OpenWetWare:Software/Projects/Lab Notebooks

Lab Notebooks

Note: this page is not intended as a general discussion of lab notebooks but implementation status on features coming from the Lab Notebooks working group.

Initial Discussion: Friday October 5, 2007

• Will post details on my deliverables later this week.

Initial Discussion: Wednesday January 9, 2008

Current Status

• Worked with Jason on a new model
  • Based upon Austin's model
    • Uses DPL
    • Plan to move to Semantic MW
    • Austin's model used a project form with a date header
    • Jason's model permits entry by date
      • Splits dates into project views
      • Projects are based on main page
      • Projects creaetd using a template and "create box"
      • All Entry pages (by date) can be accessed from the Project view
      • Currently uses an intermediate file to rewrite entries as they are created
      • DPL allows these pages to be viewed in a clean format
      • Currently finishing mods Jason and I agreed to on 1/8/2008

Oerview

We're also putting up a new lab notebook on OWW this week. One advantage of using this is that I'm actively working on it and looking for input. Jason, Barry, and Austin have been providing input. Jason and I have based it on work that Austin did for a version he uses. Both Barry and Austin currently use that one.

Individual entries are made for multiple projects within daily entry pages. The main page of the Lab Notebook is the jumping off-point for all activity. All daily pages are always accessible. Since this uses MediaWiki, all edits and revisions of the pages are always online. It has a "big brother" characteristic of never letting anyone make an entry that isn't properly time-date and project-stamped. In other words, you'll always know when the entry was made, who the user was, and what project the entry is associated with.

I'll have a structured walk-through of the entire lab notebook available Friday.

This is how it works:

1. You'll see a new 'My Lab Notebook" link at the left-hand top of OWW pages on Friday.

• Jason R. Kelly I think we should roll this out with a beta-test group (still on the main site) but not have this link pop up on everyones toolbar just yet.

2. Click on it to go to the front page of the notebook.

3. You can create multiple projects on the notebook's main page.

4. The calendar will allow you to see all of the dates for the month.

5. Click on a date to either create a new date entry or go to an existing one.

6. A simple template is used to identify the content in the entry page for each project.

7. Saving the page will update each project with the entries just created.

8. On the main Lab Notebook page, the projects will all display all activity by date for that notebook.

9 We will be adding a search button that will only search the contents of the lab notebook rather than all OWW pages.

10. We also are adding a single-button export to allow users to save a copy of the notebook outside of OWW if they move on.

11. This will work with the WSIWG editor.

12. Users can customize the format the projects use as the creation template. For instance, for your class, you may want a specific way to view the content or to automatically link the entries to a category tag for your class.

13. The same will hold for the daily entries. A format will allow the pages to be templated with specific information. Every new daily entry will always start out with the same content before the user edits it.

14. There's no need for a private wiki for it. The Lab Notebook will be rooted in the User:[UserName] page range that the User's personal pages already use.

15. We can also customize the Toolbox the user has access to when working with the Lab Notebok. If you have specific documents, such as assignments, to post for the class, the custom toolbox will be present when they are using pages tagged as part of the Lab Notebook.

16. We can set up the toolbar in a way that allows you to modify the contents of it but keep the students from changing it.