[Nix-dev] Regarding the Wiki

[Anderson Torres]

Why not to unofficialize wiki? It can be hosted in a site like wikia,
with no official interference or support of NixOS staff.
It would free some resources on official site and be better maintained.
Also, we can use Stack Exchange to answer questions, and the
configurations files could be hosted on Github or Bitbucket.

2016-01-10 10:47 GMT-02:00 Mateusz Czaplinski <czapkofan at gmail.com>:
> Being a beginner to Nix myself, I want to join in saying that as of now, the
> wiki *is hugely helpful to me*. The manual(s) *do* have a lot of good stuff
> and I like them very much, that's for sure, but the wiki totally does too.
> And I can't really remember finding any advice there that would be dated, I
> mean that it wouldn't work for me.
>
> Specific examples of what I seem to remember being useful to me recently
> (and I believe I came to all of those via Google):
> - https://nixos.org/wiki/Installing_NixOS_from_a_USB_stick (the notes about
> syslinux, I think; I'm not 100% sure if that was the wiki, but I remember I
> was helped by some advice on how to use syslinux);
> - https://nixos.org/wiki/Howto_find_a_package_in_NixOS (also the first time
> I read about nox; have to try it yet);
> - https://nixos.org/wiki/Network_Manager - this unfortunately I think I *did
> not* find when struggling with how to use NetworkManager on my first minimal
> install (answer: nmcli) -> that's also why I'm trying to contribute the PR
> with declarative config for NM;
> - https://nixos.org/wiki/Cheatsheet (by the way, this isn't even linked from
> the main wiki page I think).
>
> Thanks,
> /Mateusz Czapliński.
>
> On Sun, Jan 10, 2016 at 2:47 AM, Jonathan Glines <auntieneo at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>>
>> 2016-01-09 17:44 GMT-07:00 Profpatsch <mail at profpatsch.de>:
>> > We have basically decided to shut it down soon (™), right?
>> >
>> > Just now I tried to set up my printer again.
>> > For that I first looked at docs and the source, which didn’t
>> > provide any helpful info, and then I found the article on generating
>> > the correct Cups files here: https://nixos.org/wiki/Printers
>> >
>> > If we dissolved the wiki, we would need to tranfer all that knowledge.
>> > But should we all pack it into nixos-help?
>>
>> This is the first time I've heard this; I missed the thread where they
>> decided to shut it down.
>>
>> It's somehow difficult to defend the wiki. It has a lot of dated
>> information, some misinformation, and not enough editors. But the
>> wiki's articles are mostly orthogonal to the official documentation.
>> There's no way we can replace the wiki with official documentation.
>> Here's what I mean:
>>
>> 1. When I started using NixOS, the manual mostly confused me. I
>> Googled for "example nixos configurations" and wound up on the "Real
>> World NixOS Dotfiles" on the wiki. That's a page that would never fit
>> in the official NixOS documentation. A year later, someone (not me I
>> swear) added my nixrc to that wiki page, and now I have over a dozen
>> stars on my GitHub repository. Wow. Those people are crazy for
>> thinking I know how to write configuration files, but I'm sure the
>> examples on that wiki page help to inspire them like they did me.
>>
>> 2. The "Raspberry PI" article does not belong in the NixOS
>> documentation until /after/ the Raspi build is working. But if nobody
>> documents the progress, how will curious people experiment with it and
>> get Raspi working? Scrape the mailing list? Scroll through the feature
>> request on GitHub? Unlikely. It's a catch 22 problem without a wiki.
>>
>> 3. Random people documenting how they set up their laptop's weird
>> hardware. Sure, some people have blogs. But not all of us have the
>> time to maintain a blog. A wiki is a good place for those people to
>> contribute.
>>
>> 4. Does anyone remember when Gentoo's wiki crashed, and the fallout
>> effect it had on that community? I know our wiki is much smaller and
>> probably not that significant, but if the NixOS userbase does grow,
>> where will those users turn to? (Probably the Arch Wiki TBH)
>>
>> Incidentally, I contributed to the printer article you mentioned. I
>> still don't know (after a year of using NixOS) how one would go about
>> contributing to the official documentation. I feel it would be a shame
>> for future NixOS users to lose that easy means to contribute. If new
>> users are reluctant to contribute to the wiki, why should we expect
>> them to contribute to the official documentation?
>>
>> The maintainers of the wiki are making a huge mistake trying to shut
>> it down. The wiki as it is now is a tiny seed that reflects how small
>> the NixOS community is right now. We should help it grow, probably by
>> pruning the ugly bits (even linking them to the official docs). Please
>> don't kill it.
>>
>> I'm really sorry for the rant...
>> _______________________________________________
>> nix-dev mailing list
>> nix-dev at lists.science.uu.nl
>> http://lists.science.uu.nl/mailman/listinfo/nix-dev
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> nix-dev mailing list
> nix-dev at lists.science.uu.nl
> http://lists.science.uu.nl/mailman/listinfo/nix-dev
>