Businesslink.gov.uk, the official Government website for businesses of all sizes, selected Peacock Carter for MediaWiki consultancy as part of a cross government experiment to open up some content on www.businesslink.gov.uk to public editing. We also worked with NHS Choices and Directgov as part of the project.
The brief
Our brief was to create a wiki powered by the popular MediaWiki system as an experiment to see what happens when members of the public are encouraged to contribute to content on the www.businesslink.gov.uk website. The website needed to simplify MediaWiki's default controls to help those new to the concept of wikis edit the content with as much ease as possible.
The website needed to simplify MediaWiki's default controls to help those new to the concept of wikis edit the content with as much ease as possible.
The solution
We provided MediaWiki consultancy covering the initial installation and configuration of the wiki to advising on best practice for managing it on a daily basis and integrating a design (known as a 'MediaWiki skin') within MediaWiki's framework.
Using our expertise in MediaWiki, we were able to suggest suitable extensions to improve the experience of visitors and advise on likely pitfalls of the project.
The result
The resulting wiki was tailored to the client's requirements, received positive feedback in review meetings, and was maintained internally by the client. The experiment has been completed and the wiki is now offline.