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Should Handheldmuseum move to being a wiki

 
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vcoleiro1
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Joined: 08 Jan 2012
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PostPosted: Wed Feb 01, 2012 12:46 am    Post subject: Should Handheldmuseum move to being a wiki Reply with quote

I was wondering what it would take to convert the handheld museum pages to a wiki which would work like wikipedia where everyone could add and update pages.

Rik, is this something you have considered?

I don't know whats involved with setting one up , but it would lend itself well to the handheldmuseum task of logging all electronic games and writing up details about them. Thats what a wiki is best at achieving.

Perhaps this has been discussed before, if so , forgive my noobness.
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kisember
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PostPosted: Wed Feb 01, 2012 2:18 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Although I'm not a HandheldMuseum staff, let me add my two cents as I have experience in this topic.

Wiki is easy to install and many people already familiar with using it. It is also easy to learn how to edit pages, so it should be a good idea to use it for this purpose. I guess it would grow rapidly.

Unfortunately it has some serious limitations. As it is a general purpose database it cannot handle game specific attributes properly. Lets see a very basic attribute: serial. Suppose if a game belongs to a serial, then each of the game should contains a reference to the page of the serial (where all of its members listed) or each other game of the serial. Now suppose that a new game of this serial appears, then both the page of the new game should contains a reference to the serial page and that page need to be also updated, or all of the other games need to be updated. Sooner or later it would became incostistent, and it yields a really annoying user experience.
Another weak point is searching. Would it possible to find all games released at 1981? Well, might be possible to search all pages that contains '1981' but it is definetly not such a list that collectors expect. What about refineing search criteria: games before 1982?

Wiki does not really a communty engine in such way as a forum. How could people add their opinion, memories and such about a game?

Let me share my experiences too. A few years ago I've read many comments here about how collectors eager to help Rik to update this database, unfortunately there was no way to edit the pages, but the only choiche is to share the info via the forum or email and wait until Rik has some spare time to update the site.
As I'm a web developer and a handheld game collector it was so inspiring to me that I've decided to create HandheldEmpire. It has all the features (and many more) collectors complaining about but guess what? When people got tools to achive their goal it became less urgent. Yep, a bit hars but I believe it is true. Obviously, it might went differently if we could achieve this under the HandheldMuseum domain, no doubt.
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vcoleiro1
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PostPosted: Wed Feb 01, 2012 9:49 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Yes, your last statement is exactly where I was coming from. There are pages I wanted to add to , update and even add new games (like the Commodoor Dolphins) . It occurred to me the best way was possibly a Wiki

I see from handheldempire what your doing there, suffice to say Ive found a new site to explore . Can anyone be an administrator on handheldempire?
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kisember
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PostPosted: Wed Feb 01, 2012 11:21 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

vcoleiro1 wrote:
Can anyone be an administrator on handheldempire?

Yes, it has a sophisticated right system. Anyone could be an administrator, just drop me a line with your login and I could set you up.
There were some fundamental concepcts from the beginning of the planning of the site:
1) Open: anyone could be an administrator. I don't have time to manage and update everything, why not collectors do it. As you mentioned, it works perfectly for wikipedia.
2) Free: it is not just free to join but all the data (except personal data obviously) is free including the game database (with its relations) and images. I didn't made it for myself, I just made a database that could be filled and ordered. If anyone could make a better one, than it might be a good startup database, be it a wiki or a sophisticated one. This is why I dare to mention HandheldEmpire here, it is not really a concurrent site.
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Rik
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Joined: 07 Oct 2005
Last Visit: 25 Mar 2024
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Location: California

PostPosted: Wed Feb 01, 2012 11:44 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

vcoleiro1 wrote:
Yes, your last statement is exactly where I was coming from. There are pages I wanted to add to , update and even add new games (like the Commodoor Dolphins) . It occurred to me the best way was possibly a Wiki


If you have information about a new game (something not on the museum site), post it here in the forum... That's the purpose of the 'missing games' section. The game entry will be located there in the forum until I add it to the main site.

I've never looked into making it Wiki style, and would probably never do that as I'd have to monitor every change people make to the site. There's already been situations on the actual Wikipedia where I've had to change things that people put there for personal gain... I only found those entries because the Museum was mentioned as a reference (though the information was 'modified' slightly in an attempt to increase the value of a game, and then when the person tried to sell it on eBay, they made reference to the Wiki article as proof of it's value). I'd have to make sure that wasn't happening here... I prefer to have people tell me about missing or incorrect things and then I make the changes... Although I know I haven't been doing enough of that lately... Rolling Eyes I'm actually currently trying to make the structure of the pages a little easier to modify and add to, then I'll be able to make much more frequent updates...

If you think this 'works perfectly for wikipedia', then you obviously haven't really looked into it... Wikipedia has entire legal teams in place to deal with untold amounts of issues that pop up from abuse on a daily basis. Everyone I've talked to that has tried a Wiki style has always given it up after a while due to abuse... I suppose you can limit the people that can make the changes, but for the most part I'd still want to know every single thing that has changed on my site. The site is my responsibility, and I have to keep that in check... Even if it means slower updates than even I would like to be making...

But I do make updates to the site, and more frequently than I post on the main page (but I do usually post the significant ones there). But if you never post about a missing game, then I'd certainly will not be able to add it...
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blanka
Atari Cosmos


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PostPosted: Thu Feb 02, 2012 1:18 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

@ kisember:
What do you mean with serial? Not the number on the bottom do you? Is it more about series of games that belong together?
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vcoleiro1
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PostPosted: Thu Feb 02, 2012 2:25 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Sorry if I have upset anyone, I sincerely didn't mean to that. It was just something that popped in my head as something that might work and I was wondering what people thought about it. You could say I'm a bit of an idea's person - lol.

I know I can post changes, additions etc to the forums, but I thought that would just bog you down Rik. Especially when I'm sure others are doing the same. What I thought might work with a Wiki - if it can be done - Is that people could make additions , changes etc that don't go live until an administrator(s) reviews and approves them. I think a wiki can be setup to work this way and it would make it a lot simpler for you as well as getting people more actively involved in the DB listings. If you want total control, you would just setup yourself as the sole admin - or you could add a select few you have total faith in.

Anyway, it's just a thought. I think the Handheldmuseum is fantastic and that you have done a great job with it. Just would be great if there were a setup where people could help you out as effectively as possible
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Rik
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PostPosted: Thu Feb 02, 2012 2:57 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

blanka wrote:
@ kisember:
What do you mean with serial? Not the number on the bottom do you? Is it more about series of games that belong together?


He means like a series of games, but based on what the game physically looks like... Like all of the Tiger Flip-open games are a series, The Tiger 'Large Screen' games are a series... Stuff like that...

vcoleiro1 wrote:
Sorry if I have upset anyone, I sincerely didn't mean to that. It was just something that popped in my head as something that might work and I was wondering what people thought about it. You could say I'm a bit of an idea's person - lol.


Nope, not upset... It's not really a bad idea actually, I just wasn't sure if there was a practical way to do it... Even if I have final approval over changes, if the changes can be made by anyone, there will be 'adult themed' links and overseas drug sales, etc entered into the database daily... I finally had to resort to people Emailing me personally for a password just to sign up on the forum because nothing I did would stop the Chinese and Russian spammers... They actually have facilities with people that spend all day joining forums (and other sites) just to spam weblinks everywhere they can. That defeats _all_ the safeguards you can put in place to stop bots from doing it. If they had free-access to a Wiki, they'd be spamming every page of it daily, it would simply never end...

Now, if it was something people had to log into to even make changes, that might be a little better...

The other concern (for me, anyway) is converting the entire site over to another format... Shocked
I'd probably have to set up an alternate site (or just alternate page) that contains the new database, and see how fast I (and others) can build it up... Then at some point retire the existing site and let the other one take over... Not sure if I'd want to look like a Wiki site though, I'd have to see how configurable something like that is. And, like Kisember mentioned, something that could be easily geared toward handheld games in particular, and lots of images of them... Wiki itself doesn't seem like the right solution, but I'm sure there's something out there that would work.
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vcoleiro1
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PostPosted: Thu Feb 02, 2012 3:49 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Ah those bloody spammers, why do they do it. I've seen a couple of forums absolutely destroyed by these guys. Real annoying
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kisember
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PostPosted: Fri Feb 03, 2012 1:15 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Seems like I constantly missused serial word over series?! Embarassed

Although I don't believe if wiki would be an ideal solution for a handheld site, if anyone want to try it, I could support with the data to have a good kick-start. The best would be someone with database skills as nobody want to create ~3000 pages manually.
I'm really curious how it would turn out.

On the final word, I'm on the Rik's side. I've made efforts to design the data structure that serves well so I want to make sure that it is used as it should be. The number of administratos not so much and most of them doesn't come day by day, it is stlill possible to track all the modifications. I've made a tutorial to lay down some rules and it also help members to understand how games related to others. If someone read it and understand why and how relations works then it became obvious that no general purpose web-engine (cms, wiki, ...) would fit well.
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Tomasrg
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PostPosted: Wed Mar 21, 2012 4:47 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Hi friends, interesting theme for me here.
In my opion may be a Wiki isn´t the better way to manage a site like this, but surely another advanced content management system (CMS) will works.
I´m thinking time ago on make a maintanable and updatable site on Drupal.
Drupal is a high level CMS with a lot of posibilities and higly scalable.
Kisember has worked a lot on Hanheld Empire and is for me is the nearly site to my thoughts.
The problem always is the maintenance and the people who want to help to create the site and fill the data, pictures , etc.
I´m working when I can and investigating what can be the better way to make a open database for collectors. If anyone is interested can contact to me.
Thanks and sorry for my english is anything is incomprehensible
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kisember
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Joined: 10 Sep 2007
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PostPosted: Wed Mar 21, 2012 1:22 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Tomasrg wrote:
The problem always is the maintenance and the people who want to help to create the site and fill the data, pictures , etc.

Yes, it is a common issue. That is what HandheldEmpire solved in first place. It lets people gather the information about handheld games. With a google/facbook account (or a simple registration process) anyone can add pictures or write comments (like a forum thread per game). With elevated privileges, people may add/edit games to the database, write descriptions (like a wiki page per game), etc.
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