Abstract:
Selection of content for sharing is described. An indication of desired content to be shared between a first database and a second database is sent from the first database to the second database. The first database receives desired content corresponding to the indication and a relevancy determination corresponding to a threshold fraction of users that tag the desired content to a particular category. A first version of the desired content is identified in the first database. A second version of the desired content is received by the first database from the second database upon an identification, at the second database, of the second version of the desired content.

Description:
CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION 
       [0001]    This application is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11/680,578, filed Feb. 28, 2007, the entirety of which is hereby incorporated herein by reference. 
     
    
     FIELD 
       [0002]    The present disclosure relates to online collaboration, and more particularly, it relates to content sharing. 
       BACKGROUND 
       [0003]    A Wiki is a piece of server software that allows users to freely create and edit Web page content using any Web browser. Wiki supports hyperlinks and employs a simple text syntax for creating new pages and crosslinks between internal pages on the fly. Of note, a Wiki allows the organization of contributions to be edited in addition to the content itself, otherwise known as “open editing.” This allows everyday users to create and edit any page in a Web site, encourages democratic use of the Web, and promotes content composition by non-technical users. Wikis are popular due to their simplistic approach. The time needed to learn how to use a wiki is less than most typical content management systems or HTML editors. 
         [0004]    Today, hundreds of different wiki engines exist. However, these wiki engines all have a different syntax and different user interfaces. Thus, current Wiki engines are mostly monolithic applications. 
         [0005]    Unfortunately, this results in different wikis being unable to share content with each other. This effectively limits the breadth of information that can be encompassed by any one wiki. In addition, it results in various wikis being repetitive of each other. 
         [0006]    Accordingly, it may be desirable to provide methods and systems that allow for wikis to be distributed and to be able share content. It may also be desirable to provide methods and systems for sharing content with wikis or other types of websites that have slow or intermittent network connectivity. 
     
    
     
       BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 
         [0007]    The accompanying drawings, which are incorporated in and constitute a part of this specification, illustrate embodiments of the invention and together with the description, serve to explain the principles of the invention. In the figures: 
           [0008]      FIG. 1  illustrates an exemplary distributed wiki system that is consistent with the principles of the present invention; 
           [0009]      FIG. 2  illustrates an exemplary architecture of a distributed wiki that is consistent with the principles of the present invention; 
           [0010]      FIG. 3  illustrates a general process for distributed wikis to share content in accordance with the principles of the present invention; 
           [0011]      FIG. 4  illustrates an exemplary lifecycle of a page of content in the distributed wikis; and 
           [0012]      FIG. 5  illustrates another exemplary lifecycle of a page of content in the distributed wikis. 
       
    
    
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION 
       [0013]    Embodiments of the present invention provide a way to combining content on web sites that can be edited over the Internet using distributed revision control. This also makes it possible to use writable web sites while not being connected to the Internet. In some embodiments, the present invention may be applied to wikis. In particular, when a wiki reconnects, differences are automatically sent over and changes from other wikis are merged automatically. Wikis may also be synchronized on a periodic or event driven basis. Embodiments of the present invention may also be used for load balancing between wikis, or to share information with users who can only occasionally connect to the Internet. 
         [0014]    In some embodiments, conflicting changes at various wikis are permitted to persist in merged versions. This permits users to become aware of the edits and input from across the entire wiki-base. Conflicting changes may eventually be resolved manually, for example, by an editor at one of the wikis Upon receiving such a version, the embodiments of the present invention utilize that version as the reference point for tracking future changes. 
         [0015]    The content shared between wikis may be specified in various ways. For example, one wiki may provide the other a set of tags indicating content that is desired for sharing. These tags may relate to various subjects or themes of content at a wiki. 
         [0016]    Reference will now be made in detail to the exemplary embodiments of the invention, which are illustrated in the accompanying drawings. Wherever possible, the same reference numbers will be used throughout the drawings to refer to the same or like parts. 
         [0017]      FIG. 1  illustrates an exemplary distributed wiki system  100  that is consistent with the principles of the present invention. As shown, system  100  may comprise a plurality of wiki systems  102   a - b  and one or more clients  104  that are coupled together via a network  106 . 
         [0018]    Wiki systems  102   a - b  may represent websites in which content is contributed and may be edited. Wiki systems  102   a - b  may comprise the hardware and software for providing a wiki. Wiki systems  102   a - b  may be implemented using well known components of hardware, such as a general purpose server having one or more processors, a memory, storage, etc. 
         [0019]    Wiki systems  102   a - b  also may comprise well known collaborative software that runs the Wiki. This software typically allows web pages to be created and edited using a web browser. Wiki software may be implemented as a server side script that runs on one or more web servers, with the content generally stored in a relational database. Wiki systems  102   a - b  are further described with reference to  FIG. 2 . 
         [0020]    Clients  104  provide a user interface for system  100 . Clients  104  may be implemented using a variety of devices and software. For example, clients  104  may be implemented on a personal computer, workstation, or terminal. In addition, clients  104  may run under an operating system, such as the LINUX operating system, the Microsoft™ Windows operating system, and the like. Clients  104  may also operate through an Internet browser application, such as Firefox by Mozilla, Internet Explorer by Microsoft Corporation, or Netscape Navigator by Netscape Communications Corporation. 
         [0021]    One skilled in the art will also recognize that clients  104  may be implemented with various peripheral devices, such as a display, one or more speakers, and other suitable devices that are capable of providing feedback information to a user. Clients  104  may also be implemented with various peripherals for accepting input from a user, such as a keyboard, a mouse, and the like. Although  FIG. 1  shows a single client, system  100  may include any number of clients. 
         [0022]    Network  106  serves as a communications infrastructure for system  100 . Network  106  may comprise one or more networks, such as a local area network, or wide area network. In addition, network  106  may support a wide variety of known protocols, such as the transport control protocol and Internet protocol (“TCP/IP”) and hypertext transport protocol (“HTTP”). 
         [0023]      FIG. 2  illustrates an exemplary architecture of a distributed wiki system that is consistent with the principles of the present invention. As shown, wiki system  102   a  (or  102   b ) may comprise a page management module  200 , a control module  202 , a search engine  204 , a database management system  206 , a page database  208 , a control database  210 , a search index  212 , and a version control system  214 . 
         [0024]    Page management module  200  manages the content of wiki system  102   a.  For example, page management module  200  manages the creation, read and modification of pages by users of wiki system  102   a.    
         [0025]    Control module  202  manages certain administrative functions of wiki system  102   a.  For example, control module  202  may control user accounts and authentication, tracking user histories of pages visited, user/IP address blocking, and providing various special pages, such as database logs, server histories, etc. 
         [0026]    Search engine  204  allows users to search the content of wiki system  102   a.  For example, a user may enter various key words and, in response, search engine  204  may provide a listing of pages in wiki system  102   a  that contain the entered key words. 
         [0027]    Database management system  206  manages the access and modification of information stored in the databases of wiki system  102 . Database management  206  may be implemented as a relational database system. Such systems are well known. 
         [0028]    Page database  208  serves as the repository for the content pages of wiki system  102 . Control database  210  contains the administrative information of wiki system  102 , such as user accounts, user histories, etc. Search index  212  is a search index data structure to assist search engine  204 . 
         [0029]    Version control system  214  controls and synchronizes the content contained in wiki systems  102   a - b . Version control system  214  is configured to allow multiple simultaneous editing of pages on any of wiki systems  102   a - b . In some embodiments, version control system  214  does not enforce a change conflict resolution and instead allows for conflicting changes to persist. In order to indicate conflicting changes, wiki systems  102   a - b  may instead employ a markup display or dual display that highlights the conflicting changes. 
         [0030]    All changes are distributed by merging (pushing/pulling) between wiki systems  102   a - b . This allows wiki systems  102   a - b  to collaborate with each other even one is temporarily without a network connection to network  106 . Furthermore, version control system  214  also allows wiki systems  102   a - b  full revision control capabilities without requiring permissions to be granted by a central authority. 
         [0031]    The sharing relationships between wiki systems  102   a - b  may be in different forms. One wiki may fully share all of its content with another wiki. Alternatively, a wiki may share only portions of its content with other wikis Furthermore, wikis may merge changes from other wikis with different priorities. For example, one wiki may automatically accept any changes provided from another wiki. However, in other cases, a wiki may accept only selected changes provided from another wiki. This feature allows wikis to establish different levels of sharing and editing authority with each other while sharing content. 
         [0032]    In some embodiments, version control system  214  employs delta encoding to store and transmit changes between wiki systems  102   a - b . In delta encoding, changes are encoded in the form of differences between sequential data rather than complete files. Version control system  214  may be configured to push/pull changes and merge with other wikis on a periodic or event driven basis. For example, version control system  214  may be configured to automatically synchronize with other wikis on a daily or hourly basis. In addition, version control system  214  may be configured to automatically synchronize with other wikis upon establishing or reestablishing a connection to network  106 . 
         [0033]    Wiki systems  102   a - b  may select or filter the content that is shared between them. For example, an administrator at wiki system  102   a  may provide or select various themes or categories of content that are interest at wiki system  102   b.  Wiki systems  102   a - b  may filter content to determine content that is desired or may filter content and remove content that is undesired. The filtering process may also be performed either at wiki systems  102   a  or  102   b , alone or in combination with each other. 
         [0034]    In some embodiments, the administrator may specify various tags that indicate the desired content to be shared by wiki system  102   a  with wiki system  102   b.  Wiki systems  102   a - b  may query based on tags using a uniform resource identifier (URI) handler and a syntax, such as tag:&lt;tag&gt;. Tags are commonly used in wikis to organize and categorize their content. Wiki content may comprise multiple tags to indicate various contexts of the content. Using tags, wiki systems  102   a  and  102   b  can search and identify the content categorized under a tag or a collection of tags. Tags in wiki systems  102   a - b  may be predefined, e.g., by an administrator, or may be automatically created as content posted in the wikis. 
         [0035]    Wiki systems  102   a  and  102   b  may select relevant content based on the tagging used in the content. For example, the relevance of a particular piece content may be measured by the fraction of users that tag the particular piece content to a category. In addition, relevance may consider a relative fraction of tagging. For example, web page articles having been tagged with “sports” as category may require a higher fraction to be considered relevant versus articles on obscure topics, such as “particle physics.” This algorithm may be useful to overcome mistagging as well as to account for the commonality or obscurity of a desired content. This algorithm may also be useful in filtering for desired content. For example, wiki systems  102   a - b  may restrict themselves to sharing content that only have relatively high relevance to a desired category above a given threshold. 
         [0036]    In some embodiments, wiki systems  102   a - b  may calculate various statistics related to how content is tagged. For example, wiki systems  102   a - b  may calculate various percentile distributions of how often a piece of content was categorized in a given category. Other statistics, such as mean, median, standard deviation, etc., may also be calculated. Accordingly, wiki systems  102   a - b  may utilize well known statistical techniques to identify content that is relevant to a desired category. 
         [0037]    In addition, wiki systems  102   a - b  may be configured to search for content using their respective indexing schemes. For example, some wikis provide an index or categories listing to assist in organizing the content. One well known scheme is the categories listing used by WikiMedia Foundation, Inc. Of note, wiki systems  102   a - b  may be configured to accommodate different implementations of wiki tagging. This allows wiki systems  102   a - b  to implement their own naming conventions, syntax, etc., yet still be able to share content with each other. 
         [0038]    In order to illustrate how wiki systems  102   a - b  can share content,  FIGS. 3-5  are provided.  FIG. 3  illustrates a general process for distributed wikis to share content in accordance with the principles of the present invention.  FIG. 4  illustrates an exemplary lifecycle of a page of content in the distributed wikis.  FIG. 5  illustrates another exemplary lifecycle of a page of content in the distributed wikis. These figures will now be briefly described. 
         [0039]    Referring now to  FIG. 3 , an exemplary process by wiki systems  102   a - b  for sharing content is provided. For purposes of illustration,  FIG. 3  provides as an example wiki system  102   a  sharing selected content from wiki system  102 . In order to establish this form of sharing, wiki system  102   a  may first provide selected content themes, categories, or tags that indicate the desired content to be shared. For example, wiki system  102   a  may provide a set of tags or categories to wiki system  102   b.    
         [0040]    In response, wiki system  102   b  may receive this information and search its content database  208  for relevant content. For example, the tags from wiki system  102   a  may be passed to search engine  204 . Search engine  204  may then search its search index  212  based on the provided tags and locate the content in content database  208 . 
         [0041]    In addition, wiki system  102   b  may perform other related tasks. For example, wiki system  102   b  may authenticate that wiki system  102   a  is approved for sharing content. This processing may be performed by control module  202  and queries to control database  210 . 
         [0042]    Next, wiki system  102   b  may provide the selected content to wiki system  102   a.  In order to preserve network bandwidth or processing resources, wiki system  102   b  may perform this upload to wiki system  102   a  in portions, or at less busy times of the day. Wiki system  102   b  may also be configured to upload its shared content on a periodic basis, for example, as requested by an administrator. Alternatively, wiki system  102   b  may simply provide links to the shared content, which are accessible from wiki system  102   a.    
         [0043]    Wiki system  102   a  stores the shared content to its content database  208 , and thus, allows its users to view and edit the content. Accordingly, users of wiki system  102   a  now have the benefit of shared content from wiki system  102   b.    
         [0044]    Finally, wiki systems  102   a - b  may exchange changes to their shared content with each other. For example, as noted above, the version control systems  214  of systems  102   a - b  may exchange delta encoded changes with each other to indicate changes in shared content.  FIG. 3  illustrates a fully symmetric sharing relationship between wiki systems  102   a  and  102   b . However, one skilled in the art will recognize that wiki systems  102   a  and  102   b  may exchange changes in an asymmetric fashion. 
         [0045]    For example, wiki system  102   a  may be system that only intermittently has network access. Thus, changes submitted to wiki system  102   a  may be exchanged with wiki system  102   b  with higher priority to take advantage of a current network access of wiki system  102   a.  Alternatively, wiki system  102   a  may be a site where content is primarily viewed, but not edited. Hence, changes from wiki system  102   b  to  102   a  may be given more priority. Other variations in exchanging content changes are also within the principles of the present invention. 
         [0046]      FIG. 4  illustrates an exemplary lifecycle of content that is shared between wiki systems  102   a - b . As shown, it is assumed that wiki systems  102   a - b  start with a clean (or base) version of the content. A clean or base version may be any version of the content which is used as reference point for identifying changes. Over time, either of wiki systems  102   a  or  102   b  receives edits to the content. These changes may come from a variety of source, such as the users of either wiki systems  102   a  or  102   b.  In addition, some of these changes may or may not conflict with each other. 
         [0047]    For example, as shown at wiki system  102   a,  changes  1  and  2  have been received. Meanwhile, at wiki system  102   b,  changes  2 ′ and  3  have been received. In this example, changes  1  and  3  are non-conflicting changes, i.e., changes to different sections of text. However, changes  2  and  2 ′ are conflicting, i.e., changes to the same section of text. 
         [0048]    In particular, as shown, wiki systems  102   a  and  102   b  perform an automated synchronization with each other. During this synchronization, version control systems  214  at wiki systems  102   a  and  102   b  attempt to merge the changes together. However, unlike conventional versioning systems, the present invention generally allows for conflicting changes to continue even after synchronization. Therefore, as shown after synchronization, the content now includes changes  1  and  3 , and changes  2  and  2 ′. 
         [0049]    Changes  2  and  2 ′ may co-exist or continue in the content in various forms. For example, conflicting changes may be highlighted or annotated. In addition, wiki systems  102   a  and  102   b  may present conflicting changes in different ways. For example, at wiki system  102   a , conflicting changes are presented in the order of  2  then  2 ′, whereas wiki system  102   b  may present these same changes in the order of  2 ′ then  2 . This scheme may be employed, for example, to assist users in readily identifying which wiki system was the source of a change. Of course, other ways of presenting conflicting changes is within the principles of the present invention, such as displaying them side by side. 
         [0050]    One skilled in the art will recognize that allowing conflicting changes to continue after a synchronization process is unlike conventional version control systems or typical wiki systems. Typically, version control systems require that all conflicting changes must be resolved before allowing further edits to a particular piece of content. The present invention provides a mechanism to allow for a wide spectrum of changes and allows for conflicting changes to continue so that various users can see them. 
         [0051]      FIG. 5  illustrates more of the exemplary lifecycle of shared content between wiki systems  102   a  and  102   b.  In particular, at wiki system  102   a,  an additional change  4  has been made to the content. However, at wiki system  102   b,  a user or administrator has made manually edited the content to resolve the conflicting changes  2  and  2 ′. Accordingly, wiki system  102   b  has transitioned to a new clean version, or new base version. 
         [0052]    A new clean or base version of the content may be designated in various ways. For example, the user or administrator making the edits may be prompted to indicate whether their edits result in a new clean version or if they are simply more edits. Alternatively, wiki system  102   b  may provide a report or notification to an administrator that requests resolution of content having conflicting changes. Upon responding to this report or notification, wiki system  102   b  may then designate a new clean version into its content database  208 . 
         [0053]    Subsequently, wiki system  102   b  may provide the new clean version to wiki system  102   a.  The new clean version may be appropriately marked as new clean version in the delta encoding provided from version control system  214 . Upon recognizing the receipt of a new clean version, wiki system  102   a  may store it in its content database  208  and will then proceed with using this version as the reference point for changes. 
         [0054]    For example, as shown, the new clean version has merged and resolved changes  1 ,  2 ,  2 ′, and  3 . However, change  4  has not been considered in the new clean version. Accordingly, wiki systems  102   a  and  102   b  may exchange change information, which results in a new version that includes change  4 . Processing and sharing of content by wiki systems  102   a  and  102   b  may then proceed as described above. One skilled in the art will recognize that these processes of sharing content may be modified in various ways. 
         [0055]    Other embodiments of the invention will be apparent to those skilled in the art from consideration of the specification and practice of the invention disclosed herein. It is intended that the specification and examples be considered as exemplary only, with a true scope and spirit of the invention being indicated by the following claims.