@Mohammad are you asking if the contents of this thread could be summarised into a paper? If so, interesting idea! Where could this paper be published?
@hpy
My point is if you have a section for collaborative projects or ideas here on GOSH. Members post their projects/ideas and they request specific complementary skills related to the project/idea. Other memebrs join in and push the project/idea to maturity. Then all those who collaborated on a specific/idea eventually write a paper or tutorial and they publish to open source hardware journals or other related journals. This concept is something I have been searching for for a while now.
In terms of where to publish it. I have some ideas as where this may land. Back to your point. You brought another interesting idea which is if this post can be made into an article giving some modification. One can think of turning this post into an article titled “Practicle guides for sharing collective knowledge in Open Source Hardware Projects” Such article will offer insights and resources on the best practices for maintaing and keeping knowledge.
I’m willing to help if you are up for it. I do have one journal in mind but need to search for it again. this journal kind of made headlines in academia when it came in 2015. This journal publishes proposals, experimental designs, data and software. Somewhat unconventional to modern academic publishing. I remember finding about it back in 2020.
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Thanks @Mohammad for your engagement and thinking about possible ideas.
Right now, I don’t have capacity to do anything other than adding posts to this thread, but please feel free to take the lead if you want to pursue an idea that makes use of this thread! 
Just noticed yet another collaborative document/note/wiki editor. But this time, in addition to being fully open source and self-hostable, I think it’s notable that this is a joint project between the French and German governments:
I stumbled upon it here:
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One solution could be to create a Knowledge Hub using a structured Wiki, like MediaWiki (used by Wikipedia) or dokuwiki [DokuWiki] (simple and doesn’t require a database). This would centralize discussions, documents, and resources in an organized, searchable format.
For shared files and real-time collaboration, something like Nextcloud (https://nextcloud.com/) could replace Google Docs and WhatsApp, keeping everything in one place with version control.
I hope I’m not repeating anything already mentioned, but hopefully this has some usefulness! 
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Thank you @derekren! Wikis were discussed long ago near the beginning of this thread, but I don’t think we went much into specific tools like dokuwiki.
It’ll be cool to have a wiki-like thing, though one challenge is IMO the need to have someone to tend to it.
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Speaking of wikis, another interesting wiki tool is Mycorrhiza Wiki. It seems technically minimalist (e.g. everything is managed as a set of flat files, no databases) and semantically powerful at the same time.
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Yeah @hpy! Totally agree that the upkeep side of things is the tricky part. Even the best tools fall flat without someone actively curating and updating. I hadn’t heard of Mycorrhiza Wiki before, but I like the flat file approach! It feels more transparent and future-proof in some ways.
Also appreciate the shoutout on Nextcloud, I’ve used it in a smaller org and the integration between file sharing, chat, and calendar was surprisingly smooth. Could be more practical for smaller groups who want to move away from Google but still need an all-in-one system.
Appreciate your responses! This thread is super helpful as we think about sustainable structures moving forward!
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@hpy thank you for the feedback. The journal I mentioned earlier is called Research Ideas and Outcomes.
Just wanna share it with the community.
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I was recently at the 2026 (European) Open Science Retreat in Wales, and joined a session learning about how to manage a MediaWiki instance.
I learned that Wikimedia DE gives free-of-charge/gratis hosting of MediaWiki wikis!! They call the service Wikibase:
So, if you want to host a wiki, you can consider this option.
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AFAICT, Wikibase is for Wikidata-style wikis hosting structured data, not the typical Mediawiki use.
If you just want a wiki to register learning/research work, I would rather suggest creating a page and subpages on Wikiversity, the Wikipedia-style wiki for academic uses hosted by the Wikimedia foundation.
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Thanks @solstag, that’s what I thought about Wikibase, too.
Buuuuut…..
The person who ran the session I was at works with Wikimedia, and he confirmed that Wikibase can host actual Mediawikis! In fact, we set up a new one in real time and was able to manage and edit it like any other Mediawiki instance. 
Also, thanks for pointing to Wikiversity as well. I agree it’s another good place for sharing academic research-y stuff.
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Interesting to see this conversation bubble back up after so much time! This is all very much in my wheelhouse…those that don’t know, my academic background is largely in library and information science, so I have opinions on knowledge and information capture, sharing, and preservation. 
I’m actually doing some research right now for OSHF to see what tools are available for us to host/support an OScH research/resource library. Has anyone ever used the tool Kerko ( Kerko )? It’s an open tool that uses a Zotero group as its data source for creating a browsing library. I’m curious about the potential of a three-tiered system that uses Zenodo as a publishing platform for new/original work, Zotero to catalog and capture cataloging information, and Kerko to act as a discovery layer.
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I think EdTech Hub uses/used Kerko for: EdTech Hub - Evidence Library
Also with Zenodo: GitHub - edtechhub/zotzen-cli: Scripts for interacting with the Zotero API and the Zenodo API. · GitHub
This library is in need of an update, but it’s still live (and open to contributions!): Zotero | Groups > Open Hardware Library
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Hiya. Inspired by a chat with @griffey at the weekend, I’m thinking that the Internet of Production Alliance should also have a resource library. Perhaps, like our forum, we should again choose what GOSH chooses so that the resource libraries might also be able to interconnect. So… am watching this space! Thanks, Andrew
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Thanks @griffey @eric @andrewlamb TIL Kerko! Thank you for giving me the vocabulary to describe what I’ve always wanted to see for Zotero, i.e. a “discovery layer”!
As a meta-comment: It might be fun to organise what we’ve learned in this thread into its own wiki haha…..
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maybe something like this a start? Editing and creating wiki posts - Using Discourse - Discourse Meta
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Eric,
This is a great find - I wasn’t aware of this capability within Discourse.
This has, in general, been an interesting thread to follow, as I share Jason’s background in library and information science. It’s also particularly timely, as I’ve been preparing to invite community members to help develop and maintain shared community resources for GOSH. What’s been discussed here suggests at least a few intriguing directions that effort could take, and I’ll be sure to point the group toward this thread once they’re established.
If you’d like to join the effort, you might keep this conversation in mind—I’ll be opening a call for pod members over the weekend.
Cheers,
Jamaica
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@hpy is it possible for someone from GOSH team to enable the wiki feature for this thread - or perhaps a new one? I can extract the links/tools from this discussion and add them.
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Hi @eric thanks so much for the suggestion!
I think I did the right thing and have made this thread a wiki. Can you let me know if it works now?
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