Better platform for communication: Slack

From Pietro's presentation on "Public diplomacy" - how: ... a joined-up approach allowing to coherently engage in the long term with our target audiences and partners abroad across policy areas and in partnership with local actors.

For such purpose I have "invented" #tagcoding (which can be used in addition to "social capital wikis")

Via Twitter @collaboratewiki you can discover what it means: there are #tagcoding hashtags (global and for each country), a.o. for these topicdimensions: 

(sustainable development) goals and targets such as reducing poverty 
#SDGs hashtags

economic activities such as transportation and construction
#isicWW hashtags

functions of government such as in education and environmental protection
#cofogWW hashtags

local territories: a country, state, city
Country hashtags and #WWlgu tags

codes for reporting about the destination of aid contributions
DAC 5 and CRS Codes (OECD DAC)

 

 

About "registration platforms" versus #tagcoding & (open) wikis", pls consider this contribution I made elsewhere before:

 

Community based climate collaboration via #tags and wikis  

Dear Pietro,

 

Thank you for these comments. Capacity4dev is certainly not the only tool out there and should be complemented by others.

Please note the user interface is currently in the making - we are working on a much more intuative version that will be available later in the year. We are confident this will make a big difference!

For your information, the types of sub-groups you mention in slack that are done via tagging can also be applied here - using website taxonomy or custom group tagging. Each group can define its own terminology and link to key words, much like in slack - or use the wider terminology that is shared across the platform. What's not possible is defining sub-groups with different access rights.

If you would like to better appreciate these features, please feel free to contact us for support - we are always available to help you make the best of capacity4dev.

Thanks for your time!

Dear Diane,

thank you for your reply. Actually the "sub-groups" (as you call them) in slack are not just based on tagging. They are conversations organised in channels (which are linked to an #) that different people in the same workspace can join. The list of the channels can also be reorganised: this ensures that overall coherence in the conversations can be kept. People can indeed tag other individuals in a conversations (which is also useful) but this is another functionality not debated here.

Also, as noted in earlier exchanges with your colleagues, it would be extremely useful to allow to have in the same group users and subgroups with different access rights.

If you look at redeveloping the interface of capacity4dev I would suggest that you make it much faster and leaner. You may wisht to look how other companies such as Slack, Higher Logic etc have done but also other institutions that have developed coworking spaces and communities of practices such as the World Bank or the World Economic Forum.

Finally, could you share with us the timeline of the above mentioned redevelopement?

Kind regards,

Pietro

 

 

Every environment has it's benefits ;)

We are working hard to improve the interface and performence, but there are a number of dependencies we cannot exclude. Please remember that we are binded by EU regulations and in-house obligations that do not allow us to be as open as other foreign-based services mentioned. It may not seem useful in a public space, but for restricted and private environments (that constitute the majority of this platform) it is of paramount importance that everything respects EU data privacy.

Some improvements are already planned to be released in the coming month, while others will be delivered throughout the year. If you would like to continue this discussion, I'll be happy to meet you in person - feel free to contact me.

Thanks!