All, I wanted to tell you briefly about something I've been working on--maybe too briefly to be clear, but this is just a "heads up."
In the same way that we collect "metadata" about articles, I think we should start collecting "metadata" about ourselves. I'd like to start a new template that displays certain standard information about a Citizen, especially about what we have been doing and what our plans are. Designed the right way, we can tap into this information in all sorts of great ways. We can put it on our user pages, of course, but we can also put it on workgroup pages--so, for example, people could have *automatically* displayed what their plans are for advancing the mission of the Chemistry Workgroup (for example), and so forth. This will be just a little complicated, but I think it could pay off in big dividends. Mainly what I'm excited about is that it's a way that we can see, all in one page (or a few pages), everything that everyone has been doing, or intends to do. This would be hugely useful to me as a project organizer--it would be "the project's dashboard," compiled automatically from data that each Citizen inputs about him- or herself. I think this would also help tremendously in ramping up workgroups, which is really why I am pursuing this: we need to think of new ways to get people aware of what each other are doing, and get coordinating their efforts. We can also have similar "metadata" pages for workgroups and initiatives. Anyway, if anyone wants to help me (technically) design this system, please go here: http://tinyurl.com/2k8ch8 I don't really expect anyone to help, because it's kind of complicated and only Mediawiki template masochists will be interested--but you're very welcome anyway (Chris, Steve, Robert, and anyone else!). Once the system is up and running, we'll be in a better position to discuss whether to implement it widely. --Larry _______________________________________________ Citizendium-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.purdue.edu/mailman/listinfo/citizendium-l
