Knowledge Base Update

[Mark L. Chang]

The knowledgebase is coming along nicely. I have a couple people on
'beta' right now, and the feedback is very helpful.  I wanted to lay out
some basic ideas for the list to get a grip on what we're doing, and
*how you can help*.

The format for this thing will be a wiki. See some more information at
http://www.c2.com/cgi/wiki?WikiWikiWeb

Controversial, yes, useful, definitely. Read on to see how we take
advantage of this.

The knowledgebase will be supplemental to the list and its archives. But
as we know, searching the archives is hard sometimes, as the context of
things discussed sometimes is not apparent. Other times, threads don't
come to a useful conclusion with a summary. We're trying to change that.

The Knowledgebase (KB) will be a collection of articles, how-tos,
write-ups, faq-entries, etc. They will have a high signal to noise ratio
and be single, atomic, tidbits of audi information. Need to know about
exhaust hangars? It's right there, down to the part number and why we
need it. The Wiki gives us a powerful medium, as well. See something
wrong? Fix it yourself. See something that was overlooked? Add an entry!
Don't like how something is worded or organized? Change it. It's all in
community control.

Thus, we need a couple things from listmembers.
1) Articles
   Write-ups are the best. Tidbits of information that *you* have found
   useful that you want to share with the rest of the world. Synthesize
   the posts you've saved over the years, write it up, send it to me. If
   you do not have the time to write it up, but have lots of posts on
   particular subjects already - save 'em. Read on. There will
   eventually be someone youc an email.
2) Moderators
   As we move forward, I don't want the learning curve for the Wiki
   system to be an problem. We'll nominate volunteers to be moderators
   for particular areas. Either by car model or repair group. You'll be
   able to browse the KB and find who's responsible for an area, and
   email them with changes or additions. This will reduce my workload
   over time :).

   Moderators have another set of jobs to do.
   a. monitor the list for possible contributions. See a big thread?
   Synthesize it (even on the fly, in the middle of discussion) and post
   it to the KB if it seems useful.
   b. point people to the KB when they ask that common question.


Finally, I'd like to thank everyone that has already offered a helping
hand. There are articles flowing in already, and more coming by the day.
Encouragement has been awesome, and I thank you for that. For everyone
else, thanks for allowing me to waste your bandwidth with my posts.
Hopefully it'll be useful to you soon.

Mark

--
A good sermon should have a good beginning and a good ending, and they should
be as close together as possible.