MIXINS

Mixins are electronic documents that contain information from various sources. For example, an html page that includes a quote from an online book, a homework questions created by the course teacher, and an answer created by the student would be one type of educational mixin or workbook.

Other examples:

• Local pages that include wikipedia artices (see http://www.tiddlypedia.com/)
• Online supplements to printed books (see http://mitpress.mit.edu/books/0262062585/WebCampaigningDigitalSupplement.html)
• Offline material from one or more wiki's (see http://www.socialtext.com/unplugged)

Ideally, mixins should be:

• transportable (not require the viewer to visit a specific site to see the content)
• dynamic (if the original information changes, the mixin should reflect those updates)
• editable (an individual should be able to add their own material to either a shared mixin or their own private copy)

Mixins are related to work on wiki interoperability.

These project pages are focused on possible educational and health related uses of mixins, such as:

• online, localized versions of books like Where there is no doctor, which could include information on local remedies
• educational materials such as problem sets, commentary, etc. related to textbooks. See SMETE digital library for examples.

Pilot project

In Dec 2007, UnaMesa and WikiSpaces began working together to create and demonstrate practical mixins using a combination of TiddlyWiki and WikiSpaces technology in conjunction with the MORE project.

See Wikispaces project page for details.