And so it was that I ran head on, so-to-speak, into the mystifying world of Wiki-code. I have never in my life attempted any sort of computer programing before this, and to say it was a steep learning curve is quite the understatement.
As the 75% late penalty approached, my anxiety increased, and I focused on this pointless quest of Wiki-expansion and battled the army of Wiki-code with all the zeal anyone could...for eight hours...And then, completion!
...But life is never that easy.
Much to my dismay, I discovered that some ne'er-do-well on the other side of the globe had been rearranging my code even as I conquered it. So when I went to save my completed article, I was confronted with the following: "There has been an editing conflict. You will need to merge the two codes together." or something to that effect, in addition to another message from my effort under-miner: "Welcome to Wikipedia. Your referencing wasn't in the correct format. I made a few changes. Let me know if there are any problems." Or something to that effect.
Well that's just Wonderful, I thought...
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en.wikipedia.org |
...Needless to say, I was more than a bit miffed.
After taking a walk, I returned to write my second coded article Agropyron cristatum. My previous experience meant that this one only took three hours, as I had the code more or less figured out, and my Word article already done.
So, Here's the link to my Wiki:
...And here's a screenshot:
(I got some help from Laura. you can see her blog here: http://laura-everything-ag.blogspot.com/)
In reflection of this exercise, I come to conclude, as I have with all our social media endeavors, that the stress of using them heavily far outweighs any benefit. I don't need to war with code to benefit from Wikipedia. I suppose that school and life both involve a lot of jumping through hoops to earn your meat. As long as you clear the flame, I suppose it doesn't much matter whether the exercise has any useful purpose or not.
benblitch.blogspot.com |
