Office 2.0 get's a challenge!

Ismael just threw out a challenge to all the Office 2.0 companies,

The object of the challenge is pretty simple: develop the first Wikibase.

My definition of a “Wikibase” is the following: a Wikibase is to a database tool what a Wiki is to a document editor. In a Wiki, multiple people collaborate on the development of a document, moderators can approve or reject modifications to the document, and all modifications are captured through some versioning mechanism. The idea for a Wikibase is very similar: the Wikibase’s owner defines a database schema, contributors are free to create and modify records in the database, and the owner can approve or reject them. Of course, more complex workflows and meta-data management rules could be devised, but let’s keep it simple for the time being.

- First Office 2.0 Challenge

And it looks like Charles over at Zoho Creator has already nailed half of it.

Ismael,

I tried attempting this for fun using Zoho Creator, and ended up with this first application. It has a Speakers Registration Form similar to what you have here. When a prospective speaker submits an entry, it falls into a “Yet to Approve” tab. There is another tab called “Approved Speakers” in which all the approved speakers are listed.

Only the owner of the application has the permission to approve a speaker or not. Others can only view “Approved Speakers” and “Yet to Approve” entries. When the owner signs in, he will have to just edit each of the “Yet to Approve” entries and select the “Approve” field and update it. This “Approve” field is hidden to everyone else.

Thus moderation for adding an entry is achieved. What needs to be done is to have moderation for updating and deleting the entries as well. For this, we have to integrate a database versioning system, which we have already developed in-house. Once it is integrated, that should also be possible. User name and password for the owner of this application is owner and owner. You can try it out to see how it works.

-Charles

It's going to be interesting to see if they can get the rest before someone like DabbleDB does. The coolest thing about's Charles's post which was followed by one from Sridhar is the simple fact these guys are really active in the community/blogsphere and wanting to really make their product the best and by listening to the community I think they will!