Consider TWiki [1] which pioneered the structured wiki [2] concept 10 years ago. Other wiki engines copied the idea, but many require you to program in PHP or Java to add structure to content. In TWiki you add structure by creating a wiki application using some wiki markup. With this you can create contact lists, call center status boards, to-do lists, inventory systems, employee handbooks, bug trackers, blog applications and more. The power of structured wiki is that you can mix structured content (form data, table data) with unstructured content (wiki content).

The basic steps to create a TWiki forms based wiki application are as follows:

1. Create a form that defines the database schema: Named form fields with type (text, date, checkboxes, select, ...) and with initial value.
2. Create a template page and attach the form to it.
3. Create a form to instantiate a new page based on that template page. A set of pages that share the same type of form build a database table.
4. Embed SQL-like queries in pages to query and format a table.

I wrote two blog posts that introduce structured wikis [3] and wiki applications [4]. The Wikis for Dummies book I co-authored [5] has step by step instructions on how to create wiki application using TWiki. You can create your own wiki applications, or if you prefer, TWIKI.NET sells ready made applications [6].

The open source TWiki entry on WikiMatrix is at http://www.wikimatrix.org/show/TWiki

-- peter.thoeny.public [at] twiki [dot] net - http://www.twiki.net/ - http://twiki.org/

[1]: http://www.twiki.net/ and http://twiki.org/
[2]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Structured_wiki - Wikipedia article on structured wiki
[3]: http://www.twiki.net/blog_2007-06-01.html - what is a structured wiki? (blog)
[4]: http://www.twiki.net/blog_2007-06-04.html - wiki applications and the long tail (blog)
[5]: http://www.amazon.com/Wikis-Dummies-Com … 0470043997 - Wikis for Dummies
[6]: http://www.twiki.net/twiki_applications.html - TWiki applications

Ben,

  Take a look at MindTouch Deki.  MindTouch Deki includes extensions for exposing data from MySQL, SQL, Access, and more.  You can create the database you want or use one that already exists and expose the data within Deki.  From there you can take it one step further and mash it up with graphs and other applications which gives a flexible dashboard within the Wiki. 

You can download MindTouch Deki here: http://wiki.mindtouch.com