Is it time to use TiddlyWiki for STEM students and researchers?

[Mohammad]

In the era of artificial intelligence, is the use of typesetting software such as Microsoft Word, Google Docs, or Overleaf still prevalent? Do educators continue to require students to create their PDF reports using outdated tools?

I believe students should transition to micro-content and self-sufficient AI-enabled tools (as a writing aid). Our team has already initiated this process by developing a portable lightweight, and distributable app on top of TiddlyWiki in two versions with code name Tiragn and Mehregan (a public version already available on the net).

TiddlyWiki Exceptional Features

• It stores its data and code in a single HTML file, requiring no installs, no external dependencies, just a web browser
• It lets you choose where to keep your data, guaranteeing that in the decades to come you will still be able to use the notes you take today
• It is infinitely customisable and extensible with many plugins that add new features
• TiddlyWiki is the product of a collective of developers, part of an extensive community of users.

Both Mehregan and Tirgan, provide support for KaTeX, code highlighting, BibTeX with Zotero integration, and multimedia capabilities, including image, voice, and video support.

Important NOTE:
I believe students should transition to using micro-content and self-sufficient AI-enabled tools as a writing aid, NOT as a substitute for critical thinking, problem-solving, reasoning, or research. These tools can help streamline writing tasks, improve clarity, and enhance productivity, but they should complement, rather than replace, traditional learning methods that foster deep intellectual engagement and independent thought.

[pmario]

You should explain what STEM actually means. I suspect you mean: Science, technology, engineering, and mathematics

[CasperBooWisdom]

See, this is why the all-in approach for AI I think is a slippery slope. I am by no means wanting to stand in the way of progress, but the idea that now that AI is coming into its own, we suddenly abandon our skills? Manual labor? We will all be unable to do anything on our own, much less programming, as the AI will do everything for us. It’s just the attitude that these are “old” and “outdated” as if they are useless.

I am not trying to be a roadblock here, but I also noticed another thing you posted today:

Proposal: A TiddlyWiki Print Dialog

A TiddlyWiki plugin that provides a user-friendly dialog for printing would greatly simplify the process of printing and exporting to PDF… The plugin aims to make printing more flexible, customizable, and visually appealing by leveraging modern web technologies. Here are the key features and enhancements planned for the plugin: Modern CSS for Printing: The plugin will utilize the latest CSS features, including the CSS Paged Media module, to provide advanced and attractive print layouts. This…

And a bit of irony kind of, as this post is talking about “abandoning” outdated ways of doing things and turn it all over to AI, and then your other post is about your concept of how printing could be done in a plugin, but you want someone else in the community to design that plugin, and I am not sure if it is because you like the idea but are too busy to program the plugin, or if you simply do not know how to program the plugin, because again, abandoning programming to let AI do it.

With a little bit of tweaking, because, from my experience, they all have some problems with witkitext, I am sure the AI can just write that plugin for you as well, so why ask developers to “program” it. Isn’t that an “old” and “outdated” concept as well?

I know, sorry, I am really hammering on this and sounding like a real jerk, that is not my intention. I just fear we are so excited about all the new tech, before long, we will be a bunch of bumbling idiots that have no skills, talent or ambition… the death of creatively!

[Scott_Sauyet]

@Mohammad

I believe students should transition to micro-content and self-sufficient AI-enabled tools.

You had me until you brought AI into it.

I’m a strong believer in the eventual utility of AI, but I don’t think the current crop of mostly-LLM tools is either all that useful or worthy of the hype. I think we’ll be seeing more and more disillusionment as companies realize they’ve bought into something not particularly useful.

I suspect we’ll see more articles like yesterday’s Wall Street Journal article, MIT Says It No Longer Stands Behind Student’s AI Research Paper, and more of them like the nearly two year old The LLMentalist Effect: how chat-based Large Language Models replicate the mechanisms of a psychic’s con. I know I’ve been reviewing code by junior developers who use these tools in a way that solves 80% of the requirements they’ve been given… and then have no idea how to extend that to the 95-100% range.

@CasperBooWisdom

And a bit of irony kind of, as this post is talking about “abandoning” outdated ways of doing things and turn it all over to AI, and then your other post is about your concept of how printing could be done in a plugin

I don’t see a contradiction here. These days, much of my own “printing” is simply generating PDFs. Using a tool like TW to organize your content but still be able to distribute it via the PDFs that are the norm in STEM publishing sounds like a great win!

[Mohammad]

Thank you both, @CasperBooWisdom and @Scott_Sauyet.

I sincerely appreciate your comments and opinions. It you are deeply concerned about the misuse of AI tools in education, and I completely agree with you. Thank you for sharing your concerns.

If you read the OP again, it presents the idea of using TiddlyWiki for STEM students instead of Microsoft Word, Google Docs, due to the immense flexibility and capability that TiddlyWiki offers. Therefore, it is not about using AI; it is about TiddlyWiki. Then it recommends using AI. AI for what? For research, critical thinking, problem-solving? No, it suggests using AI as writing aid for TiddlyWiki.

For instance, I teach computer-aided design in chemical engineering, which requires writing numerous mathematical formulas—quite a lot! Instead of spending time at my inputting these tedious formulas using MathType in MS Word, I write them on paper using a pencil, and use ChatGPT to convert them into KaTeX and WikiText formats, which I then simply paste into tiddlers in TiddWiki.

When preparing a presentation from my computer simulations, I provide the results and graphic outputs and create tiddlers once again using ChatGPT or DeepSeek, which significantly saves time.

I also utilize DeepSeek to digitize old nomographs, extract as CSV data, and plot them again using Python. All the results are then pasted into markdown or wikitext tiddlers, saving me a great deal of effort.

I prefer not to compare the flexibility of micro-content in TiddlyWiki with the limitations of MS Word.

I hope this explanation clarifies my purpose. Additionally, I updated the original post by including “AI-enabled tools (writing aid).”

Thank you again!

[alanc]

I would say that the (reasonable) use of office products such as Word, Docs or Writer, let alone LaTeX, already poses challenges to students and their instructors. I can’t count the number of students’ reports or theses where the table of contents and any kind of formatting are done manually because of a lack of understanding and experience of the tool. It is a reality that most students today are only used to touch interfaces which just “work” for a limited number of use cases without exposing the underlying model and education does not encourage them to go beyond this kind of “surface-level” appropriation of digital environments.
The use of TiddlyWiki or similar hypertext-based software is indeed a good idea (not just for STEM but for any field really) but it would require the development of an “hypertext literacy” on top of solid “digital literacy” foundations. Concepts such as “personal knowledge management” or “tools for thought” emerged with similar goals but their application to education is far from easy.