Wikis
1. What it is
Wikis gives your organization a structured, collaborative space for creating
and maintaining living documentation. Authors write pages using a rich-text
editor, organize them into a hierarchy of sub-pages, and tag them for
cross-cutting discovery. Built-in version history, edit locking, and content
freshness tracking keep the knowledge base accurate as it grows.
- Enablement: Wikis requires a license and is disabled by default. An admin
enables it from the Apps Marketplace. - What it is not: Wikis is not a file repository. For storing and sharing
files, folders, and external links, use Drive. For curated library
collections of company resources, use Libraries.
2. Standing it up
- Go to Admin → Apps Marketplace and enable Wikis. The app appears in
the side navigation once enabled. - Open Wikis → Settings and review the default configuration. The most
important decisions are the Edit Lock Duration (default 30 minutes) and
the Stale Wiki Threshold (default 120 days). - Optionally create one or more templates under Wikis → Templates.
Mark one as the default so every new page starts from it. Templates are
browsable by all users; only admins and Wikis app admins can create or edit
them. - Grant access. Any licensed user can view published wikis and create new
pages. To delegate administrative tasks — settings, reordering, trash
recovery, template management — without granting a full admin role, assign
users as Wikis app admins under Admin → Apps → App Admins. - Confirm it works: create a test page, publish it, and verify it appears in
the browse tree and in Global Search (if the Include Wikis in Global
Search setting is on, which it is by default).
Silent-until-paired: the Notify Users on Wiki Publish setting is off by
default. Until you turn it on — and optionally pick a recipient group under
Settings — publishing a page does not notify anyone.
3. How it fits together
Pages, sub-pages, and the browse tree
Every wiki page can have sub-pages nested under it, up to 5 levels deep. The
browse screen shows a tree on the left and the selected page’s content on the
right. Admins can drag pages into a custom order; users can sort by title,
popularity, or recency.
A page starts as a Draft (visible only to its creator and admins), moves to
Published (visible to everyone or to specific groups, depending on its
visibility setting), and can be Archived by its owner or an admin. Deleting
a page moves it to Trash along with all of its sub-pages; an admin can restore
it from Wikis → Settings → Trash.
Visibility and permissions
Each page carries three independent permission controls, set by its owner or an
admin through the Properties drawer:
- Visibility — who can read the page: Everyone (default), Specific
Groups (selected notification recipient groups), or Just Me (private to
the creator). - Edit permission — who can edit the content: Admin and Creator
(default) or Any User. Admins can always edit a page. - Comment permission — who can comment: Any User (default), Admin and
Creator, or Nobody — choose Nobody to turn commenting off entirely
for a page.
Additional per-page toggles: Allow Duplication (default on), Allow
Export (default on, gated by the app-level PDF export setting), Show
Author (default on), Show Table of Contents (default on), and Locked
(default off — prevents all member edits regardless of edit permission).
Edit locking
When someone opens a page for editing, the app acquires an edit lock for the
configured duration (default 30 minutes). Another user trying to edit sees a
conflict dialog with the lock holder’s name, role, and avatar. From that
dialog they can:
- Ask to Edit — send the holder a message via email or Chat asking them
to release the page. - Notify me when free — subscribe to a notification that fires when the
lock is released or expires. - Break lock (admins only) — force-release the lock immediately.
Saving or explicitly releasing the lock notifies anyone who subscribed.
Version history
Every publish or edit of a published page creates a numbered version.
Drafts do not create versions — they appear only once published. From the
Versions tab, any viewer can browse the version timeline, view the full
content of any version, and compare any two versions side by side with a
line-level diff. Users with edit permission can restore a previous version,
which creates a new version recording the rollback.
Ownership transfers also appear in version history.
Tags
Tags are free-text labels (up to 50 characters each) that cut across the
page hierarchy. Filtering by a tag in the browse view shows a flat list of
matching pages regardless of where they sit in the tree.
Templates
Templates are admin-managed starting points for new pages. Each template has a
name, an optional category, a body, and optional icon, color, and cover image.
One template per organization can be marked as the default — new pages
automatically start from it unless the author picks a different template or
chooses to start blank. Every user can browse and preview templates; only
admins and Wikis app admins can create, edit, or delete them.
4. Running it
Reviewing the dashboard
The Wikis dashboard shows KPIs and widgets tailored to the viewer’s role:
- All users see their own wiki count, draft count, bookmarked count,
mentions count, total views on their pages, and views on their pages this
month — plus widgets for their drafts, bookmarked pages, recently viewed, and
recently updated pages across the organization. - Admins additionally see the organization-wide total, published, draft,
archived, and stale counts, plus org-wide engagement (views this month), a
most-viewed list, top contributors, recent activity feed, and a
needs-attention widget listing business-wide drafts pending publish.
Managing stale content
Published pages not updated within the configured Stale Wiki Threshold
(default 120 days) are flagged as stale. The dashboard’s Stale KPI links to a
filtered list of all stale pages. Editing and saving a stale page clears the
flag; admins see a flash message with the count of remaining stale pages.
Transferring ownership
The page owner or an admin can transfer ownership via the page’s tools menu.
The new owner must be an active member of the organization. The transfer is
recorded in version history. If the transferring user can no longer view the
page after the transfer (for example, a private or group-restricted page),
they are redirected to the browse view rather than seeing an access-denied
error.
Exporting to PDF
When the app-level Allow PDF Export setting is on (default) and the page’s
own Allow Export toggle is on (default), any viewer can download the page
as a PDF from the page’s tools menu.
Duplicating a page
When a page’s Allow Duplication toggle is on (default), its owner or an
admin can duplicate it. The copy is created as a draft beside the original
(same parent). The copy is a snapshot — subsequent edits to either page are
independent.
5. Settings
| Setting | Where | Default | What it changes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Enable Wikis AI Agent | Wikis → Settings | Off | Activates the Wikis AI agent for Ask AI queries |
| Include Wikis in Global Search | Wikis → Settings | On | Whether published wiki pages appear in platform-wide search results |
| Edit Lock Duration (minutes) | Wikis → Settings | 30 | How long a page is reserved for one editor before the lock expires |
| Allow PDF Export | Wikis → Settings | On | Master toggle for PDF export across all wiki pages |
| Stale Wiki Threshold (days) | Wikis → Settings | 120 days | How long a published page can go without an update before it is flagged as stale. Choices: 90, 120, 365, or 730 days |
| Notify Wiki Owner on New Comments | Wikis → Settings | On | Whether the page owner receives a notification when someone comments |
| Notify Users on @Mention | Wikis → Settings | On | Whether a user receives a notification when @mentioned in a wiki comment |
| Notify Users on Wiki Publish | Wikis → Settings | Off | Whether users are notified when a wiki is published. Recipients are determined by the configured recipient group, falling back to app admins then business admins |
6. More help
- Wikis FAQ — specific setup and operating questions
- Ask AI — the assistant answers questions about Wikis from these articles.