[TW5] Hopefully NOT for the next 25 years!

[Mat]

@Jeremy, here are some what I consider major difficulties for us / TW - but hopefully not so for the next 25 years. So, if(!) you have time, I'd love to hear your thoughts/opinions on how we might deal with them.

• Add-ons (plugins, tweaks, themes...) - difficult to find or (more likely) even know they exist
• No quality assurance of add-ons
• Lacking documentation
• The aggregated knowledge from discussions relies on 3d part system not optimized for us
  
• Little insight into what attracts new users
• Little insight of user needs, tw applications, behaviors etc
  
• Challenging to get tiddlyverse overview (resources, applications, options, services, people...)
  
• Demanding learning curve for customization
  
• Too few developers (I'm just assuming this is always an issue)
  

Thank you!!!

<:-)

[Danielo Rodríguez]

Wow, a post full of complaints. Even the title is discouraging : I hope the main TW5 pretension to not come true.

[Richard Smith]

 Hi Mat. I'm not a developer, but I am a daily user of TW. I really think it's amazing stuff and I think it's awesome that Jeremy has given it away for free to the world whilst devoting so much of his time to developing it. 

I'm sure you don't mean to sound harsh in pointing out it's flaws, but I think it's important to remember that the old version of TW still exists and the new one has only been out of beta for a short while and relies entirely on the good will of volunteers for its continued existence.

The things you point out are perhaps things that all open-source projects suffer from to some extent. At least TW is useful enough, to enough people, that we have a chance of solving some of them together over time. Here are some of my suggestions about how we might address these issues, when we find the time.

• Add-ons (plugins, tweaks, themes...) - difficult to find or (more likely) even know they exist

 There aren't many plugins at the moment, when there are more it will make sense to have places where they are listed and discussed. I think there is already a site hosted by one of the group members that plans to do something like this and also allow users to build an initial wiki by choosing plugins from a list.

• No quality assurance of add-ons

If any of the add-ons you download don't work, I will personally give you back your money ;)  

• Lacking documentation

We all need to help with this. I keep threatening to help, but documenting TW is really difficult. I find that I can only see what's wrong with the documentation when I can't find out how to do something. When I go looking to improve explanations of things I know how to do, I can't find anything wrong with what's there.

The biggest issue for me with trying to find information in tiddlywiki.com is that the search lacks context. I think it might be a good idea to take the docs out of the main website altogether so that people don't expect to be able to use it as such. Instead the website can function as a shop-window for what can be done with the software and the 'complicated wiring' can be hidden elsewhere.

Also - Eric Shulman is seeking support to write a manual - https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/inside-tiddlywiki-the-missing-manual . I'm going to donate as a Christmas present to myself and hope other people will too. 

• The aggregated knowledge from discussions relies on 3d part system not optimized for us

I agree that Google-groups is not very friendly or beautiful. What are some of the alternatives we could use. Let's brainstorm... 

• Little insight into what attracts new users

Do you mean for them or us? IMO anybody who goes looking for a personal wiki or micro-contnent management system will find TW. The fact that it can do so many things makes it difficult to explain just how awesome it is.

• Little insight of user needs, tw applications, behaviors etc
  

TW can be used in so many different ways that it's difficult to pin down. Who hasn't got insight? You? Jeremy? The users?

• Challenging to get tiddlyverse overview (resources, applications, options, services, people...)
  

• Demanding learning curve for customization
  

How does this learning curve compare to other software? How hard is it to customise the UI and back-end functionality of your second-favourite program? Can Word be turned into a web-server? Can Evernote become an interactive novel?

• Too few developers (I'm just assuming this is always an issue)

TiddlyWiki is very complicated. Presumably the overlap between people with sufficient skills, sufficient time and sufficient motivation to contribute to the core is quite small. By building the community over time, we will increase the potential pool of new developers. 

As I say, I'm sure you didn't mean to sound discouraging and only want to contribute to making TW better for everybody. Perhaps it would be a good idea to pick one area that you think we should focus on and suggest some practical steps we can take?

Regards,

Richard

[Mat]

No, wait, it is not at all meant as complaints. I love TW and think it is fantastic. I've used TW for longer than most in here, for sure. I am just pointing out areas where I think the community could benefit tremendously(!) if we put our minds together. I have thought for a long time about these things, some of them many years, and considered elaborating on each point in my post but decided not to because I hope to get Jeremys view. But, Danielo, please tell me if you think anything in my assessment is wrong. It could well be that I expressed it poorly so maybe I must clarify something.

Really, I think TW is fantastic. Not to mention Jeremy.

<:-/

[Mat]

Ok, the answers so far indicate I did a poor job at phrasing my question so let me start by saying this:

Please re-read my post and I think you will find it is actually not about TW itself (and definitely not about any individual!) My points are really about how we can attract more people to TW.

This is a "directors board question" and Jeremy is simply the chief in command. (And one excellent such!!!) This is why I aim my question to him specifically, but I posted it here because (1) I figured these questions are of general interest (2) these types of qustions ought to be discussed more and (3) because they are probably demanding questions and so if I am going to ask for Jeremys attention for them, it had better be for the common good.

While I have a lot of thoughts about each individual point in my 'list', I intentionally kept the points brief because I don't want to steer the conversation and risk missing out on something that Jeremy would otherwise bring up.

That said, I'll tell you that my own reasoning is a lot about easening the burden on the developers. I think there is a lot of potential among the non-developers here (I'm one such) but we don't really have the infrastructure(!) to take advantage of this. I have specific ideas about this but, as mentioned, I'd rather not talk about them right now.

Ok, hope this clarifies a little.


<:-)

[Mat]

@moderator - I'd appreciate it if the subject could be changed to "[TW5] How do we make TW rule the earth within 25 years?"


I got a comment about why a list? It's "all over the place"? How can that be constructive?

There are two primary reasons:

1. Listing many things at once should indicate what types of concerns I'm talking about, and hope to keep the thread about. I.e more "visionary" in nature. And by mentioning "25 years" I figured that eventual answers would also stay on this overview level.
2. ...and perhaps most importantly: Listing all at once makes it easy to compare them and put them against eachothers, - maybe people simply don't agree that some are "major". Discussing only one issue at a time can be myoptic and does not put the issue in the context I'm hoping for in this particular thread.
   

BTW, with "major concerns" (or whatever I called it) I mean areas that have great potential for making TW as good as possible and get maximum market penetration. Big words, I know. Personally, I believe the development rate of "Tiddlyverse" is proportional to the number of members in the community and so the most valuable thing a non-programmer (like myself) can do for TW is probably to get more people involved. In my mind, the list touches mostly on things from this perspective. That is my own underlying theme here.


Now, as mentioned, I have a lot of thoughts for the concerns raised, but maybe everyone is tired of my voice right now and nobody would read if I wrote longer. I'll be happy to elaborae with specifics if anyone asks me to.

Peace and love to everyone.


<:-)

[Danielo Rodríguez]

Hello Mat,

Maybe you did not pretend to offend, but a post full of problems and zero ways to solve them sounds like complaining. I can't avoid getting "offended" about some points:

 

• No quality assurance of add-ons

Since I programmed several plugins and widgets I would like to know which of them you consider to do not have enough "quality". It took me several months to figure how TW5 core works and how to program using it. It's a big amount of work and I still not knowing everything.

• Lacking documentation

I have to agree with you. I used to complain about this. After several complaints more I started to write more documentation. 

• The aggregated knowledge from discussions relies on 3d part system not optimized for us
  

I have to agree with you here. Google groups lacks some important features like editing post. This is useful to make FAQs and list of resources. 

• Little insight into what attracts new users
• Little insight of user needs, tw applications, behaviors etc
  

If you have ideas about this please share with us. 

• Challenging to get tiddlyverse overview (resources, applications, options, services, people...)
  

I agree. We still need a repository of resources. 

• Demanding learning curve for customization
  

 Everything needs a learning curve for customization advanced use. If you wan use TW like notepad is quite easy. Do you know how many things you can do with excel for example? Pivot tables, conditional formatting, importing data from external sources, macros.... all of them needs a BIG learning curve.

• Too few developers (I'm just assuming this is always an issue)

I am one of them. Try to keep us happy :D 

[Jeremy Ruston]

My first reaction to Mat's list was frustration because I think we've discussed almost all of those issues at some length in past hangouts. I guess a lot of those discussions have never been written down in a way that allows other people to see and join in.

My second reaction is that I think that list reflects what you'd find with a lot of open source projects, and particularly ones with our balance of users vs. developers. So, there are other people who have trodden this path before, and we should try to learn from them.

Mat's way of putting things in his opening post was pretty brutal but he has a long history with TiddlyWiki (since May 2007 according to the group archive), and has made several tiptop suggestions that I've found very helpful. So I knew where he was coming from.

Perhaps the most practical use for this thread may be to discuss strategies for dealing with the concerns that Mat enumerated. I'd be happy to discuss things at the hangout on Tuesday too.

There are also some lessons to be learned: Google Groups is pretty terrible for us. As owner of the group I still don't have permission to edit posts; I can only delete them altogether. I'd be in favour of moving more of our project and dev discussions to GitHub Issues. The great advantage there is that we can edit the title and text at the top of the issue to reflect the ongoing discussion. Perhaps we should even consider closing the TiddlyWikiDev group and moving all future discussions to GitHub (I presume we can leave the group accessible in a read-only mode).

I've a couple of other specific proposals arising from this discussion, which I shall make the subject of separate posts.

Best wishes

Jeremy.

--

Jeremy Ruston
mailto:jeremy...@gmail.com

[Mat]

Thanks for your reply Danielo - and, Richard, thanks for your also.

• No quality assurance of add-ons

Since I programmed several plugins and widgets I would like to know which of them you consider to do not have enough "quality". [...]

I'm not saying a single one does not have enough quality. I'm just saying we don't have any quality assurance. At least not in any consistent day. That's just a fact. (Personally, I stand in awe when I look at the things you guys put together.)

Example why this is of importance: "Hm, is it really a good idea to install these things they call plugins just like that`? What about viruses? ...And which add-ons are for my needs anyway?" A regular non-coding user is pretty much in the dark here. He is forced go snoop around on the boards. ("Oh, my embarassing English... hm, I'll just skip it") You and I know it's worth the effort... but a newbie doesn't and at this early stage we risk losing him. Would you install an app on your cellphone that you don't trust? You know you can relax if you get things from, say, iOS App Store because they have strict quality controls. There is no way the app store would be as successful as it is otherwise (and not iPhone either for that matter).

I don't think we'll ever have the resources for anything comparable to the App Store quality control. But there are other ways: Imagine if we had, say, a "most popular plugins" list. Or if there was a place for reading and writing reviews. Maybe an optional sensor in installed(!) plugins stating "new update available". Maybe a "likes" rating system. Or an "inter-system" showing which addons are common together (i.e work well), or where people can write that "plugin A conflicts with theme B" and this is then visible in their respective download places. These would all contribute to a kind of social quality assurance.

Or, even a simple solution here on the boards; Individual threads dedicated to individual addons. Subject [Theme: Snowwhite] with a restricted kind of information.

Trying to bring this back to the more general perspective: I estimate an increasing need for ways to deal with add meta-data for add-ons, possibly directly connected with the physical tiddlers. This will probably be extra important for the node.js versions and if several people share tiddlers.

 

• Lacking documentation

I have to agree with you. I used to complain about this. After several complaints more I started to write more documentation.

We have Erics exciting "Inside TiddlyWiki" indiegogo project and we have ambitious individual efforts - most notably Jeremy on tw.com, but previously also from several individuals for TWC sharing wonderful but, unavoidably, with both lacking and overlapping information. The non tw.com efforts also suffer from the "dispersity problem" ie that users don't know where to look or even that it exists.

However, as is obvious from the boards, there is just no end to questions. There are some common/recurring issues - many I assume Eric is aiming at - but the overall picture is clear by now: A few individuals can't solve the documentation need satisfactorily. Other than guides at tw.com, the closest thing we have is perhaps tw.org (initiated by Tobias but where anyone who has a tiddlyspace account can edit)... but, again, it relies on individual effort.

I have ideas for a completely different take on this (actually discussed with Eric some time back) where you'd instead convert our board discussions into gradually refining documentation, in the form of a TW. Kind of a copy of the discussion threads but with a summary at top. And extremely easy to modify or add information to e.g "like" buttons or and adding predefined tags, to name two things that would affect search. Perhaps add a star on post to set it as the starting point for the summary. Or, next to a paragraph in a tiddler, click "add to summary" or "delete". Even one single of these actions would add value and documentation would  form in an almost organic way. Add to that system recognition of plugin names (eg to create pretty links), possibilty to create filters, possibility to drag-copy tiddlers into your private TW's...

Unfortunately, even if someone were to build this (I' have been informed that the basic concept is actually simple to build) - even if someone were to build it, the idea relies on that people actually find the place (the dispersity problem again). But if documentation is considered important enough then maybe a good solution would be hosted at some obvious-to-go-to place.

 

• The aggregated knowledge from discussions relies on 3d part system not optimized for us
  

I have to agree with you here. Google groups lacks some important features like editing post. This is useful to make FAQs and list of resources. 

For example the just mentioned documentation idea would solve this. We'd not have to deal with the poor archive search engine here (what company was that running this again?). And we wouldnt have to worry as much about Google Groups joining Google Wave, Buzz, .... We would still need a communication system if that happened tho.

I get sad when I think of all the fantastic answers provided here that are probably almost never looked at again. Sooo much knowledge and such generosity in helping.

 

• Little insight into what attracts new users
• Little insight of user needs, tw applications, behaviors etc
  

If you have ideas about this please share with us. 

Well, I think the only way to find out is by "measuring". For instance, I would gladly send in my plugin list to be used with other peoples plugin lists for analyzing patterns such as which plugins are often used together etc. Or, if a site hosted a collection of application themes; "notebooktheme", "gtdtheme", "booklibrarytheme", "multimediatheme" then we could get very clear indications.

IMO one of the most important (and tricky?) questions is not what attracts new users but what makes potential users dismiss TW. Maybe it is lack of information about what it can do? Maybe they think it to be too complicated? Maybe a developer says "Html, JS, CSS? Pfff! I don't want to make silly homepages!" Maybe a school teacher is thinking "Oh, what a pity it doesn't have more colors?" We just don't know. And we don't know how many we loose. (Maybe none?)


 

• Challenging to get tiddlyverse overview (resources, applications, options, services, people...)
  

I agree. We still need a repository of resources. 

• Demanding learning curve for customization
  

 Everything needs a learning curve for customization advanced use. If you wan use TW like notepad is quite easy. Do you know how many things you can do with excel for example? Pivot tables, conditional formatting, importing data from external sources, macros.... all of them needs a BIG learning curve.

I'm saying it from a pragmatic point, to get more people into the community. The more demanding, the less people that accept it. If the learning curve is the bottle neck for whatever goals there are for TW then maybe it's worth putting focus on it. Besides, you can look on things from other perspectives; perhaps we could minimize the need for customization?
 

• Too few developers (I'm just assuming this is always an issue)

I am one of them. Try to keep us happy :D 

You are my heroes. Not only do I try to keep you happy but I am also searching for ways on how us non-developers can contribute. As mentioned, I think the most valuable thing non-developers can do is to bring others here.


In conclusion... for this post at least: I talk, and talk is cheap. But my intention was not really to discuss specific "solutions". It was more an attempt to find out what high-level areas are on the radar and the thoughts about them.


<:-)

[Mat]

Hangout Tuesday it is!
Richard and Danielo hope you can join also - as well as all other guys who probably wisely only peeked at me making a fool of myself; come Tuesday and bring popcorn as I make a fool of myself LIVE!

<:-)

[Richard Smith]

Hi Mat,

Thanks for coming back with humour and good grace. I've not been involved in the hangouts before now, fearing also to make a fool of myself live on air :) Perhaps now would be a good time to start (though the time difference to Australia probably means I'll need a lot of coffee to participate).

I hope that in the future, we non-developers will be able to find more practical ways to help Jeremy out and support the development of TiddlyWiki by addressing these and other issues.

The point you make about plugins being 'trustworthy' and that some people might consider installing one akin to installing a dubious phone-app is an interesting one. Perhaps one of the things that we can emphasise to people is a way of working with TiddlyWikis in general - ie; creating many backups and alternative versions, trying things out in a dummy wiki and then bringing them across to your production wiki, different procedures for automatically backing up tiddlers etc.

I don't pretend to understand half of what TW can do myself, but the things I can already do with it would be of use to many, many people and I share your excitement about getting the word out and building a strong community.

Regards,

Richard

[Alex Hough]

Dear All,

I this reminds me of a thread a while ago - I call it the NASA thread [1].One of the contributors to the thread is Neil Olonoff. I asked him a question - he was doing a phd in knowledge management at the time and had chosen TW to gather his knowledge - interesting context.

All groups have similar problems: how to share knowledge. Here in TiddlyLand we have a great tool in development acting as a beautiful muse for deep questions like this.

This is cut and pasted from my gmail, I can't find the web URL:

From a  knowledge management specialist angle, what can the TW community do to facilitate the flow of knowledge in such a way that diverts it from the "negative long-term effects by stymying deeper understanding and perpetuating reliance on a small group of established experts"? 

[...]

From a Knowledge Management (KM) perspective the TiddlyWiki group and its related groups TiddlyDev etc, constitute a quasi professional "community of practice" (COP). Professional COPs share a common vocabulary and shared "repertoires," or routinized activities. 

By participating in this group, the members participate in a creative space for communication. A Japanese KM theorist named Ikujiru Nonaka calls this a "ba", which is a concept that comes out of Japanese and Buddhist philosophy. It's something like "space," although English doesn't have an equivalent word. Dr. Dave Snowden uses a Welsh term -- Cynefin -- which has the added dimension of geographical space (sort of like "neighborhood")  

In order to enhance this space for communication it might be useful for the members to learn more about one another, in order to strengthen relationships and increase the "bandwidth" or richness of the communication. Learning about other people's day jobs and their interests definitely can help. This points to a qualitative change in the group's posts, that may not be of interest, however. But really, that's the essence of becoming a "knowledge community." 

All groups have a micro-culture. Others have observed that this is a generous and giving culture. Changing the communications might change the culture. The communication bandwidth has been narrow, focused on TW.  Widening the bandwidth carries both risks and opportunities, and only you can decide if it's something you might want to pursue. 

Part of the risk is this: Possibly what has kept this community so civil is the narrowness of its focus. It's hard to get personal when you're talking about plugins and uploads. But start talking about personal matters and the conversation can easily go in unexpected directions. This is what happens in so many other communities.

Alex

[1] https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/tiddlywiki/mXaXqvcbxFA%5B26-50-false%5D

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[Richard Smith]

Thanks Alex, That's really interesting.

Widening the bandwidth carries both risks and opportunities, and only you can decide if it's something you might want to pursue. 
Part of the risk is this: Possibly what has kept this community so civil is the narrowness of its focus. It's hard to get personal when you're talking about plugins and uploads.

TiddlyWiki is such an interesting tool because we each use it for personal projects and, I think, often things which are quite important to us.

It's also interesting that even though Jeremy built it, even he doesn't know everything it can do. It's like having a Swiss-army knife where someone finds a new tool every week that we didn't know we had.

In terms of easing adoption for new users, one possibility would be to consider a loose notion of tiered-learning. There are a number of basic concepts needed to use TW as a personal wiki and note-store. The next tier might be use of tags, lists, macros. The next tier might be templates and interface customisation.

Personally I have never really been into joining internet communities - I can find enough snarky, judgemental people in the real world if I ever want to - but I really like the TW community. It would be very interesting to know more about what people use it for.

I'm using it to write textbooks for high-school kids, how about you?

[jb]

"In terms of easing adoption for new users, one possibility would be to consider a loose notion of tiered-learning. There are a number of basic concepts needed to use TW as a personal wiki and note-store. The next tier might be use of tags, lists, macros. The next tier might be templates and interface customisation."

+1

[Alex Hough]

Dear Richard,

I think you are onto something here with tiered learning. Your observation about TiddlyWiki being used by people for personal and valuable information is a valuable one. There is a lot of emotion bound up in ones personal notes, and TiddlyWiki is the vehicle for connecting and grouping personal insights.

One of TiddlyWiki's many joys is the way it gently pulls  you into wanting to learn more about it. Thinking back to my first encounter I think it was editing a tiddler TiddlyWiki.com and making a link. It's the experience of using which got me hooked. Before long I wanted to change the colours - I then encountered the warmth of the community - some of which I now recognise as being part of many open source projects. It was my introduction to open source culture and looking back it has had a huge impact on the way I think about many things. Everything should be open source, everything should be run like TiddlyWiki: my car, house, kids school, local governant..... 

Måns made an observation that tiddlng can be a therapeutic activity. I must not be the only one not totally focused on producing a set of notes for a groundbreaking use case (thanks to TiddlyWiki I now use words like ’use case') -- the activity of tending to my TiddlyWiki is to enter a mental zone where problems can be solved, people are diverse, interesting and polite. 

The diversity is especially interesting to me, and as an English person subject to a public discourse where anti-European sentiment is all pervasive, it's wonderful to find myself communicating with fellow Europeans. It's refreshing - so much of online culture and popular culture in general comes from the USA. TiddlyWiki culture has a certain feal about it. And it it TiddlyWiki worked 'too well' - nobody would have any problems and the side effect of an emerging  culture would simply not occur.

Back to tiered leaning... TiddlyWiki.com could host many TiddlyWikis, the one which new people see could be minimal. The user could simply edit a tiddler the download it. The simplicity of a new fresh TiddlyWiki on one URL - minimal beauty there to see and experience. A 'blank sheet of paper' ready for ideas --- so enticing a premise. (In the past if I had a new idea I'd go through the ritual of buying a new notebook, a new pen or something - now I get a new TiddlyWiki)

After editing, and downloading, and getting comfortable with tagging, I think the next step is using a tag to change the appearance, using the style sheet tag. I though Stephan did something rather cool in an answer to a question. Rather than giving the answer he gave an example and encouragement to use it on TiddlyWiki.com. I thought that this was a breakthough - it reinforces the idea that once in the browser TiddlyWiki is yours and yours only - there is no server connection!

And 'THERE IS NO SERVER CONNECTION' is quite a big thing to deal with... I think it takes a while for the penny to drop. It opend up a huge number of possibilities - being told that TiddlyWiki can be emailed, stored on a data peg or put in a drop box all follow on from this astounding fact. I'd emphasise that this is really a big thing for people I am introducing to tiddlywiki to understand. Even technical people don't see the benefits - rather they thing because its got no server then it's a toy for those dabbling in development.

The latest step for me has been towards GitHub. I can see how beneficial it is. Again this is a big step, and it along wth TiddlyWiki offers more insight into coding culture - a culture which non coders can derive benefits. For example, academics are now using GitHub for colaboration on papers. GitHUb has jumped the gap. Having a TiddlyWiki with all the documentation available from GitHub could be something to concider. This would introduce the idea that documentation is part of the TiddlyWiki experience. If you want to delve deeper into TiddlyWiki the notion of co-creating knowledge and documenting it is part of being part of the community -- if you want. It's also an entry into 'how knowlege should be created' in more general terms. A learning practitioner should be engaged in reflective practice and sharing knowledge in a community - this is what academic publishing is all about, or should be about: it's lack or open source ethos is only just beginning to be adressed - most knowledge is behind the so called academic firewall.

Einought for now--'real life' calls...

Alex

[Nathan Smith]

Jeremy,

Have you considered moving the TiddlyWiki community to Reddit? I'm not a fan of Google Groups either. Reddit is a vibrant community and an efficient communication platform, one that I think newer / non-techie users would naturally gravitate towards.

I think there's a far argument to be made for moving the mainline TiddlyWiki community to a subreddit (e.g. /r/TiddlyWiki) where active discussion, links to resources, etc. can be posted and moving the dev community entirely to GitHub where the more technical discussions could take place.

I would love to see TiddlyWiki get more exposure and I think a Reddit based community could help achieve this.

Just a suggestion.

- Nathan

[Tobias Beer]

Hi Nathan,

Perhaps not the best choice to post this in this already long thread with the problematic title,

actually opening up an entirely new topic.

Perhaps, create a new thread instead?

I would concur that reddit provides a lot more features than google groups...

On the other hand, the ui is a wee clunky in that it shows to many things

you don't want to see when dealing with all things TiddlyWiki. 

Also, google groups makes it easy to do formatting and embed images or attach files.

That's a very helpful feature where google groups has its strong suit... and reddit falls short.

Best wishes, Tobias.