Socialtext provides 'business-like' wiki/blog software and hosting. Unfortunately, it has been somewhat inelegant and, to the uninitiated, downright confusing.

Now, the company has released a beta of Socialtext 2.0 which addresses a number of shortcomings of the previous version. It also makes some of the rather obscure features more visible and more relevant.

Ross Mayfield, the boss, explains his new baby in a screencast demo. Whether you're brand new to this kind of software or already experienced, you'll find he explains things pretty well.

At the superficial level, Socialtext 2.0 beta just looks nicer: big buttons, cleaner layout and the display areas just make more sense. You don't feel you're entering a secret world any more. The Home page provides all manner of navigation links so, no matter how deep in the wiki you go, you can always climb out and reorientate  yourself.

A whiteboard acts as a pooling area for users of the workspace. Notpad is for your own notes, but others can see them. Blogging is easy, and others can edit the blogs and have the same version history as the wiki. This is good for team-focused blogs.

Any page can be tagged with words of the editor's choosing, although tag lists will pop up to help with consistency. Pages can be searched for and listed by name, date, tag, whatever. And you can see at a glance which pages have been changed frequently - this is usually a sign of a mature page. Incoming links are also counted and it's easy to get a list of the linking pages.

Wiki Web Services are APIs which make integration with other systems easy and there's even a mobile version called miki.

With this release, Socialtext has abandoned its geeky air and made itself much more acceptable to novice and experienced users alike.