[pmwiki-users] User rating of cookbook recipes

Radu Luchian radu at monicsoft.net
Tue Jan 20 07:17:39 CST 2009


Ah, the instruments of democracy...!!! ;)

Rating is a great idea as a quick, unidimensional measure of fitness to a
particular goal.

For example, You know the category 'ToEdit' or some such that was used every
now and then on the documentation pages? Replace that with a star system and
you get a prioritized list for working on the docs rather than a flat list
in the ToEdit category.

But opening a large voting system to a community is tough on resources and
will limit the meaningfulness of the system because everyone tends to use
different dimensions in voting (remember, we all have different goals in
using the wiki and different levels of sophistication), and not everyone can
be expected to test and rate each recipe. Also, if 5 users vote on one
recipe and another two (different) people on another recipe, how can we
compare the two values? Apples and oranges. On big sites with millions of
users you tend to get a statistical consensus, especially when the number of
votes is recorded and a mechanism exists for weeding out duplicate votes
(which is not the case on pmwiki.org).

I suggest that if this is implemented, only the site managers to have access
to voting, so that a balanced, consistent measure can be applied.

Also, I would make the recipe multidimensional (as many sites came to do
it): we could consider the need of values for:
number of downloads (self-descriptive, easiest to implement), which can be
clarified by the following two measures
number of uses (# or list of people who are done testing actually use the
page/recipe in their wiki or farms; this is more useful, but would require a
mechanism for the users to be contacted periodically to confirm continued
use)
interest (# or list of people interested in the recipe but who did not yet
implement it; see above for keeping the number/list up to date)

Then a few starred dimensions:
documentation (how well is described)
portability (does it work on all platforms or only some?)
features (how well does it cover the intended targeted function)
functional (how well does it work, are there any bugs, etc)
popularity (this can be left open for everyone who passes by to vote on)

Now, I do feel that this is a lot of data to maintain, which is why I would
implement it as a separate page (i.e. RecipeVotes, e.g ABCMusicVotes), and
all those variables can be condensed by a weighted average of some sort,
into a single one to be displayed in the recipe page summary, with a link to
the Votes page.

<star image> (<actual weighted value in a %.2 format>)
e.g. *** (2.78)

That way, the  one value will at least be meaningful :)

Cheers,
Radu

On Tue, Jan 20, 2009 at 3:36 AM, Hans <design5 at softflow.co.uk> wrote:

>
> As PmWiki is moving forward with renewed interest,
> and Petko is taking on the site admin role for pmwiki.org,
> I wonder if it is a good time to come to some decision regards rating
> of cookbook recipes:
>
> I like to propose that users will be offered an opportunity to rate a
> recipe, using a 5 star rating system, as used on many sites.
> Cookbook pages will generally have a rating markup in place, showing
> the current rating as star images, and a form to cast a vote.
> I propose the use http://www.pmwiki.org/wiki/Cookbook/StarRater
>
> In addition to an easy and attractive star rating display,
> simple voting option with  a degree of protection against multiple
> voting built in, one can also generate recipe pagelists ordered by
> rating, to show most valued recipes etc.
>
> Any comments on this? Anyone wants to second such proposal?
>
>
>  ~Hans
>
>
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