Developing WikiBOK: A Wiki-Based BOK Formulation-Aid System

The design and implementation of WikiBOK, a Wiki-based body of knowledge (BOK) formulation-aid system, is investigated in this paper. In contrast to formulating a BOK for a matured discipline such as computer science, BOK formulation for a new discipline such as social informatics needs a “bottom-up” approach because academics in a new discipline cannot draw its entire figure par avance. Therefore, an open collaboration approach based on the collective intelligence concept seems promising. WikiBOK is under development as part of our project based on BOK+, which is a novel BOK formulation principle for new disciplines. It uses Semantic MediaWiki (SMW) to facilitate its fundamental functions. To support a rich graphical user interface for WikiBOKers, a a graph visualization software, Graphviz, is adopted. SMW is enhanced to work in conjunction with Graphviz. Because edit conflicts occur when WikiBOKers collaborate, a resolution principle is investigated to resolve BOK tree edit conflicts.