Peter,

I really was not thinking about a wiki, I was thinking about a message board. Why? You as an atendee of a wiki already have noticed that a wiki lacks of rules, standards, etc, and that, sure, is the spirit of freedom, and self-organization of a wiki. When you try to implement a wiki at some company, you'll have to add some more functionality, like security, organization, standards etc, while cutting out some of a pure wiki's features.

I'm trying to learn all I can about wiki's philosophy (as a sport!) and even attending at other wikis, elsewhere. If you like the wiki idea (like I do), please let me tell you a great book about wikis (the first and only one, as far as I know): "The Wiki Way, Quick Collaboration on the Web" by Bo Leuf and Ward Cunningham ( ISBN 020171499X ). I'm still reading it and having great fun.

You'll find code inside the companion CD that creates a wiki for you to play with. Really nice. The authors discuss every aspect of the implementation of wiki, for your own use (in your notebook, for example), for public, academic or company use.

Back to start. I really meant a message board. Why? It has some more added structure and rules you can state. Please, check (if you haven't yet) West Wind's Message Board (http://www.west-wind.com/wwthreads/) and you will understand what I mean. How to get that software (if you like it)? Just purchase West-Wind's WebConnection (US$399), and all the source code of the message board app (wwThreads) come along for free, among other goods. You can use it (one copy of WC yelds one copy of wwThreads per web server), modify it, enhance it etc.

Of course a wiki has its own place in the collaboration tools arena. But here we're discussing some narrower subject as a tool to help the help desk guys, and it seems to me that a somewhat more simple and focused app, like a message board, should fit better.

Thanks again, for your participation in this discussion. You are really helping!

Regards,

Fernando