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Can Web 2.0 Evolve Into an Enterprise Technology?: Page 2 of 11

Part of the reason is that business users already have access to more sophisticated versions of the same technologies. Blogging is publishing, a wiki is a CMS (content management system), and Ajax is a more standardized way of achieving what many internal enterprise apps already do with ActiveX or Java. That doesn't mean the new technologies can be ignored—their lower costs and simpler administration mean they will quickly overtake legacy platforms, and already have done so in some areas. But it does mean they need to fit in with their predecessors.Wiki Wishlist

"It's awful having an artificial distinction between a wiki and a CMS," says Aaron Hathaway, CIO at investment bank Prager, Sealy & Co. In common with most of the users in our survey, he sees wikis as having greater use within enterprises than other Web 2.0 technologies such as blogs. Wikis' other big attraction is that, in keeping with their collaborative nature, almost all of them are free. (Visit wikimatrix.org for a full list.)

Hathaway started using wikis four years ago to manage the IT department's internal documentation, but soon saw that the same technology could be more widely applicable. "The work itself was becoming more collaborative, but the tools had not." In 2005, he decided to roll out TWiki, a popular enterprise wiki whose other users include Disney, Yahoo and British Telecom.

It was a decision Hathaway came to regret in fairly short order.

The problem was that TWiki couldn't easily share data with Alfresco, the bank's open-source CMS. Users who needed information had to look in both, while those adding documents risked duplicating effort. The bank didn't want to give up on either, so Hathaway turned instead to Deki Wiki, which is also open-source but backed by a commercial vendor, MindTouch. Its biggest advantage is that its Web services API eases integration with other applications.