WG/OBIT/Wikispaces Migration

Migrating from Wikispaces to MediaWiki

OBIT is considering a migration from wikispaces to a privately hosted instance of MediaWiki.

The rational for this is simple: moving to MediaWiki will give us ownership and control over our data.

Importing pages from wikispaces will not be perfect!  Some formatting errors are to be expected, and will have to be corrected.

"Pros" for the migration:

1. Occupy Boston web space can be consolidated under occupyboston.org (without a $20/mo fee)
2. We control our own data, on private servers, protected from corporate (& gov't) interests
3. A MediaWiki instance will allow for more customization and more powerful features than wikispaces (elaborate?)
4. Users and User(Working)groups can have their own page hierarchy, useful for collecting and sharing and organizing within that group but not in the main page space. The idea of a public face existing alongside a 'workspace' (elaboration)

"Cons" against the migration:

1. No wysiwyg editing (work in progress)
2. People will have to be re-trained (this can hopefully be mitigated with a wysiwyg editor)  
3. Effort has already been placed into wikispaces (The majority of this effort will not be wasted if data is transferred over to the wiki. Effort is worth it if the wiki can continue to grow)
4. A premium account at wikispaces has been purchased (expires in January) 

Migration Mechanics:

1. Schedule downtime
   
2. Freeze old wiki
3. Export old wiki
4. Import data to mediawiki
5. Reorganize new pages as needed
6. Place banner on wikispaces, directing folks to mediawiki.

bugs with the import/convert script