Yet another platform recommendation: web (LAMP) based scientific/engineering knowledge base
by lpallard from LinuxQuestions.org on (#4T914)
Over the years I have gathered hundreds of technical papers (PDFs) on various science/engineering topics, built several excel tools and spreadsheets, and written lots of contents in word files. This is all neatly stored in a cloud server. While the content is easily accessible, one need to know what they're searching for, it is not easy to navigate, and doesnt allow to "link" or "merge" the entire contents of the server as a single knowledge base.
As a result, I am searching for a specific type of web based platform which would allow to create "articles" with text, hyperlinks, formulae and pictures.
For example, if one need to work on a specific calculation, an article would provide the basic information (inputs parameters, assumptions, etc) while linking to other articles for more advanced analyses. Tools could also be retrieved via hyperlinks (matlab files, excel spreadsheets, etc). References could also be provided (linking to PDF files, etc).
Basically I see this platform as something like Wikipedia, where one can create an article (a page) with some text, populate the article with pictures and formulae, and add hyperlinks to external files.
Mediawiki would probably work, but it needs specific content coding which the users won't know. I prefer a "WYSIWYG" approach which will allow to create richer content without the burden of platform specific coding (more or less analog to an online word processor). For equations, I guess "LaTeX" format is OK, but an editor (like MS Word) is prefered, although I doubt such platform would allow to create formulae that easy.
The other requirement is the ability to create tables of contents and indexes. You can imagine after a few years, there will be hundreds of articles, each with specific categories, topics and keywords. This platform should be able to provide a table of contents to navigate the knowledge base efficiently, and the ability to search by keywords with filters for powerful searches.
MySQL (MariaDB) storage is prefered over proprietary database storage.
Wordpress or Drupal wont cut it, they (AFAIK) require too much coding and web programming knowledge/expertise, and would require a trermendous amount of mods (plugins, etc) to achieve the end result. With such solutions, I would need to start from scratch and build on, which will probably end up with a crash or malfunction of some sort since I am not qualified to build such web platforms. There's gotta be an already functional opensource solution out there?
Looking forward to some replies and recommendations! Thanks.
As a result, I am searching for a specific type of web based platform which would allow to create "articles" with text, hyperlinks, formulae and pictures.
For example, if one need to work on a specific calculation, an article would provide the basic information (inputs parameters, assumptions, etc) while linking to other articles for more advanced analyses. Tools could also be retrieved via hyperlinks (matlab files, excel spreadsheets, etc). References could also be provided (linking to PDF files, etc).
Basically I see this platform as something like Wikipedia, where one can create an article (a page) with some text, populate the article with pictures and formulae, and add hyperlinks to external files.
Mediawiki would probably work, but it needs specific content coding which the users won't know. I prefer a "WYSIWYG" approach which will allow to create richer content without the burden of platform specific coding (more or less analog to an online word processor). For equations, I guess "LaTeX" format is OK, but an editor (like MS Word) is prefered, although I doubt such platform would allow to create formulae that easy.
The other requirement is the ability to create tables of contents and indexes. You can imagine after a few years, there will be hundreds of articles, each with specific categories, topics and keywords. This platform should be able to provide a table of contents to navigate the knowledge base efficiently, and the ability to search by keywords with filters for powerful searches.
MySQL (MariaDB) storage is prefered over proprietary database storage.
Wordpress or Drupal wont cut it, they (AFAIK) require too much coding and web programming knowledge/expertise, and would require a trermendous amount of mods (plugins, etc) to achieve the end result. With such solutions, I would need to start from scratch and build on, which will probably end up with a crash or malfunction of some sort since I am not qualified to build such web platforms. There's gotta be an already functional opensource solution out there?
Looking forward to some replies and recommendations! Thanks.