (deletion, editing protected pages, protecting/unprotecting), but I intend to follow the community's advice. --Max 15:55, 2 Jun 2004 (EDT)

Who should be allowed to vote/nominate? I think this is one of the few things that we should seriously consider restricting access rights. (Translation: Should only registered users be allowed to vote/nominate?) --Astronouth7303 16:14, 2 Jun 2004 (EDT)

This would be done like wikipedia votes for stuff. Underneath the proposition are three bullets, support, oppose, neutral and anyone can put comments underneath any of those bullets. It wouldn't be a real vote per se. Thats why i called it "discussion" not a vote. --Max 16:22, 2 Jun 2004 (EDT)

How about FIRSTwiki talk:Administrators? --Astronouth7303 16:16, 2 Jun 2004 (EDT)

Post nominations/aggrements on FIRSTwiki:Nominations for adminship. If the sysops feel like there is enough support, they will be sysop-ed.

Motto

The motto has been decided, by ChiefDelphi poll to be "We learn, we edit, we inspire: The FIRSTwiki

I modified the motto to be "Learn, edit, inspire: The FIRSTwiki" Its less wordy. --SilverStar 15:50, 7 Jun 2004 (EDT)

Dedicated Server

Brandon Martus has given us space on the CD server for FIRSTwiki use. FIRSTwiki will be moved there sometime this weekend. We will have support for nice URLs and for rendered math. --Max 21:36, 28 May 2004 (EDT)

Very cool. --SilverStar 21:41, 28 May 2004 (EDT)

What are we talking about with how much resources it takes to run this thing? --Astronouth7303 15:48, 28 May 2004 (EDT)

Not much at all. Probably a regular relatively modern desktop. 1.5Ghz+. 512mB ram would be nice so the entire site can be cached. In fact, I'm considering using a spare computer i have. The main problem is not the computer, its the connection. I can't eat up all my 256kbps up with this thing, i have other people in this house, including a business. I may be able to put it on my schools network, but they are a bit nuts about adding foreign stuff to the network.

Of course if anyone can offer a nice connection (at least 256kbps), we may be in business. --Max

Brandon Martus responded to http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/showthread.php?threadid=28767 --Astronouth7303

Seen it and responded same place. --Max 16:27, 28 May 2004 (EDT)

Domain

Okay, I'm registering it, speak now or forever hold your peace - Phrontist

www.firstwiki.org now redirects to wiki.chiefdelphi.com --Max 19:42, 29 May 2004 (EDT)

I've found my sponsor will pay the small cost of a domain. I'm ready to register at the drop of a hat! http://firstwiki.org sound good? - Phrontist

I think its a good idea, but Max'll have to approve that.--SilverStar 20:48, 28 May 2004 (EDT)

Sounds excellent, but is everyone ok with the domain firswiki.org? --Max

sure --Astronouth7303

I like the domain makes it easy to link to --Cyberwolf_22

FLL Links on Main Page

I notice there is a signigicant difference between how the team Links under FIRST and FLL work. In particular "FIRST Robotics Competition Teams" links to FIRST_Robotics_Team which makes sense and is easy for an editor to remember. On the other hand, FIRST LEGO League Teams links to Team_(FLL) which doesn't make sense and would not be easy for an editor to remember. I would fix it, but since I'm new to Wiki I'm concerned that I would break links by renaming a page. Any thoughts on this? If someone would help me I'd be happy to get the FLL sections going. --PeterFll 11:44, 13 May 2005 (EDT)

It is very easy to rename a page: simply click on the move link at the top of the page. This renames the page, and redirects any links pointing to the old page name to the new page name. Our previously agreed upon naming scheme for FLL (and now Vex) is to add "(FLL)" or "(Vex)" to the end of the page name if it is a page likely to appear concerning FIRST material (team pages, national championship page, and, as you can see, pages describing what a team is). This particular example appears to be a mistake on our part. I believe the correct naming for the FIRST team page should just be "Team" unless we want to break the format for overlapping pages and call each of these pages "FIRST Robotics Competition Team" "FIRST Lego League Team". What do you think? --Max [1257] 12:38, 13 May 2005 (EDT)

Max, what you suggest "Team" vs. "Team (FLL)" vs. "Team (Vex)" would work if FLL and Vex participation on this WIKI remains very low. I think it would be a big mistake to assume that though. There were over 6,000 FLL teams last season. Many teams have websites. The official FLL forum (closed for the season right now) would easily see dozens of posts a day in the fall. I think the only reason you're not seeing much FLL participation is I don't think FLL teams are aware of FIRSTWiki yet. Also, I'm a little concerned that pages with similar names may have very different meanings. For example, there really is no such thing as First Lego League National Championship (this year it was FLL World Festival and in prior years it was FLL Invitational). So I would be more likely to make a page called "First Lego League World Festival" rather than make a page "National Championship (FLL)" if you see what I mean. Even something as straightforward as a page on Gracious Professionalism might have a different description for FLL vs. FIRST teams. Some other examples:

• Regional Tournament (No such thing in FLL - we have State Tournaments, Qualifying tournaments, and Local Tournaments)
• Programming - Would really need a separate page for FLL - obviously very different (Robolab/RIS for FLL vs. C for FIRST)
• Motors/Pneumatics - Would be topics of great interest to FLL, but also very different from FIRST

The list would go on and on. The more I think about it the more I think you would need a very different "front page" for FLL vs. FIRST teams each with its own "Feature Articles", "What's Happening", and "Browse" sections. Don't want to open up too big a can of worms. I'll be happy to proceed with creating/editing FLL pages in the current structure if that will help the community to get a feel for how the FLL stuff would look. Let me know what you think... --PeterFll 14:06, 13 May 2005 (EDT)

I know what you mean. Just the shear number of team and the associated support pages is stagering. That's why for the long term I suggested using subdomains with interwiki links (with local flag) instead of the current system. The problem is with that, you have to set up and maintain 3~4 different instances of MediaWiki, not to mention Apache configuration. --Astronouth7303 16:19, 13 May 2005 (EDT)

I would like to recharacterize this discussion. The more I'm looking around the site, the more concerned I am about the overall structure of the home page and some of the "top level" stuff. It is totally natural (and please don't take this as complaining) that there is a distinct bias towards FRC right now. Since all the editors have probably been FRC up till this point that would be hard to avoid. So the question becomes how ambitious do you want to be. If you truly want this to be a FIRST wiki rather than an FRC wiki then this is something best dealt with sooner than later. I have an example that may help clarify the issue. Please take a look at the FIRST page. The first sentence is about FIRST. The rest is almost totally about FRC. Shouldn't this page be a description of the overall mission of FIRST. It should then say something like "FIRST currently sponsors and run three premier competitions..." with links to FRC, FLL, and VEX (and eventually perhaps Junior FLL as well). This is one example, but the home page certainly has a similar bias in the overall organization of the page. Not sure I think using subdomains as user Astronouth mentioned is needed. I mean if Wikipedia can be run without creating a lot of subdomains it hardly seems necessary for FIRSTwiki to. I'm thinking a relatively major "top level" reorg would really make this a FIRST wiki. Here is what I propose...

• The home page should be very generic to FIRST. Featured Article and What's Happening Now would be there, but only things that rise to the level of being of general interest to FIRST would go there. It would probably be a mix of FRC, FLL, VEX, etc. It would be up to the community as authors to decide what is either "specific but critical", or generic enough to go here.
• Just below these two sections there would be something like "Competitions" which would be just links to a page for each competition. This would link to a "home" page for each competition where each would also have its own Featured Article and What's Happening Now page. This would be where dedicated FRC, FLL, and VEX authors could edit and link to articles of particular interest to those communities.
• The top level home page could still have things like "Index to FRC Teams", "Index to FRC Regional Competitions", etc. However, more specific types of things like "Kit of Parts", "Programming", etc. would probably best be left to the competition home pages.

PeterFll 09:48, 16 May 2005 (EDT)

Peter, I agree with you on all points. The only thing I would like to mention is that this restructuring should only happen if it is actually accompanied with an influx of editors for Vex and FLL. It seems pointless to place these competitions more prominently on the front page and in the organization structure if they are just gonna be a bunch of red links or pages that no one reads. So, go ahead and edit as you will, just make sure that there is good content to get to from the front page.

Jamie, again, the subdomain thing does not make any sense to me at all. Why run seperate instances of the software? What do we do with the significant number of overlapping pages? Should we sync user databases and user pages? And, most importantly, what advantages does it give us (perhaps splitting up the special pages like Special: Recent changes, but they aren't exactly crowded yet)--Max [1257] 13:36, 16 May 2005 (EDT)

OK, I'll get some stuff up for FLL. Agree that it certainly doesn't make sense to do anything big to the home page unless there is a growing community on the FLL/Vex side. My plan is to put a bit of framework and some samples up for FLL, then get the word out to some of the more motivated teams (those who attended the World Festival just passed being the obvious example). --PeterFll 18:00, 16 May 2005 (EDT)