[pmwiki-users] RFC: PITS 00701 -- WikiFarm confusion

[Jonathan Scott Duff]

On Tue, Mar 14, 2006 at 11:09:18AM -0500, Neil Herber wrote:
> At 2006-03-14  09:36 AM -0600, Patrick R. Michaud is rumored to have said:
> >So, I could use some help here from people who have set up
> >WikiFarms and struggled with it -- what is it about WikiFarms
> >(and the associated documentation) that is confusing?

I modified http://www.pmwiki.org/wiki/PmWiki/WikiFarms to read slightly
better IMHO. Let me know what you think.

I think the original poster is just missing some clear examples. For
instance, while QuickFarms seems to be the right place for a directory
layout example, it seems jumbled and confusing. Also, that page doesn't
have a clear conceptual flow IMHO.

> What confused me right off the bat was the terminology.
> 
> I expected a "farm" to be a collection of "fields", just as in the 
> agricultural world. But in the original instructions I read, the 
> place where pmwiki.php was installed seemed to be called the "farm 
> field" or something similar, and it could be an active field, as well 
> as being the code repository for the farm.

If you think of it terms of arable land it might make more sense. The
farm consists of several plots of land where crops are grown (the
fields) and one plot of land for the farmhouse (where pmwiki.php lives)
It just so happens that the plot of land that has the farmhouse is also
big enough and arable enough to grow some crops, so the farmer has a
little garden there too (A pmwiki installation that is both a "farm" and
a "field").

> I quickly read the current instructions on
> http://www.pmwiki.org/wiki/PmWiki/WikiFarms and it looks like it now
> refers to the "farm's home directory" and seems to recommend using it
> only to hold the code. This is much clearer to me, and, I would hope,
> to new admins.

I agree that it's probably conceptually clearer to keep them separate,
but I still think it's good that pmwiki doesn't enforce the
separation.  :-)

-Scott
-- 
Jonathan Scott Duff
duff at pobox.com