eXo Platform 3.5

## Chapter 4. How To Use Wiki?

## Overview

This section provides you a guide to use all Wiki features and configure the Wiki application to make it work in your desired way. Before going further, you should know some basic concepts about Wiki. After accessing the Wiki application, the Wiki homepage will appear as below:

Details:

Item | Description
--- | ---
| The Breadcrumb which shows the page hierarchy.
| The Wiki administration area which allows administrators only to configure the space settings.
| The Search box.
| The pages tree view.
| The Page Control area which helps users take actions with the current page.
| The page content.
| The page information. You can click View Change to see changes in latest versions, click Attachment(s) and Revisions links to open the Attachments details pane and the Revisions pane respectively. These two panes can be collapsed by clicking the relevant links again.

### The page hierarchy in Wiki

Wiki content is organized as a page tree in which each page may contain many sub-pages. The hierarchy is reflected on UI by the Breadcrumb and the page tree at the left pane. When a page is added, it is always defined as a sub-page to the current one. You can have wikis for portals, wikis for groups or users.

### Wiki Spaces

A space is a set of pages, so the space partitioning means they are independent trees. This separation is to enable Wiki to provide knowledge spaces for different groups.

There are 3 space types:

- Portal wiki: wiki for the current portal site.

- Group wiki: wiki available for members of a group.

- User wiki: wiki for personal pages.

### Note

In this document, Spaces are referred as wikis, particularly portal wikis, group wikis and user wikis.

Any space which has an implicit root page is named Wiki Home.

## Work with Wiki pages

Pages are places where information in Wiki is stored and shared. Pages are stored within a spaces. Actions that a user can perform on a specific wiki page depends on permissions assigned by the administrator. See the Page Permissions for detailed permissions.

In a page, you can:

- Create a page with the simple markup language or the Rich Text editor.

- Edit a page.

- Delete a page.

- Move a page to another location.

- Watch a page.

- View page information.

### Create a page

There are two ways to create a page:

The first way

In this way, you need to use the toolbar.

1. Go to a Wiki space in which you want to create a page.

2. Click Add Page and select Blank Page or click From Template... to add a page with a template.

If you select From Template..., a list of available templates will appear.

You can:

i. Click Preview corresponding to the template you want to see. The template preview appears.

ii. Click Select corresponding to the template you want to select for your new page. The selected template appears.

3. Enter the title for your page. The page title must be unique.

4. Enter the content of your page by using Wiki Markup or the WYSIWYG editor.

5. Optionally, click Preview to see how your page looks like.

6. Click Save to finish.

The second way

In this way, you need to use the undefined link in a page.

In the Wiki application of eXo Platform, you can add a link pointing to a page which you are going to create later. Such links are called undefined links. These links are often used to remind other Wiki users to create the page.

Add an undefined link for creating a page later

1. Add a link by typing the page title between square brackets '[[...]]' or '[.... ]' (depending on your selected syntax) into your page body.

For example:

Syntax | What you type | What you get
--- | --- | ---
Xwiki 2.0 | [[eXo User Guide]] |
Confluence 1.0 | [eXo User Guide] |

2. Click Save to save the page containing the link. The undefined link is colored in red with the underline.

3. Click this link will open the Add Page form.

4. Follow the steps stated above to enter the page title, content and save the page.

### Edit a page

You can edit a page at any time if you have the edit permission on that page.

Edit a whole page content

To edit a whole page content, click Edit in the Page Control area. Your page will be switched to the Edit mode.

Now, you can rename the page and edit the page content. In view mode, hover your cursor over the page title and double click to edit page title. The toolbar in the edit mode will be changed to activate the following actions.

Details:

Item | Description
--- | ---
| Switch to the Rich Text (WYSIWYG) editor.
| Display the preview mode of the currently edited content. Previewing a page helps you verify the result of rendering the markup you just entered without saving.
| Open the Wiki syntax help pane.
| Show more syntax help.
| Input the edit reason if necessary.
| Save the current page and go back to the view mode. Changes will be sent to watchers via mail notification.
| Save the current page without sending notification to the watcher.
| Discard the current changes and go back to the view mode.
| The Syntax drop-down list. You can select your preferred syntax here.

Edit a page section

To edit only a section in the whole page content, hover the mouse over the title of the section you want to edit and click .

The selected section will be switched to the Edit mode.

### Tip

In the View mode, you can quickly edit the page title by double-clicking it and press Enter when finish.

### Move a page to another location

1. Select a page that you want to move.

2. Click More in the Page Control area, then select Move Page from the drop-down menu.

The form to select the destination page appears.

3. Select the destination page.

4. Click Move.

### Note

The Move page action is not displayed when you are at the Wiki Home. You can only move pages inside a wiki space and not between spaces.

### Delete a page

1. Open the page you want to delete and select More in the Page Control area.

2. Click Delete Page from the drop-down menu.

3. Click OK in the confirmation message to accept your deletion.

### Note

The Delete page action is not displayed when you are in the Wiki Home.

### View page information

Viewing page information is accessible to users who have the View permission on that page. The page information provides details about related pages of the current page, the hierarchy structure of the current page, the page history and more.

1. Select the page you want to view the information.

2. Click More from the page toolbar, then select Page Info from the drop-down menu.

All information of the opening page, including page summary, related pages, page hierarchy, recent changes will be displayed.

#### Add a related page

This feature allows you to add pages related to your page. This function can be done in the Page Info view and is activated to users with the Edit permission.

1. Click Add More Relations in the Page Info view, then select the related pages in the Select a page window.

2. Click Select to add the selected page to the list of the Related Pages.

The related pages of the opening page are displayed in the side pane as below.

#### View a page history

To access the page history, just click View Page History in the Page Info view.

The History Page appears.

Details:

Area | Function
--- | ---
| Compare selected page versions.
| Allow you to select two versions that you want to compare.
| Allow you to specify the version labels of the page and link to view a specific version.
| The date and time when the page is changed.
| The authors who make changes of the page.
| The reasons why the changes are made (optional).
| Restore a page to the selected version.

### Watch a page

Watching a page allows you to receive a notification message about any changes in the page.

Watch a page

1. Open the page you want to watch.

2. Click More in the Page Control area, then select Watch from the drop-down menu.

Stop watching a page

1. Open the page which you watch.

2. Click More in the Page Control area, then select Stop Watching from the drop-down menu.

## Work with attachments

Attachments are any files enclosed with your pages. The attachments may be images, documents, presentation or multimedia files.

In this section, you will know how to:

- View all attachments of a page.

- Add an attachment.

- Delete an attachment.

- Download an attachment.

### View all attachments of a page

1. Open the page you want to view attachments.

2. Click Attachment(s) link in the Page info area.

The Attachment pane of that page will appear:

Delete an attachment

To delete an attachment, click corresponding to the attachment.

Download an attachment

To download an attachment, click the attachment name.

### Add an attachment to a page

There are two ways to add an attachment to a page:

The first way

In this way, you need to open the Attachment pane of the page.

1. Click the Upload New File in the attachment list pane. The upload window will appear.

2. Select a file from your local device and click Open. The file will be uploaded automatically then.

The second way

You can use this method when editing the page content by WYSIWYG editor (Rich Text editor).

1. Select a page to which you want to add an attachment.

2. Select Edit at the Page Control area. For more details, see the Edit a page section.

3. Select the Rich Text editor on the page toolbar.

4. Click on the toolbar of the Rich Text editor, then select Attached File... from the drop-down menu.

The Link form is displayed as below.

5. Select a file to upload. Now you can choose to upload a new file or select from existing files.

- Upload a new file:

i. Double-click Upload new file or click Upload new file --> Select in the Current page or All pages tab.

ii. Click Browse to select a file from your local device, then click Upload.

- Select from existing files: Click the file, then click Select.

The form to edit the link parameters appears.

6. Provide the link label and tooltip.

7. Click Create Link to update the link.

### Insert image

1. Click on the text editor, then click Insert Image...

2. Select an inserted image of the current page or click the All Pages tab to select an image attached to another page in the space.

3. Click Insert Image.

## Use the WYSIWYG Editor (Rich Text editor)

WYSIWYG stands for What You See Is What You Get. The WYSIWYG editor allows you to edit an wiki pages directly in wiki markup language. This has the advantage of being faster than the Rich Text Editor for some formatting tasks.

You can switch between the Source and WYSIWYG editors at any time by clicking or . In the Source editor, which is selected by default when you edit a page, you have to use the wiki markup language for text formatting, while the WYSIWYG editor enables the contents to be appeared during editing that is very similar to the published result. Thanks to available tools on this editor, you can format your content visually without using wiki markups.

### Note

If the final result is not similar to what you wish when editing a page by the WYSIWYG editor, you can go back to the Source editor and use Wiki markups to edit the content.

When using the WYSIWYG editor, examples of commonly used markup are displayed in a lateral panel with a link to the Full Syntax Notation page for more details.

To learn more about the WYSIWYG editor, you can refer to this guide.

- WYSIWYG editor user guide

## Syntax Help

If you do not know how to use a syntax, you can use the Syntax Help function. The Syntax Help is displayed by clicking from the page toolbar. When being clicked, a lateral pane slides beside the editing area will show all the information of the currently used syntax. The lateral pane can be hidden by clicking in the upper right corner or by clicking again.

You can click at the bottom of short Help Tips form to open the Full Syntax Notation page.

You can insert icons, emoticons to emphasize the content. The usage is described in the Full Syntax Notation page with example so you can easily remember and use them.

Example of Emoticons and icons:

## Work with Macros

By using macros, you can apply extra formatting, functionality and customization to your content. You can easily add macro tags by using the Rich Text editor.

1. Switch to Rich Text editor.

2. Click Macros, then select Insert Macros... from the drop-down menu.

The Insert Macros form appears.

The macro is classified into different categories: Content, Formatting, Navigation.

3. Select a macro category.

4. Select your desired macro from the selected categories list, then click the Select or simply double-click it. For example, if you select the Box macro, you will go to the Macro Parameters form.

5. Enter parameters into the corresponding fields for your selected macro. Click Insert Macro to perform your macro insertion or click Previous to return to initial Insert Macro form.

The following table describes specific functions of common macros.

Macro | Function
--- | ---
Excerpt | Create additional information for the current page and it can be set to "hidden" in the current page, but displayed to add more information as the summary about the page when it is used with the Page Tree macro.
Include Page | Include the content of another page in the current page.
Box | Draw a box around the provided content.
Color | Change the text color.
Code | Highlight code snippets of various programming languages.
Error Message | Display an error message note.
Float | Allow a content to 'float' on the left or the right.
Info Message | Display an info message.
No Format | Keep the content displayed like you type.
Note Message | Display a note message.
Panel | Embrace a block of text within a fully customizable panel.
Table Table cell Table row | Inset a table. Insert a table cell. Insert a table row.
Tip Message | Display a tip message block.
Warning Message | Display a warning message block.
Anchor | Create an anchor in a page.
Children | Display the children and descendants of a specific page in the current page.
Page Tree | Display the hierarchy of a page in the current page.
Related Pages | Render the related pages of the current page.
Table of Content | Generate a table of content for the current page.
Section & Column | Using the Section and Column macros allows you to write the content in columns.

## Work with page versions

When editing the content of a page, Wiki will automatically create a version of that page after it is saved. Thanks to the page versions, you can make changes to the page safely and rollback to an earlier version without worrying about messing things up.

In the Page History view, you can see all versions of a page.

Each version includes the following information:

- Revision numbers.

- Author making changes.

- Date and time when changes are made.

- Summary (if any).

In the Page History page, you can:

- View versions of a page.

- Compare page versions.

- Restore a page version to the current version.

### Note

All functions, including viewing, comparing and restoring, can also be done by clicking the Revisions link at the Page Info bar. One pop-up pane appears right under this bar, allowing you to do the same steps as described below.

### View versions of a page

To view a specific version of a page, just click a version label in the Page History page. The selected version of that page will be displayed.

At a version of the page, you can do the following actions:

Item | Description
--- | ---
| Compare the current version with the selected one.
| Replace the current version with the selected version.
| Go to the Page History page.
Prev | View content of the previous version.
Next | View content of the next version.

### Compare page versions

Wiki tracks histories of changes to pages by maintaining a version of the page each time it is modified. To compare two versions, select two checkboxes corresponding to each relevant version, then click .

A page which shows the changes between these two versions will be displayed.

The changes between two versions will be marked with colors:

- Words/lines which are red-highlighted with strike-throughs indicate that they were removed.

- Words/lines highlighted in green indicate that they were added.

### Note

Only two revisions can be selected at one time.

### Restore a page version to the current version

When you notice that there are changes in the current page version that you are not satisfied, you can rollback to an older version of that page quickly.

To restore an older version, click corresponding to your desired version in the Page History page.

### Note

Restoring an older version will create a copy of that version. For example, if the [current version (v.2)] is restored to the [older version (v.1)], Wiki will create a new version (v.3) containing contents of v.1. The version v.3 will become the current version.

## Work with Spaces

Wiki provides permanent bookmarkable URLs to all wiki pages. Wiki will resolve wiki pages by inspecting the URL used to call it. URLs are in the following form:

    http://hostname/$CONTAINER/$SITE/$NAV_URI/[$OWNER_TYPE/$OWNER]/$WIKI_PAGE_URI

Item | Description
--- | ---
$CONTAINER$ | The portal container.
$SITE | The portal site (e.g,'classic').
$NAV_URI | The URI of navigation bound to a page containing the Wiki portlet.
$OWNER_TYPE | May be 'group' or 'user'.
$OWNER | The wiki owner which can be name of user or of group.
$WIKI_PAGE_URI | The URI inferred automatically from the wiki page name.

Any wiki page should be accessed by a friendly URL. For example:

- Portal wiki URL: http://hostname/portal/classic/wiki/eXo+Wiki+Specification.

- Group wiki URL: http://hostname/portal/classic/wiki/group/platform/Administrators/Admin+Guide.

- Personal wiki page URL: http://hostname/portal/classic/wiki/user/john/Sandbox.

## Search

In Wiki, you can search spaces, or pages in a space and attached files. There are two types of search in Wiki:

- Quick Search

- Advanced Search

### Quick Search

1. Enter a key word in the search box.

2. Select your desired page from the drop-down menu. You will be redirected to the selected page.

### Note

If you are standing in the portal wiki, quick search will search on all wiki spaces, otherwise it will only search on the current wiki.

### Advanced Search

The Advanced Search function allows you to search with a key word in a specific space. This mode helps you limit the search results.

1. Enter a key term into the search box and hit the Enter key.

The search results are displayed like the illustration below.

If no results matched with the key words, the search screen informs "there is no search result...!"

2. Click to select a space from the drop-down menu to define a scale where to search for the entered word.

3. Click Search.

## Wiki Administration

### Note

This section is for administrators only.

The administrator has the highest right in Wiki. The administrator can delete a page, change the space settings, set the edit permission for users and more.

### Set up space settings

For each space, you can manage page templates and change the syntax.

Access the Space Settings page

1. Open a Wiki space.

2. Click Browse, then select Space Settings.

The Space Settings page appear.

Now you can:

- Manage permissions on spaces and pages.

- Manage page templates.

- Set up wiki syntax.

### Manage Permissions

Wiki gives you the choice to make a space or an individual page to be open or restricted to specific users, groups or memberships. There are two levels of permissions in Wiki: Space Permissions and Page Permissions.

#### Space Permissions

Each space may have its own permissions. Space permissions determine which actions a user can do within the space. A permission can be assigned to any users, groups or memberships.

To change the space permission, open a space, click Browse and select Space Settings from the drop-down list. Click Permission in the Space Settings page that appears.

There are some permissions to a space as follows:

Permission | Description
--- | ---
View Pages | Specify who can view and watch pages of this space, its attachments and history.
Edit Pages | Specify who can edit pages of this space.
Admin Pages | Specify who have the administration rights on pages of this space.
Admin Space | Specify who can administrate the space permissions and settings

In the Space Permissions form, you can add or remove the space permissions of the users, groups and memberships.

##### Add space permissions

In the Space Permissions form, you can add permissions for individual users, groups of users or memberships.

1. Click to assign permissions to a user, a group or a membership respectively.

The form to select the user, the group and the membership appears.

2. Select a user, a group or a membership, then click Add.

3. Click the plus icon to add the selectors to the Owner column in the Space Permissions form.

4. Click the checkboxes corresponding to each permission you want to assign to the selectors.

5. Click Save to commit.

### Note

View, Edit, Admin Pages permissions are applied by default to any pages of the space unless specific page permissions are set. The super user has all permissions implicitly.

##### Delete space permissions

To delete the permissions of a user, group or a membership in a space, just click corresponding to a user/a group or a membership in the Space Permissions form.

#### Page Permissions

The Page Permissions allows you to set the view and edit permissions for a specific page of a space.

1. Open a page of the space that you want to set the permissions.

2. Click More and select Page Permissions from the drop-down menu.

The Page Permissions form appears.

Pages are viewable/editable according to the space permission. On each page, a user with the Admin Pages permission will be able to override the view and edit permissions on this specific page.

A Page Permissions action appears in the page action menu when the user has the Admin Pages permission.

You can add and delete the View Pages Permission or the Edit Pages Permissions for the page. Do the same as Add space permissions and Delete space permissions .

#### Manage a page template

When adding a new page, you are not required to write the content from scratch. You can start by selecting a page template which is actually a Wiki page with predefined contents.

In the Space Settings form, select the Template tab and the form to manage templates appears.

Details:

Item | Description
--- | ---
| Search for a template.
| Create a new template.
| Edit a template.
| Delete a template.

##### Search for a template

This feature allows you to find your desired template quickly from the existing list as follows:

1. Input a word included in the title of your desired template in the Search textbox.

2. Press the Enter key or click the Search button next to the textbox to start your search.

All matching results which contain your entered search term are displayed right below the textbox.

### Note

The Search function is only performed by the template titles and you must enter a complete word into the Search textbox. For example, to find the template whose title contains "daily report", you can input "report" rather than "repo", or "daily" rather "ly".

##### Create a new template

1. Click Add more... in the Spage Settings page and the sample template form appears.

2. Add the title for the template.

3. Write the description in the Description....

4. Write the content for the template.

5. Select the Syntax to write the content.

6. Click Save Template at the Page Control area. A message will inform your successful template creation.

##### Edit a template

1. Click the Edit icon corresponding to the template you want to edit.

2. Change the title, the description or the content as you want.

3. Click Save Template at the Page Control area.

##### Delete a template

1. Click corresponding to the template you want to delete.

2. Click OK in the pop-up confirmation message.

#### Set up the wiki syntax

By setting up the Wiki syntax, you can select the default syntax and allow user to choose syntax while writing a document or not.

1. Click Syntax in the Space Settings page.

2. Click the Default Syntax box and select a syntax from the drop-down menu. This syntax is set as the default for your document.

In case you want to use another syntax, tick the "Allow user to select other syntaxes" checkbox.

### Note

It is highly recommended that you should use such simple syntaxes, such as XWiki 2.0, or Confluence 1.0.