[R] Wikis etc.

[paul sorenson]

Frank E Harrell Jr wrote:
> paul sorenson wrote:
> 
>> I am a fan of wiki's and I reckon it would really help with making R 
>> more accessible.  On one extreme you have this email list and on the 
>> other extreme you have RNews and the PDF's on CRAN.  A wiki might hit 
>> the spot between them and reduce the traffic on the email list.
> 
> 
> Thanks Paul.  But as long as the email list is active I fear a wiki 
> won't be.

That would be sad if that were true.  They are different beasts, as 
would be an IRC channel.  I say complementary, not mutually exclusive.

A wiki takes time to reach critical mass (eg my home brew wiki 
http://brewiki.org/ or wikipedia) and you couldn't just pull the plug on 
this list without a serious impact on the uptake of R I would have thought.

Contributions to the wiki from mugs like me with less R/statistics 
experience would hopefully make R more accessible to newbies - pointing 
out the traps for new players.

One way to bootstrap it is to simply add a "wiki" menu entry into the 
r-project.org menu. This is what the guys over at 
http://wiki.wxpython.org/ have done.  Over time, some of the other items 
there might morph in to wiki pages as appropriate.

I have no doubt that if the R-Wiki was supported in the same thoughtful, 
thorough and patient way in which questions on R-Help are answered, it 
would be one of the lowest entropy wiki's around.

I have some experience with moinmoin (a python wiki) and would be 
willing to contribute some time and skills if that would help.