What is a RoadMap?

Well, that may not be the best name for it, but the idea comes from the usage on WardsWiki.

The basic idea is

.. a wiki is not a treelike structure. In fact the greatest value fo a wiki (like the www in general) is if there are lots of links to various pages.

So, it is intended there be many routes to any given page. The route chosen depends greatly on the user's background, immediate context, or maybe just state-of-mind. The roadmaps should be designed with titles or descriptions matching such user viewpoints that come to mind.

In fact wikizens are strongly encouraged to invent their own roadmap pages (or at least post their suggestions).

Some proposed roadmap properties

• a roadmap page should itself have a memorable title and/or be easy to discover. An example is LinuxAnswers. Note the plural conveys a suggestion that the page contains links to pages.
• a roadmap may be a sub-section of a larger roadmap or a sub-page. Sections are probably better for fast-scanning convenience. Subpages may be good for extensive lists of very closely-related pages.
• it should collect annotated links to pages that are related by some common user-oriented point of view. More like a thesaurus than a dictionary. Especially more like a thesaurus that elaborates on concepts, compares and contrasts and ranks and disambiguates .. etc. The annotations are worth their weight in gold (or at least, lead).

Benefits of roadmap

• provides a nice rendezvous point for see also .. entries
• grouping of similar pages suggests very clearly where site content could be improved by page combinations, splits, additions, ..
• invites users to contribute other roadmap titles