JP1 help update - Site wiki?

Post by **vickyg2003** » Wed Jan 12, 2011 10:27 am

Well yes I'm having trouble with the whole wiki concept. I've got a lot of topics in IRHelp, that I'd like to pull out, like a basic EFC's vs OBC discussion, and the Remote Basics section that would be nice short topics that need a venue and since they are minor topics they seem to be ideally suited for a singular topic linked from the main page.

However when I get to the IRScope Manual, it is a 32 page document in word. I dumped it in to the wiki as raw text, but its so long even that way, that I'm getting wiki warnings that the topic is too big for many browsers, and then there is the matter of getting all the images in place, is this ever going to load as an HTML document, or is it going to be so dog slow that nobody will ever bother.

Or is there another format. Should it be an overview with the table of contents, and then a link that points to a pdf file off somewhere in space, but doesn't that kill the whole wiki concept.

So I'm not opposed, I'm just challenged by the wiki concept. I'm willing to help. I really like the idea of well maintained documentation. Just not sure how to get on board.

Post by **mathdon** » Wed Jan 12, 2011 12:46 pm

The Robman wrote:I think the main problem, for Vicky at least, is that she's not familiar with wiki's in general, so therefore doesn't know how to approach this one. Hopefully that not the case for most people, but I could be wrong.

It sure is the case for me. That's the first wiki I've ever looked at

.

Post by **The Robman** » Wed Jan 12, 2011 1:16 pm

For those of you that have never seen a wiki before, you really should check out Wikipedia at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page

The best way to use Wikipedia is to start with Google. Search for your favorite topic and just add wiki to the search terms. For example, search for "british house of commons wiki" and you'll find this...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_C ... ed_Kingdom

There's also a wiki page on JP1:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JP1_remote

The thing to keep in mind is that every wiki, either here or at Wikipedia, is a group effort. Sometimes the person that starts a page just puts a couple of lines to describe the topic then others come along later and fill in the detail. Then someone comes along and corrects their mistakes and adds more detail, and so it goes on.

xnappo · Post by **xnappo** » Wed Jan 12, 2011 2:01 pm

Not saying it is the best in the world, but the XBMC Wiki might give people some ideas:

http://wiki.xbmc.org/index.php?title=XBMC_Online_Manual

xnappo

Post by **vickyg2003** » Wed Jan 12, 2011 2:49 pm

xnappo wrote:Not saying it is the best in the world, but the XBMC Wiki might give people some ideas:

http://wiki.xbmc.org/index.php?title=XBMC_Online_Manual

xnappo

Thanks Chris, since I'm interested in XBMC, I think I'll explore this one and see what the pros and cons are.

Post by **The Robman** » Wed Jan 12, 2011 2:58 pm

Just to give an example of how this could work, I've just converted the Protocol Builder Help Doc into a wiki:

http://www.hifi-remote.com/wiki/index.p ... ol_Builder

You'll notice that the Assembler and RM portions are not present, that's because nothing has been written for them yet. Mike might be a better person than me to write the assembler section, and Greg or Chris would be best suited to write the RM portion.

Post by **vickyg2003** » Wed Jan 12, 2011 3:24 pm

The Robman wrote:Just to give an example of how this could work, I've just converted the Protocol Builder Help Doc into a wiki:

Ah, so you can create sub pages from the sub pages.

I'll go back and read the wiki instructions again.

Post by **The Robman** » Wed Jan 12, 2011 3:28 pm

They're only sub pages because you think of them that way, in reality they're just regular pages.

Capn Trips · Post by **Capn Trips** » Thu Jan 13, 2011 9:38 am

OK. I've transferred my Extender FAQ over to the Wiki. It looks very primitive, cause I couldn't figure out how to get colored fonts, only bold and italics.

Post by **The Robman** » Thu Jan 13, 2011 11:20 am

Here's the Capn's Extender FAQ:
http://www.hifi-remote.com/wiki/index.p ... 8an_FAQ%29

Btw, the syntax to change the font color is this:

<span style="color:red">red writing</span>

source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help:Using_colours

I've added some color to your FAQ to get you started.

ALSO...

I have done the first chapter of Vicky's IR Help here:
http://www.hifi-remote.com/wiki/index.php?title=IR_Help

Post by **vickyg2003** » Sat Jan 15, 2011 11:23 am

The Robman wrote:They're only sub pages because you think of them that way, in reality they're just regular pages.

Okay, I see what you mean now, they are just scattered pages, they don't subclass them, like my HTML editor does. Also all images are comingled. Now that I now that, I've been changing all my image names to start with IRHelp followed by the chapter number. IRHelpChp2.....

Confusing....

Post by **The Robman** » Mon Jan 24, 2011 4:51 pm

Progress report. If you haven't visited the Wiki page in a while (or ever) take a look because there's quite a bit of stuff there now.

There are two articles that still need work:
1) The RM section in IR Help
2) The RM user manual

The latter doc was started by Eferz a while back but a long way short of complete and might actually need to be scrapped and started over.

I'd like to thank the following people for helping out by adding articles to the Wiki:
Vicky - IR Help (many sections)
Capn Trips - Extenders (an FAQ)
Xnappo - JP1 - Just How Easy Is It? - RM-IR Version

(If I've missed anyone else that has made contributions, please let me know).

If anybody knows of a helpful guide that somebody has written, either as a downloadable doc, a forum post or even an external website, please consider porting it over to the Wiki yourself, but if you're not comfortable doing that, please at least let us know about it so one of us can port it.

Post by **vickyg2003** » Tue Jan 25, 2011 1:43 pm

The Robman wrote:I'd like to thank the following people for helping out by adding articles to the Wiki:
Vicky - IR Help (many sections)
Capn Trips - Extenders (an FAQ)
Xnappo - JP1 - Just How Easy Is It? - RM-IR Version

(If I've missed anyone else that has made contributions, please let me know).

Well you missed The Robman, but then I guess you can't very well thank yourself, but I can, thank you Rob.

Post by **The Robman** » Tue Jan 25, 2011 4:35 pm

You're welcome, and the RM/IR Help doc is done now too.

Post by **The Robman** » Fri Feb 25, 2011 8:44 am

Status update:

The wiki has been quiet for a while, mostly because almost all of the original work has been done (someone still needs to do the RM manual though).

However, I just noticed a whole other section of docs that could be ported to the wiki, and that's all the guides to building and troubleshooting a JP1 interface cable.

http://www.hifi-remote.com/forums/dload ... &cat_id=39