Wiki Wiki Help2 Wiki
Building a documentation wiki for RAD Studio has been a major goal and ongoing task here for more than 2 years. I’m extremely happy to say we have launched Version 1 of the RAD docwiki at http://docwiki.embarcadero.com/RADStudio. In addition to the over 60,000 topics in English, the wiki hosts translations for Japanese, French, and German.
The RAD docwiki is really 9 Mediawikis; 4 for general Topics, 4 for VCL/RTL, and 1 for Code Examples. It’s our "RAD Wiki Farm" and we are tending to it by fixing issues, making it more user-friendly, and coming up with new feature ideas every day.
The coolest thing about the wiki is that we use it as the content management system for the RAD Help. In other words, we generate the Microsoft Help2 system directly from the wiki content. We will update topics on the wiki every day, and periodically generate Help Updates for you to download to your system. We are currently planning two Help Updates, one in September and one in November.
One immediate benefit is that it is much easier to edit and update content on the wiki than with our previous system. Our writers can be much more efficient, and the turn-around between what they write and what you can read is now seconds instead of months. (Today this is true for English Topics only; soon it will be true for English VCL/RTL and examples.)
As a registered user you can edit the Discussion tab for the English versions (we are keeping the translations read-only for now). If you would like to edit pages directly, instead of the Discussion tab, just send an email to documentation@embarcadero.com and we’ll take care of your request.
There are issues, naturally, and we are regularly tracking your Forum and Discussion comments. You can see the major issues we are tending at http://docwiki.embarcadero.com/RADStudio/en/Known_Problems_in_the_Help .
I hope you will find the wiki very useful, and that it grows into a complete resource for your programming needs. As much content as is there, we realize there is still a lot you need, and topics that are very thin or even still missing. You will be able to see our progress and even contribute to it, if you like!
Cheers, -Dee
Note: the wiki login is not the same as your EDN login. They are different systems, and we plan to integrate with an Embarcadero single sign-on system in the future.
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Posted by Dee Elling on September 10th, 2009 under C++Builder, Delphi, Documentation, Help, RAD Studio, ednfront |
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September 10th, 2009 at 4:18 pm
Yes, that is a great place.
My two cents, if we can have more pictures and screen captures, especial for those getting start articles, that will be much much better.
September 10th, 2009 at 8:17 pm
Hmm regarding colors - I just tried and only left navigation bar is in dark colors, main content is standard black text on white background. So where is the problem?
September 10th, 2009 at 8:25 pm
Sounds very usefull. I think I will go to like it when I use it, but… I won’t use it as it is now: all that dark grey text on black background is competely unreadable for me (I don’t think I am the only one!). What a pity.
September 10th, 2009 at 8:26 pm
Using Microsoft Help2 system is a great mistake.
September 10th, 2009 at 8:29 pm
How do you envisage people using the discussion pages of the wiki?
What will happen to the comments put there?
September 11th, 2009 at 4:42 am
Ok. Let’s start with:
http://docwiki.embarcadero.com/RADStudio/en/Main_Page
and try to find help for TStringList class.
I have spent some minutes until find needed page.
September 11th, 2009 at 4:46 am
Hi Dee,
We’re currently in the throes of moving our help to a MediaWiki installation ourselves. Can you tell me why you decided to use 9 MediaWikis?
Also, I’m curious as to what system you used previously.
Thanks!
Helen Abbott
September 11th, 2009 at 6:31 am
Way to go, Dee Elling.
This could be the start of something big: no more FrameMaker, XML schemas, DITA, and other demanding tools for tech pubs that slow everything down.
Dee has invented the model W, for wiki. Like the model T for Ford, this could change everything.
September 11th, 2009 at 8:29 am
MingCheng, yes indeed! Borland purged the graphics years ago, and we are now set up to bring them back this year. Videos too!
Tiedo, what browser are you using? We’ll investigate.
Charlie, thanks for the check… what browser are you using?
Peter, to support the MS SDK we are stuck with MSHelp2 until MS puts out the SDK using their new Help3. That’s another reason we put up the wiki!
Lachlan, we will monitor and respond to comments, and incorporate new information into the main pages that are generated into the Help. I’ve already seen some good discussions and tips that other customers can use right away!
Andrei, our Search is not great, it will be better when we get more google indexing and put up a google search box.
Helen, we found, due to the volume and existing content "chunking", it was easier to divide the content (esp. the translated content) into multiple wikis. For example, we can do maintenance on one wiki and not take down the whole farm. It’s not ideal (Search is not yet cross-wiki) but is practical at this time. Previously, we used Subversion, a proto-DITA XML system, DocOMatic, and Epic Editor. During early alpha projects, we tried Dekiwiki.
Dorothy, "Model W", I like that!
September 12th, 2009 at 3:20 am
Dee,
It is a great start.
I like it more than regular help within the IDE.
One thought, is there a way to include some http://www.delphibasics.co.uk/ examples in it.
Also, pictures and videos will help a lot.
September 12th, 2009 at 5:50 am
No plans to create other language sections, where enthusiasts can create localized articles?
September 14th, 2009 at 2:38 am
Wow, Dee, this is quite an accomplishment! Model W indeed. I especially like your starting page organization describing the audience and size for each area. I also like the list of Known Problems, even listing those that come in from the Forums. This is a great model for community documentation with a strong guiding hand.
What tool do you use to create the Microsoft Help2? I’d love to learn more.
Thanks so much for sharing. Congratulations!
September 14th, 2009 at 1:36 pm
Chris, thank you, and at minimum we could add links to the delphibasics site, we are big fans!
Andrew, thanks for mentioning localization! We are holding off on allowing Discussion on the localized wikis, but if there is interest perhaps we should go for it! I’ll discuss more with Masahiro Arai, our Localization Manager.
Anne, thank you, we wrote the tool ourselves, though it uses some already-available code. We’re getting lots of requests for it, so we’ll find some time to make it more general-purpose and give back to the Mediawiki community.
-Dee
October 1st, 2009 at 8:59 am
Fabulous work! Thanks for sharing it via ContentWrangler.
How did you bulk-import the legacy documentation into MediaWiki? sorry if I missed that…