• Updated 2023-07-12: Hello, Guest! Welcome back, and be sure to check out this follow-up post about our outage a week or so ago.

Announcing... The 68kMLA Wiki!

~tl

68kMLA Admin Emeritus
Well this has been a "pet project" of mine for a while now. I've started getting a general layout in place, but it's still far from there. I haven't had much time or inspiration to work on it lately, so I've decided to just go ahead and announce it!

First a little background. There has been talk for some time about starting 68kMLA "information repository". Basically collect as much information, specs, tidbits, drivers etc as possible in one place -- make it the ultimate reference for everything 68k. The server crash got me thinking that this would be a really good idea. Also there is the fact that many websites dealing with old mac stuff may disappear at any moment. A Wiki seems like the perfect way to do this . It would also serve the reference purpose well -- while threads on the forums have some really useful information in them, it's a pain having to wade through all the crap to find it.

To get this off the ground we need some people willing to help set up a structure of the Wiki. I've done some very basic things to start with, but it needs a lot more work. I think it's important to get a basic structure in place before we start adding in any data -- otherwise the whole thing is going to be a mess. I also thing we should keep it as technical as possible. Unlike the (shortlived) MLAgazine Wiki, this isn't going to be a place for stories about how you found a certain Mac, etc. If you really want to include that, do it on your individual talk page. I also propose that we use the Community Portal as a notepad/to-do list so that anyone stumbling across the site can see what needs to be done. I've also created this forum for planning/discussion etc. Aside from that, it's up to you how this goes!

So go on... do your worst! Let's share the knowledge! [:eek:)] ]'>

http://68kmla.org/wiki/

 

funkytoad

Well-known member
Well, this sounds great.

I'll do whatever I can to help.

It's summer, I've got all day everyday.

 

Bunsen

Admin-Witchfinder-General
My dream page would be a table of all models, with all specs. And you can click on each table heading to sort the table by that spec ie by CPU, by RAM type, by expansion slots, etc.

I know (from Wikipedia) that wikis can do tables, but can anyone tell me if the above is possible?

 

~tl

68kMLA Admin Emeritus
My dream page would be a table of all models, with all specs. And you can click on each table heading to sort the table by that spec ie by CPU, by RAM type, by expansion slots, etc.
I know (from Wikipedia) that wikis can do tables, but can anyone tell me if the above is possible?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help:Sorting

I believe it is possible [:)] ]'>

 

ChristTrekker

Well-known member
COOL!

Now, a couple thoughts:

*Any firm policies on what can/can't/should/shouldn't be included?

*Isn't prefacing model articles with "Macintosh" a bit superfluous? It's of no aid at all to sorting, and it's not like Apple has had so many product lines that anyone with even a casual familiarity can't tell them apart.

*I'll start working on some templates when I feel ambitious again. I'm still a little deflated from the loss of the MLAgazine wiki.

*Do we have support for parser functions? All the cool template stuff requires parser functions.

 

~tl

68kMLA Admin Emeritus
*Any firm policies on what can/can't/should/shouldn't be included?
That's really open for discussion. However, as I said in the first post I think we should keep it strictly technical. Peoples stories about their own Macs for either their own talk pages (and subpages thereof) or the forums. MLAgazine was headed in the direction of being just a bunch of stories collated. I'd like this to be written in a unified way.

Also, I guess we should ask website owner's permission before copying anything (pictures, etc) -- unless it's released under the FDL or similar. That applies to copying from Wikipedia as well. Although the text is FDL, a lot of the pictures aren't -- so it's worth checking before we go a stealing!

Aside from that, I can't think of anything (on topic) that shouldn't be allowed.

As for what should be included... I'd like to see full specs on each machine, specs of as many upgrade cards as possible, overclocking information and things along those lines. I'd also like to see if we could start building a driver database -- though I'll have to look at upgrading the hosting if we're going to be doing that, so that's a secondary priority at the moment.

*Isn't prefacing model articles with "Macintosh" a bit superfluous? It's of no aid at all to sorting, and it's not like Apple has had so many product lines that anyone with even a casual familiarity can't tell them apart.
Possibly, but it seems like the correct way to do it. I debated with myself over this one quite a bit to be honest. In the end I decided it would be best to have the actual articles at "Macintosh Model" and then have the simpler "Model" pages redirecting to them.

*I'll start working on some templates when I feel ambitious again. I'm still a little deflated from the loss of the MLAgazine wiki.
Cheers, yeah MLAgazine was a bit of a loss! Although it was only just getting started, a few people had put a lot of effort into it.

*Do we have support for parser functions? All the cool template stuff requires parser functions.
Um, to be honest, I don't know! How could I tell? If we don't then I'm sure they can be enabled. [:eek:)] ]'>

 

MacMan

Well-known member
I made a page for the Centris 650 :)
Good start. I'd be happy to write some of the Mac descriptions but it'll need to wait until I have some free time (ie. no time soon). I can also take some photos of Macs that I own for the specs pages so that we have something different to Apple's standard ones. I am a strong believer in the "A picture tells a thousand words" philosophy and I think we should try and include an original picture of every model.

 

ChristTrekker

Well-known member
That's really open for discussion. However, as I said in the first post I think we should keep it strictly technical. Peoples stories about their own Macs for either their own talk pages (and subpages thereof) or the forums. MLAgazine was headed in the direction of being just a bunch of stories collated. I'd like this to be written in a unified way.
Yeah... While I liked the stories, I myself was hoping for more of a tech resource site. (So 68kMLA wiki is right up my alley!) While there are several good ones out there, none so far are open to contributions from the public.

Possibly, but it seems like the correct way to do it. I debated with myself over this one quite a bit to be honest. In the end I decided it would be best to have the actual articles at "Macintosh Model" and then have the simpler "Model" pages redirecting to them.
Still seems like extra work to me, but I'll follow whatever consensus there is.

Cheers, yeah MLAgazine was a bit of a loss! Although it was only just getting started, a few people had put a lot of effort into it.
I know...I was one. :(

Um, to be honest, I don't know! How could I tell? If we don't then I'm sure they can be enabled. [:eek:)] ]'>
I have no idea; I've never been admin for a wiki before. From what I've read at the Traxus Project, I'm pretty sure it's an add-in module for Mediawiki. Evidently MW is extensible that way. IMO, includeonly/noinclude blocks and ParserFunctions are the two most valuable add-ons we use, to start with. Creating useful (i.e. anything beyond simple boilerplate text) templates is hobbled without them.

 

~tl

68kMLA Admin Emeritus
Suddenly I remembered LEM.info...
Yeah... just noticed that after I posted this. Great minds and all that! [:I] ]'>

They do seem to be potentially covering the same territory, however the LEM.info Wiki seems to be more concerned with keeping a directory of links to other Mac sites, while ours will (hopefully) be more an archive of the information itself. So I guess they could coexist.

 

Bunsen

Admin-Witchfinder-General
In case my description was a little vague, I'm imagining a page much like http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_operating_systems.

IE: model name column down the left, then columns for CPU, Bus speed, slot type, RAM type/min/max etc.

And not to take over the purpose of every single page on the wiki, with detailed info on each model. More as a handy page where folks can say, "OK, I have a Comm Slot II modem, what machines does it go in?" Sort by slot type.

 
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