Journal: Vistua.com Backend Upgrade

We are now testing a new backend for Vistua.com. A backend is a software engineering term for software components which are separate from the front-end (the part the user interacts with).

Previously, the site had been running on a custom built SHTML framework which was getting out of control and becoming difficult to manage. The new backend retains the original appearance (with a few tweaks) but is running on top of PmWiki. PmWiki is a WikiWikiWeb engine, similar in functionality (although radically different in design) to MediaWiki, the software running the famous Wikipedia.

Most of the website has been migrated to the new system. Currently, the old tools page is not yet migrated due to technical difficulties. News & Notes also will not be migrating to PmWiki, at least not yet, because it has specialized needs which are not suited by wiki engines (the News & Notes backend is Wordpress).

A significant part of the WikiWikiWeb concept is the public editability of page. Except for some pages which are locked you can edit Vistua pages yourself. The benefit of this is that if you do not think a page is well designed you can fix it and if you think that a page that doesn’t exist should, you can create it. More information on this later. You can go a head and play with the “WikiSandbox” if you like.

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News & Notes is the a journal of The Vistua Network Administration and the factuality of this content is guaranteed. From time-to-time, this content may contain normative statements or set policy.