Building a personal or business wiki... my hunt for the right software
I’ve been hunting for YEARS for a wiki solution that fits my workflow and situation. I think I’ve finally found it and I couldn’t be happier to share it.
The requirements
You wouldn’t be far off the mark to say that I’m a little, or a lot, picky. I’ve been through the usual suspects of software for a wiki including: MediaWiki, Dokuwiki, Straight up markdown, org mode, and a host of others.
What I really needed was something that fit my quite odd workflow.
- Web accessible
- Authentication and role based access control
- Git backend support
- Markdown support (I really hate wiki markup)
- Editable on both web and locally via git
My frustration
Over the years, I mainly steered towards Docuwiki or MediaWiki. Both are excellent software but there are a few things that I didn’t like. At the top of the list is wiki markup. I just don’t like it, it doesn’t flow as smoothly as markdown. It’s a personal choice. A close second is git support. I travel for work very often and often, I’m on my phone, or my tablet, or my laptop or back at my desk. Sometimes I’m without internet. I wanted a solution that I could access in any situation. Sure there are VPN technologies, and I do use them here, but I wanted to ability to say write in markdown on a plane and push it back up via git after I landed.
Enter WikiJs
I’ll be honest… I’ve known about WikiJs for a long time. I for some reason kept discounting it. Finally, this week I decided to install it and give it a go. I’ve got to say I’m impressed with it’s simplicity but capabilities.
I can pull the entire wiki down to markdown files in a single command using git. Make changes to the repository and push it back up. Or I can just make changes directly in the web interface when connected to my network.
It’s really been a helpful experience.
Why a personal wiki
Have you ever come up with a solution to a problem or plan and 3 months later need that solution. I find a wiki is perfect for this situation. It enables me to build structured notes around a topic and create my own personal procedures to problems. Not sure what filter goes in the fridge, it’s in my wiki. Forgot what size blades for the lawn mower, ditto.
It really is truly a nice place and way to organize information and it’s not just small household things. I do the same with my home lab and ham station documentation.
If you own a business, it’s even more helpful. Recently we’ve taken on someone to help with a few tasks. I need to train that person on how to do those tasks, but they might like some reference material. Enter the standard operating procedure. A wiki is a great way to build a living standard operating procedure. In the future, as things change, those people that are doing that tasks can keep the documentation up to date for you. No need to rebuild policies over again and rewrite them in a word doc. Further, it’s all in source control.
This isn’t shiny but it’s a true benefit to keeping my head on straight.