Features / Usability

Directories would be used more for reference sites (a list of weblinks) than a business/organizations listing if I want users to be able to comment on and add their own information about businesses and organizations.

I strongly recommend [http://doc.tikiwiki.org/|reading the docs]. The feture list includes a brief writeup of each feature; including when/how to use it.

Some quick definitions:

• A "page" is what the user sees... everyhing ends up being served to the end-user as a "page." Pages can be:
  • Wiki — A page that can be created collaboratively.
  • Article — A page that can be submitted, approved, and can have a specific "life time" (that is, expire on a specific date).

HTH,

-Rick

> Hello,
>
> I am trying to set up a community website. After doing some research and testing out various options, I think tikiwiki is what I am looking - main reason is I like having all the features in one program instead of trying to tie a bunch of features together.
>
> After reading the documentation, watching the video's, and playing with tikiwiki, I am still not sure how everything ties together. For example, Wiki and Articles? I am not sure what the difference is and how each should be used.
>
> My site should have a section for different cities and then pages within each city where users can add information.
>
> Main Page
> *Austin
> *Dallas
> *Houston
> *etc.
>
> Would this be created by using wikis? and if so when would I want to use an article? Pages are the same thing as wikis correct.
>
>
>

> I think tikiwiki is what I am looking - main reason is I like having all the features in one program instead of trying to tie a bunch of features together.

You are probably, at this point, worrying if you are making the right choice.I know how you feel: I, too, looked around a bit before deciding on Tikiwiki. I can tell you I am not at all sorry I chose TW! Tiki has done almost everything I needed. FYI, I've also been using it for community activities (www.myaurora.org).

It does however, take a person a while to get up to speed if software is not your trade (It ain't mine!). If you are really not computer savvy or comfortable poking around and trying things then maybe it's not right for you -but then I'm not sure anything else would be any better (best to pay someone then).

You have to know your limits and be willing to tinker and ask questions. Ricks, here, has been very helpful to me in the past, as have others, so I find I can get critical questions answered. After a couple of years, I feel very positive about TW. I.e., I think it's very much worth your effort to learn it.

Yes, you can easily set up different pages for different cities and then from the cities to other pages. Poke around in a Sandbox -here or elsewhere on a wiki- and you'll get the hang of creating wiki pages and linking to others pretty quickly. Wiki pages and HTML pages are basically the same idea (in fact you can include HTML in wiki pages!) but wiki was intended to allow people who do not know HTML to easily edit a page. Wiki has the added advantage of allowing a number of people to create and edit pages on the site (this helped me so I wasn't the only one maintaining the site!). TikiWiki, as a full featured package, lets you add in powerful features as you need them and I'd encourage you to look at these -one at a time- to see how you might use them.

I don't think you'll be at all sorry picking TikiWiki!