Barblefork. A Fork of WikyBlog?

Well, well, well. What is *Barblefork* in the first place? Have you ever heard about a "bliki"? A bliki is simply a mash-up of a blog and a wiki; *BL*og + *wIKI*. That's it! What a bliki does is that it gives the webmaster some of the features of a wiki (open editing(depends on the script one is using), version control of pages, watching of pages, wiki syntax etc.) and blogging (comments, posts/entries). Barblefork is just that. It is the bliki script that is out to be the Wordpress of the *Blikisphere*.

History

 I created Barblefork out of the source code of WikyBlog, a neglected bliki engine. I love wikis more than blogs. The very first site I ever created was a wiki site. The good thing about the script I was using then was that it had comments for its wiki pages in addition to blogging features right out of the box. I guess this *blogging/blicking* feature fired up my interest in running a dedicated bliki script for my next site. Unfortunately, I neglected my site and I saw no need of it after it was hacked into. Meanwhile, I was searching all over cyberspace for bliki software until I found WikyBlog. I installed on my server and since then I have played around with some of its features while using it for my notes.

Why the Fork?

Let me give the reasons in the form of a list.

1.  *Geekiness*. Here is one truth: the average webmaster or newbie is not that interested in complicated bells and whistles. In fact this can be a turn off. The parent script, although still in BETA, still has some nerdy stuff e.g enhanced scrolling (what is that?), enhanced tabbed browsing (anyone?), maps.
2. *Developer Links*. WikyBlog has 5 more links on the side menu pointing to the developer's site in addition to the footer link. For any average blogger/*blicker* who doesn't know how to switch them off, this can dissuade from using the script. A footer link is enough, aye?
3. *Developement pace*. The last release of WikyBlog was uploaded more than 1 year ago.
4. *Usability* WikyBlog's tabbed interface is quite confusing to an average surfer. The comments system is based on MediaWiki's Talk page feature; it's not quite an attractive feature. Enhanced scrolling???? . 
5. *Target Audience*. The [[http://www.wikyblog.com|parent script's]] footer link's title reads "WikyBlog, not exactly a wiki, not exactly a blog"!!!Barblefork's bliki will be much more biased towards blogging but will still keep some wiki features such as version control, wikis syntax...

Developers

Saul Ramissisu (kenymblogs@gmail.com). I am not a developer in any way so if you'd like to contribute to the codebase, PM me on SourceForge (saul112@users.sourceforge.net) and I'll set you up.