TiddlyWiki and ZimWiki are great for people looking for personal wiki software. Both are great for taking notes. BookStack – is a free and open-source wiki that have authentication integration with login providers such as such as GitHub, Google, Slack, AzureAD, Okta and LADP. If you follow this instructions you'll get a personal wiki running in your Mac as a native app. The process is a bit long but I promise that in the end you will have a great tool. Th is is a good weekend project, when you have enough time and wont be interrupted. Jun 04, 2020 Get Wiki on a Stick, or WoaS. WoaS is a single.html file which can contain an entire Wiki. This is not nearly as advanced as MediaWiki, the software which powers Wikipedia, wikiHow, and other sites, but is far easier and quicker to set up and use. If you are still unsure you really want a Wiki, it is a great place to test the waters.
I want to share with you my knowledge base system. I need one because there's a lot of new information every day about the topics I care about (web development, design, Mac, iOS...). For a long time I searched for a good tool to store all my links, notes and micro tutorials I write for myself. Usually for my notes I use nvALT synced with Elements for iPad/iPhone over Dropbox, this is a great combo but lacks the organic order and power of a wiki. So I started using a personal wiki and I want to share how I use a web app in my Mac just as a native a app.
<h2>Why a wiki?</h2>
After years of testing applications I've noticed they all had something that made me look for different solutions, that thing was that all applications are designed to work with a workflow designed by the developer but not my own work flow. We all have different needs depending on our activities, although we all need to store information this information is varied and the way we need to organize and query it is also different. I discovered that a wiki is the most organic way to work because it allows users to create their own information system. For example, I have an HTML section on my wiki, every time I find a new article about HTML5 or a new framework it goes to that section. I have other sections like 'CSS', 'WordPress', 'Git', 'PHP', 'Mac OS X', 'iOS', etc. And this sections are linked between each other. This way I'm curating a personal knowledge base about things important for me personally and for my work. If you follow this instructions you'll get a personal wiki running in your Mac as a native app. The process is a bit long but I promise that in the end you will have a great tool. Th is is a good weekend project, when you have enough time and wont be interrupted.
<h2>What do you need?</h2>
This solution will require us to install some apps in our Mac. At the end you'll get a personal wiki that will behave as a native application on your Mac and will be simple to use, but before getting to that point you need the following:
<ul>
<li><a href='http://www.dokuwiki.org/dokuwiki'>DokuWiki</a> (free web application)</li>
<li><a href='http://www.mamp.info/en/index.html'>MAMP</a> (free native application)</li>
<li><a href='http://db.tt/QPsACWL'>Dropbox</a> (free native application)</li>
<li>AppleScript Editor (operating system application)</li>
<li>Keychain Access (operating system application)</li>
<li><a href='http://fluidapp.com/'>Fluid</a> (free native application)</li>
</ul>
<h2>Why DokuWiki?</h2>
The wiki you are going to install is a web application called DokuWiki, I chose this wiki for several characteristics and features that make it the best choice for this kind of use: its lightweight and simple, has a friendly user interface, has an easy to learn syntax and it doesn't require a database, instead of database it operates through simple text documents. Another important aspect is that DokuWiki has a large base of users who have developed plug-ins and themes that enhance the functionality of the application. Lets get started:
<em><strong>1.- Dropbox</strong></em>
First you need to install Dropbox on your Mac by downloading it from the link above. To download and use the app you should create a free account in the Dropbox website. For now you will only install the application, it will be useful later but it is important to do this before the next step.
<em><strong>2.- MAMP</strong></em>
Now you must install MAMP downloading it from the link above, this is an application that allows you to run an Apache server with PHP in your Mac which you will need to run the wiki. DokuWiki is an application developed in PHP, as you know PHP is a scripting language running on the server side, this means that you need a server with PHP installed to run the scripts and the result is sent to your computer (the client). With MAMP your Mac will be both, the server and the client.
Personal Wiki For Mac
<ul>
<li>MAMP installation is simple because it has its own installer that does all the work for you, and removeing MAMP is easy as well, it only requires you to delete the MAMP application folder.</li>
<li>Once installed open MAMP and it requires you to type your password (the one you use in your Mac session), then a page will open in your browser, thats the control panel for your server, this means that the application is successfully installed.</li>
<li>Open MAMP preferences and they should look like this:</li>
</ul>
Free Personal Wiki
<ul>
<li>In the ports section you should press the button that changes the preset ports for Apache and SQL, so that they're set as follows:</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>Finally make a change in the Apache section, here you are asked to select a directory, this directory should be the one where your wiki will live in. You can select one or create a new one but it is important that you choose one within Dropbox, for example here you can see I chose the directory: /Users/carlos/Dropbox/DevProjects/PHP</li>
</ul>
Your directory should look something like this: /Users/xxxxxx/Dropbox/xxxxxx
<ul>
<li>Finally close and relaunch MAMP to ensure its still functioning properly.If in the beginning or after the configuration MAMP doesn't open the page in the browser or the MAMP window indicators are in red instead of green it means that something is not working properly and there are thousands of different causes for this. If you require assistance please go to the MAMP forums or google it.</li>
</ul>
<em><strong>3.- DokuWiki</strong></em>
<ul>
<li>Now download and install DokuWiki. Once downloaded you must place the extracted files in the directory you chose in MAMP earlier.</li>
<li>Launch MAMP and in your browser enter this URL: http://localhost/xxxxxx/install.php where xxxxxx is the name of the directory where you moved the DokuWiki files to.</li>
<li>This is the install page for DokuWiki, here you'll choose the name of the wiki and will set a user account. You'll also have to choose if the wiki will be public or private. As this wiki will live in your Mac instead of the web you may choose to make it public or if you'll keep confidential information in there you can make private to use a password.</li>
<li>When you finish the installation you'll get to the main wiki page whose URL is http://localhost/xxxxxx/doku.php</li>
</ul>
At this point you'll have a wiki running on your Mac, to learn more about how to configure DokuWiki, the syntax, plug-ins and themes visit the official site. Although this is already working you will need to do some more things to make it work like a native application. The following steps are optional but will allow the wiki to behave as an ordinary application in your Mac.
<em><strong>4.- Open MAMP without typing your password</strong></em>
Every time you open MAMP to start the Apache server it requires your password, it is also very annoying having to open MAMP every time you want to use your wiki. To solve this you will make a small application that will open MAMP each time you log on to your account without requiring a password.
<ul>
<li>First open the Keychain Access application that is found in the Utilities folder within the Applications folder.</li>
</ul>
Online Personal Wiki
<ul>
<li>Add a new element called MAMP with your session account and password and save it:</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>Now open AppleScript Editor found in the same directory as the previous application, there you are going to do a little script, this can be modified to suit your needs but if you copy and paste this code it will work perfectly:</li>
</ul>
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