Technical DOcumentation

[garethEds]

Evening All,

 

I'm just wondering what people use to keep their technical documentation. I've been looking at DocuWiki but it seems a lot of hassle for what it is.

 

I just want something that will store pages of information and possibly keep track/diary of changes that are made to the network by myself or the techie.

 

In addition it would be handy to have sections for each department so we can refer to changes that have been made in that department.

 

A lot to ask? Maybe someone out there already uses something,

 

Gareth

[sukh]

Sharepoint is a good place to start, but costs are involved

 

Sukh

[bossman]

@garethedmondson:

 

We use dropbox to keep all our network documentation.

 

Set up the individual folders and share them with the departments who can then make changes as they go along which updates for everyone.

 

Departments can update from anywhere with just a web browser or download the app and synchronise with the online dropbox.

 

Enough free space to allow for all documents.

 

Works very well and is encrypted by them and can also be double encrypted by you.

[GrumbleDook]

There are a couple of approaches you can take to this.

 

If you want to go down the Sharepoint route then Sharepoint Foundation (the replacement of Windows Sharepoint Services ... the free option) could be an option, to give you both wiki and document libraries. You can then make use of Infopath to build queries and forms to help people update or access information.

 

You could make use of some of the knowledgebase / documentation setup that are available in various helpdesk tools. OPSmartDesk, SiteHelpDesk and others will do this for you.

 

You could go with a combination of DocuWiki ... which you have already said you have problems with ... or you could try Drupal with MediaWiki style markup.

 

You could simply use simple documents and store them as the example of Bossman ...

 

What I would do is suggest you look at what information you want to store, how you are going to update it and who is going to query it.

 

You might have a configuration management database, which could simply be an asset management tool, with full configuration details of each item, and then have a technical change library of when each asset (and its configuration) has a change made against it. Both could be done in spreadsheets if you need to.

 

No definitive answer from me, I'm afraid, but hopefully some more ideas.

[pete]

We use dokuwiki, mainly because it's ultimately a bunch of text files (no backend database) that can be edited from anywhere, so there's no excuse not to.

 

Well, that and it makes restoring a backup to a laptop without a running webserver easy in the event of "oh, it's ALL on fire" DR.

[Arthur]

The next best thing to SharePoint would probably be OneNote 2010. The only thing I don't like about it (and one area where DokuWiki is better) is the lack of syntax highlighting for scripts.

 

[b]Advanced Wiki Features[/b]
[url="http://youtu.be/sA9y1E16xzQ"]http://youtu.be/sA9y1E16xzQ[/url]

[b]Collaborative Authoring[/b]
[url="http://youtu.be/SP1OEx_i4Fg?hd=1"]http://youtu.be/SP1OEx_i4Fg[/url]

[b]How to organize stuff[/b]
[url="http://youtu.be/PYQS-b-xFFU"]http://youtu.be/PYQS-b-xFFU[/url]

 

In Microsoft OneNote 2010, you can share a notebook so that you can access it on other computers or on the Web, or so that you can work in it together with other people.

 

Taking notes as a group is a collaborative process. As a collaborative tool, OneNote offers far more than the ability to send static notebook pages via e-mail. Depending on the nature of your projects, you can use OneNote to brainstorm together with other people in meetings, use the notebook pages as a virtual whiteboard, and set up shared notebooks in which everyone can view, add, and edit information.

 

Unlike other programs that "lock" files for editing by one person at a time, OneNote 2010 lets multiple authors access a shared notebook at the same time. Anytime someone edits to the pages and sections in the shared notebook, OneNote automatically synchronizes the changes so that the notebook is always up-to-date for everyone.

 

OneNote also maintains a separate offline copy of the notes on each user's computer. That way, shared note-taking participants can continue to edit the notes locally even when they are temporarily disconnected from the network. The next time they connect to the shared notebook, OneNote automatically merges their changes with the changes made by everyone else.

[russdev]

In last job used wiki and documents store on KLP (sharepoint) but have used mediawiki heck edugeek wiki was on dokuwiki long time ago...

 

But just had good idea through...