Part I — Under the tree
00 · Arriving: under the tree
Before harvesting, we sit under the tree and learn the names of things.
Baobáxia's words
Baobáxia uses a few words of its own. It's worth knowing them before you start:
| Word | What it is |
|---|---|
| saber | anything that is kept: a photo, a video, an audio, an article, an event, a document. Each saber has a title, a description, tags and, almost always, files. (Saber is Portuguese for "knowledge".) |
| mucua | a community's computer that keeps the archive. It works without internet. The name comes from the baobab's fruit. Elsewhere it would be called a server — we don't like that: the word brings to mind an exploited machine, put to serve without end. With the mucua the relationship is one of care. |
| galaxy | a whole archive, shared by several mucuas. A mucua can take part in several galaxies. |
| mocambola | a person with a Baobáxia account. |
| territory | a place, physical or symbolic, that knowledge belongs to: a quilombo, a village, a neighbourhood. |
| root | a collection of saberes: a list, a story told in sequence, a book. |
| type (nature) | the kind of saber: media, article, event… |
An example: in the territory Casa de Cultura Tainã there is the mucua Abdias; it takes part in the galaxy Rede Mocambos, where you find the photos of the baobab festival (saberes of type media), the flour recipe (an article) and this month's workshop (an event).
Opening the website
You get your mucua's address from whoever looks after it — it might be something like http://abdias.local, a number (http://192.168.0.10) or an internet address. It works on a computer and on a phone, in any browser.
On the home page you see:
- the network's living baobab, with its galaxies, mucuas and territories;
- the archive's numbers (saberes, galaxies, mucuas, territories);
- a search box — type and press Enter to search everything;
- Just arrived: the most recent saberes.
At the top are Baobáxia's apps: Archive, Blog, Agenda, Map and Roots. Each one looks at the same archive in its own way.
Logging in
You don't need an account to see the public archive. To publish, edit, say you're coming to an event or read restricted content, you need to log in.
- Click Login (top right).
- On the I already have an account tab, type your username and password.
- If you don't have an account yet, the Create account tab creates one on this mucua (if whoever looks after it has left it open).
Tip: if the same username exists on more than one mucua of the network, Baobáxia asks which one is yours.
The menu
The ☰ button opens the full menu: create saber, the apps, and the network section — Galaxies, Territories, Mucuas, Mocambolas and Statistics. At the bottom of the menu you choose the language and log out.
The website's language
Baobáxia speaks Portuguese, English, Spanish and Italian (and the mucua can offer other languages for texts). The language shows in the address: /pt-BR/, /en-US/, /es-ES/, /it-IT/. Change it at the bottom of the menu.
Changing the website's language changes the buttons and the texts of the saberes that have a version in that language. Chapter 04 — Many languages explains how this works.
On your phone
The website fits small screens: the apps become icons at the top and the ☰ menu stays in the corner.
To publish from your phone by chatting, without opening the website, see chapter 09 — The baobab in your pocket.
To talk about in the circle
- What knowledge of your community is already kept somewhere (on someone's phone, on a hard drive, in a notebook)? What would be lost if that place disappeared?
- Who in the community will look after the mucua? Who will help others log in?