Help:AIC-CC User Guidelines

Background

In Fall 2008 AIC staff applied for an NCPTT grant to place AIC specialty group (SG) catalogues in a wiki platform. It was thought that this collaborative, online format would streamline the process of compiling the catalogues and offer conservators easier access to these resources. There are currently four specialty groups that have catalogues: Book and Paper (in this case, there are both book and paper catalogues), Paintings, Photographic Materials, and Textiles. The initial goal for this project is integrate the collaborative knowledge base with the AIC site, and input the existing catalogues into it. The catalogues existing in 2008 of which there is only a paper version will be transferred to electronic format by scanning with optical character recognition (OCR). They will then be revised prior to posting online by the SG representative, to edit errors that may have been generated by the OCR process. Future catalogs and chapters will be created directly onto the wiki platform.

Software

The recommendation from the IT Company designing the AIC website was to use MediaWiki software. This software does not use a WYSIWYG text editor, but has shortcuts to basic formatting functions. The choice for using MediaWiki software was that it is the system with a larger community, it has well established examples, notably Wikipedia, and it guarantees upgrade in the long run.
Users must be familiar with using HTML language when posting information to the website (see 3.4.).

Editing Catalogue Entries

See also: Wiki Editors' Resources

Paper based conservation catalogues have a lead editor or compiler, who collects the individual contributions. The number of contributors varies. These contributions are reviewed by an editorial board before finally being accepted into the catalogue chapter.
Similarly, online catalogue entries must be prepared before being made accessible to the wider audience. After this, chapters may be modified or added to by users with editing permissions. If at some point the editorial board deems a chapter to be complete, the entry may be locked and no additional changes will be made, until a user with administrator permission opens the entry.
Chapters on information with need of constant update, as for example of a catalog of the Electronic Materials Group (EMG) may need to be frequently added to and may not be closed for additions at any point.

Linking pages and concepts within the chapters

One of the advantages of using a online collaborative knowledge base is the possibility of linking key words to another page in the website with a definition (products or procedures, for example). External links to other websites may be added in the references area, at the end of a page.

Commenting and editing

In each individual page, the 'Discussion' tab allows for commenting, so users with editing permissions may make suggestions or initiate other discussions.
The 'History' tab allows keeping track of which and when changes were made to the article and by whom.

Searchability

Searches will display results from the AIC wiki, but not from other AIC general website pages.

Text editing within MediaWiki software

Editing wiki entries with MediaWiki software utilizes HTML, but knowledge of HTML code is not necessary. There are shortcuts to allow basic WYSIWYG editing which are easy to use.

Style Guide

Page Naming

The names of wiki pages should be succinct. Avoid duplicating page titles; pages with similar titles should have some indication of why they are different, until such time that the wiki editors can agree on a more descriptive naming convention for similarly-sounding pages.

Do not include chapter headings/section numbers from the original printed paper catalogs in page titles. For example, instead of having "Book Conservation Catalog - Chapter 1 - Section 4 - Decorations", the title should be "BPG Book Decoration".

Having short, informative page titles is very important, as it helps both readers and editors find the information they need. In addition, it helps when creating new links in wiki content, as the link-search function only searches the beginning of a string, rather than the center. So if you are looking to insert a link to the page about "Decorations", you would have to know to type in "Books Section 3" first, instead of just "decorations".

Make it easy for your collaborators to find your content and link to it, use short titles!

Headers

Headers should be used to separate different sections of the same page. Use headers in order: your first header should be header 1 ("= Test ="), your second level of headers should be header 2 ("== Test 2 ==") and so on. Do not use Header 2 if there is no Header 1 preceding it.

Table of Contents

Wherever possible, use the default wiki Table of Contents instead of creating a custom coded one or removing the Table of Contents altogether. This allows for easier navigation of your wiki page. It also reduces the need to manually update links or add in new section links related to your Table of Contents. Using the default Table of Contents will also help create a consistent look across the wiki.

Bold, Italics, and Underlines

• Bold or italics can be used to designate important words in a paragraph, but only one at a time, not both. In other words, do not use bold AND italics, but rather bold OR italics.
• Do not use bold, italics, or underlines in place of header tags.

Text formatting

• Whenever possible, use the regular size text for body text. Disclaimer text or other small "warning" text can be included within a <small> tag, but should never be used for the entirety of a section or page.

• Avoid the use of ALL CAPS, except when part of the proper name of something, or as an acronym. ALL CAPS should not be used to create headers or otherwise designate different sections of a page.

• Use the built-in numbered and bulleted list function, wherever possible. Convert old-style lists to the wiki format, either by using # for numbered lists, or * for bulleted lists. Please do not include other characters to make ad-hoc lists, such as hypens, dashes, or indents.

Links, References and Bibliographies

• When citing references that are used in the body of the page (versus a "read more" type of bibliography at the bottom of the page), use the built-in reference style of the wiki. This allows the wiki software to automatically generate a properly-numbered list of references wherever the <references /> tag is placed.

The instructions for how to make references is available when editing a page, via the "Wikitext" tab in the editing panel.

Description	What you type
Reference	Page text.<ref name="test1">[http://www.example.org Link text], additional text.</ref>	Page text.
Additional use of same reference	<ref name="test" />	Page text.
Display references	<references />

• When citing sources that are not directly cited in the body of the page, as in a "Further Reading" section, use JAIC style formatting or the formatting specific to the specialty group responsible for the page.
• Do not write out URL's in either the built-in reference or in a "Further Reading" reference. Use links! This is important because the Wiki software can scan for broken links, but it has no idea if a link is broken if it's just written out instead of an actual link.
• Attach the link to descriptive text in the body, not to a written-out URL. For example, this is the correct way to do a link. This way: http://www.conservation-wiki.com/wiki/AIC-CC_User_Guidelines is incorrect
• When creating links, avoid all use of the phrasing "click here" or "go here" in the descriptive text of the link. Incorporate the linked word/phrase into the sentence structure in some other way, so it flows naturally.

Disclaimers, Copyright Information, and Contributor Information

• Frequently-used disclaimers and copyright information should be placed in a template. When creating the template, be sure to use the Magic Words for the date, if the pages retains a current copyright. For example, putting {{CURRENTYEAR}} instead of a static '2012' for the date, will output an always-current year, like so: 2024. Magic Words are incredibly useful, for instance did you know that it's Thursday, and the current month is November?

• Here is an example of a copyright/disclaimer template:

This page has been adapted from the Blank chapter of the Book Conservation Wiki's Nonexistent section. Copyright 2024. The Book Conservation Wiki is a publication of the Book and Paper Group of the American Institute for Conservation of Historic and Artistic Works. The Book Conservation Wiki is published as a convenience for the members of the Book and Paper Group. Publication does not endorse nor recommend any treatments, methods, or techniques described herein.

• Disclaimers can be placed at either the head or the footer of a page.

• Information about contributors or original publication information (such as when the source material was published) can be mentioned in the body of the text or in a separate section of the page. Please use headers to distinguish this material from the other sections of the page, so that it does not float above the Table of Contents. This will help maintain a consistent look throughout the wiki.

Community of Users

The intended users of the AIC wiki are the wider Conservation community and related preservation communities. Contributors to the AIC wiki - who can add, delete, or edit information - must be AIC members, trained conservators, or allied professionals chosen by their Specialty Group/Network/Committee as editing members of the entries. Wiki contributors are expected to behave in a professional and respectful manner toward other wiki volunteers, including Specialty Group/Network wiki chairs and coordinators.
Submissions of content will be added as volunteer worktime permits.

Levels of Access and Updates

Access Levels

The wiki site has varying degrees of user permissions. There is no limit of the number of users who can be defined to have the various levels of access (that is to say, there is no one set number of users with the first level of access, for example). Currently the wiki content is available to the public but only those with Creator access may edit information on the site or participate on the discussion pages. It is possible that additional levels of access may be created in the future.

Obtaining Access

All access is password protected to control who is making changes, but AIC members who wish to contribute may ask to do so. Users must first create an account by registering their login name. To promote transparency on the AIC wiki site usernames should follow the general protocol of first initial lastname (e.g. jdoe), alternatively members may use first name lastname (janedoe). Wiki usernames are case sensitive. To request a change your level of access please contact the AIC e-Editor User:RPArenstein.

Cross Specialty Contributions

All users with access to editing information may contribute. There will be no separate levels of access by specialty.
This feature will most likely lead to fruitful contributions and exchange across specialties.

Updates to the website

The person(s) in charge of each chapter is responsible for certifying updates.
AIC members should regularly access the site for updates. The website has a feature that will automatically send a notification when specific pages were updated, should users wish to activate it. AIC may regularly update membership lists on the developments of the chapters.

Disclaimers

All pages regarding treatment or hands-on procedure have a disclaimer to advert against the use of the described procedures by non-conservators.
The disclaimer reads: “ This article describes conservation procedures. It is meant to be used as exchange of technical information among trained art conservators and should not be used by non-conservators to intervene in cultural property."

Copyright and Licensing

With the exception of articles published by JAIC which require copyright transfer, all material published by AIC is governed by a license agreement. Under the terms of the license, authors retain copyright of their work and are free to publish the work elsewhere. AIC, however, retains the right to re-publish the work in various media and formats. Please visit the [Help:Copyright|Copyright page] For more details on copyright and license agreement permissions for AIC wiki Authors/Creators.

All content posted on the website will be covered by the terms of the license agreement: authors own material but grant AIC the right to publish it in the future. All posts keep a record of their author. Users of the website agree that their contributions may be viewed and used in the terms established under point 5 – Levels of Access.

History of Copyright for AIC Conservation Catalogs Transitioned to the Wiki

Prior to 2006 / 2007 most work published by AIC was not covered by any publication agreement, making re-publication, on the web or otherwise, problematic. Through a series of membership emails, AIC reached out to authors to make them aware of the new license agreement and publication policy. Authors wishing to opt out of the AIC license agreement were permitted to do so. No authors decided to opt out. As a result of this effort all catalog chapters are covered by the AIC license agreement permitting re-publication on the AIC website. Nevertheless, should a past contributor wish to have their content removed, AIC will comply, and the missing content will need to re-written.

All past contributors of content from the conservation catalogs were acknowledged on the site when the wiki was launched. No authors requested that their names be removed. New content is posted by authors or wiki team members and Authorship will be assessed by recording the names of all contributors to a page.

Images

Images inserted on previous catalogs will be scanned and posted on the website. Images posted onto the website should be owned by the user. Size should be maintained at 2MB or less. AIC's Guide to Digital Photography and Conservation Documentation (both editions) recommends 1024 x 768 pixels as the most common standardized resolution across various electronic devices. Images in this range allow a clear image to be viewed on most screens while loading quickly on most devices.

Development

Editors can expand on chapters on a restricted area of the site, and later post the information to the public site. This allows define an initial draft which is later open to contributions. Editors can also post previously published chapters, opening them up for revision. Still to be determined if there will there be a cost to SGs not covered by wiki grant for upkeep and/or expansion of wiki site going into the future.

Information Backup

To be determined with the IT developing company.