Extension:WhoIsWatching

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Who Is Watching

Release status: beta

Implementation  Special page, Database
Description Find out who is watching a particular page, and add others to watchlist for that page
Author(s)  Paul Grinberg, Siebrand Mazeland
Last Version  v0.9 (October 6, 2008)
MediaWiki  1.9.3+ (and probably much earlier)
License GPL
Download Read Installation Instructions Here
Change Log

check usage (experimental)

Contents

[edit] Description

Even though this notion goes against Wikipedia and Wikimedia privacy policy, some wikis may actually like to see which of its users are watching particular pages. This extension provides just such an interface at the bottom of every page. Additionally, this extension has an option to allow any user to add any page to any other user's watch list.

[edit] Installation Instructions

[edit] Step 1

Download the extension code from SVN and place each file in extensions/WhoIsWatching folder.

[edit] Step 2

Add the following text to your LocalSettings.php

require_once( "$IP/extensions/WhoIsWatching/SpecialWhoIsWatching.php" );
$wgPageShowWatchingUsers = true;

[edit] Step 3

Edit your MediaWiki:Number_of_watching_users_pageview wiki page to have the following content

[edit] MediaWiki version prior to 1.12

<a href="{{fullurl:Special:WhoIsWatching|ns={{NAMESPACEE}}&page={{PAGENAMEE}}}}">$1</a> watching {{PLURAL:$1|user|users}}

[edit] MediaWiki version 1.12 and later

[{{fullurl:Special:WhoIsWatching|ns={{NAMESPACEE}}&page={{PAGENAMEE}}}} $1] watching {{PLURAL:$1|user|users}}

[edit] Additional Configuration

You can simply start using the extension without changing anything else. The only additional configuration that is currently possible for the extension defines how to display the names of the users watching the pages. In SpecialWhoIsWatching.php, there is

# Set the following to either 'UserName' or 'RealName' to display the list of watching users as such.
$whoiswatching_nametype = 'RealName';

As the comment implies, depending on the value of this variable, you can display either the real names of the watching users or their wiki usernames. The reason some wiki's may want to switch over to the 'UserName' mode is if they do not require their members to have a valid real name.

Another configurable option in the extension is the ability to switch on/off the option to allow any user to add any page to any other user's watch list. This is done in SpecialWhoIsWatching.php, where there is

# Set the following to either True or False to optionally allow users to add others to watch a particular page
$whoiswatching_allowaddingpeople = true;

On MediaWiki versions 1.10.0 and later, it is also possible to only display the count of watching people if the count is greater than zero. This is done in SpecialWhoIsWatching.php, where there is

# Set the following to either True or False to optionally display a count of zero users watching a particular page
$whoiswatching_showifzero = true;

On MediaWiki versions earlier than 1.10.0, this feature is not available and the value of this variable is simply ignored.

[edit] See also

Extensions that are similar in goal or style:

[edit] Revisions

  • v0.9 - October 6, 2008
    • Fixed the extension instantiation to work across MW versions
    • Fixed the feature that displays count of users if zero
  • v0.8 - September 29, 2008 - optionally display a count of 0 watching users (contributed by user:Djomp)
  • v0.7 - September 5, 2008 - added descriptionmsg, change special page alias loading method; removed obsolete code (by user:siebrand)
  • v0.6 - June 6, 2008 - Optionally disable the feature to make other users watch the page.
  • v0.5 - May 12, 2008
    • Better handling of user names
  • v0.4 - December 27, 2007
    • new feature - add other users to the list of people watching the page
    • sort the list of people watching the page
    • minor bug fix on listing which page the information is pertaining to when the page is a category
  • v0.3 - November 25, 2007 - More standard way to load i18n messages (resolve bug about "Call to undefined function wfLoadExtensionMessages()")
  • v0.2 - November 23, 2007
  • v0.1 - October 12, 2007 - Initial publication.