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The distinction between "Products" and "Components" might be a useful one in organizing the pages. This might become more useful as semantic tools are added to the wiki.
The distinction between "Products" and "Components" might be a useful one in organizing the pages. This might become more useful as semantic tools are added to the wiki.
=== Elements, inputs, outputs ===


Lucas responded:  
Lucas responded:  

Revision as of 17:35, 19 November 2009

Appropedia is, among many other things, a wiki for permaculture. It is the one active wiki creating an expanding body of permaculture knowledge and related wisdom.

The most common perception of Appropedia is as an appropriate technology wiki, and this is true at least to the extent that it is about what is appropriate to the social, ecological and financial context. This also describes permaculture, and so it could just as easily be called a permaculture wiki.

Many permaculture wikis

Many efforts have been made to make a permaculture wiki - do an internet search for "permaculture wiki" and you'll see how true this is. However, making a successful wiki is hard, and most of these wikis are dormant, while a handful have a small amount of activity. This is unfortunate, as each site represents an island, a small isolated community and a fragmented knowledge base.

The only active wiki creating an expanding body of permaculture knowledge and related wisdom is Appropedia. Its broad focus, with extensive examples of appropriate technology and natural building, is consistent with the all-encompassing nature of permaculture.

See also Green wikis and development wikis - a more detailed comparison can be found there. Search the page (ctrl-F in most browsers) for permaculture and use the sortable table on that page to find the most active wikis, or the wikis with the most pages. Some great efforts have been made; however, isolation is a killer.

A call to collaboration

to be expanded

Ideas for structure

Site structure: page types and categories

An interesting perspective comes from the post below. It may not be too different from Appropedia's structure - we will see. The nature of a wiki is that it evolves, and while the structure takes work and forethought, can be changed over time.

Start a Wiki, where the front page is a Human, and we list all the things a Human needs and All it's byproducts. Those are all links, and we follow those to pages set up about those needs. A page like, say, heat, or food. A "product" page. On a Product page, we generally describe the product, and then list what things need that, and what other things provide that. Those links go to "Component" pages, which describes a part of a system, like a chicken or a compost toilet, and what it's inputs and outputs are. Those of course link out to more product pages....

The goal here would be to have a constantly expanding design tool. When designing a permaculture system, you could use this wiki to look up what various components of your system require, and choose from lists of things that provide those needs or use the byproducts.

Like any wiki, this needs a large base of knowledgeable users to get working. My instinct says to start with the Human page and work outward. Does this tool interest anybody? Would anyone be willing to help me on this project? - Andrew Jensen on GlobalSwadeshi.

Let's compare this with the current Topic structure of Appropedia - considering the Topics category to be the "Human":

The basic topics are very similar to those described, but the perspective of human needs does give some clarity for reordering and renaming - e.g. "Construction and materials" could become "Habitation" (better than "Shelter" as it's about more than a bare physical need). "Knowledge" may lie outside this framework as it is a means to meeting human needs more than a need in itself. These are arguable of course.

The distinction between "Products" and "Components" might be a useful one in organizing the pages. This might become more useful as semantic tools are added to the wiki.

Elements, inputs, outputs

Lucas responded:

The wiki you suggest, if I get it right, or at least that was my idea and why I like yours, would be centered around the elements used in designs: I already have chicken, what else could I add and how could they be part of the system in my backyard? [1]

Lonny responded:

I think that this would work great on Appropedia as a template. It could have some permaculture imagery and two columns: Input and Output that would be easily editable. In this way any page could have listed its needed inputs and delivered outputs.

To get a better idea see the new (temporary) permaculture box at Chicken basics. You can edit the list by clicking Input or Output. This could be made much prettier and more automated... just wanted to give an idea.

All that said an interface like the Visual Thesaurus, but editable and free, would be very, very cool.

...

I can add the "designs it's used in box", which will fit nicely across the bottom of the template. We can also semiautomate the adding of the templates to pages.[2][3]

Check that test box at Chicken basics #External links.

There are some concrete ideas to work with. The key is to add knowledge to the wiki, and adapt these technical features as we go, to help make it work and fit together better.

As for the call to get started on this project: We have begun. Who will join us, and make it real?

See also

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