Extension:Configure

The Configure extension allows bureucrats (by default) to modify configuration settings of the wiki.

Installation

 * Download the latest snapshot and extract it to your extensions directory.
 * Edit LocalSettings.php and add the following lines:

as mentioned, you have to call  function in LocalSettings.php because you may want to customize some settings of the extension and to prevent an attack, the settings have to be always defined (this is done by including the Configure.php file), even if they won't be changed because they can arbitrary be set if the register_globals feature of PHP is turned on.

Configuration settings
This extension add two configuration settings. They are not editable through Special:Configure or Special:Extensions. You need to change them in LocalSettings.php.

$wgConfigureFilesPath
The extension will require a directory to store the configuration and this directory have to be writable by the web server. The default path is the directory. You can use this setting to change it. Don't forget to override this variable between the time you include the Configure.php file and the time you call efConfigureSetup, otherwise your changes won't be used.

on MediaWiki < 1.13, serialized directory is publicly viewable, and users will be able to see the whole configuration, so please make it unreadable by web interface or change it to a directory that isn't accessible via the web.

$wgConfigureStyleVersion
Like $wgStyleVersion but for Configure itself. You shouldn't change it.

Special pages
This extension adds three special pages:

Special:Configure

 * Right needed to access this page: configure (given by default to bureaucrats)

It allows to configure settings of MediaWiki itself. That page shows all settings available for MediaWiki, they are groupped by function, like Manual:Configuration settings. Each setting has a link to its description page on this wiki. The list of old versions is displayed at the top of the page, by clicking on a version, it will show the configuration as it was at that time, so that the configuration can be reverted to any version.

Some settings are restricted and can only be changed by users with configure-all right. This include the following settings:
 * paths/files (because they require also "external" changes, i.e. server rewrite rules, squid configuration, ...)
 * database
 * settings containing password such as $wgSMTP
 * access (to not allow users with only configure right to grant themself configure-all right)
 * $wgSecretKey and $wgProxyKey (they contain sensitive data)

Special:Extensions

 * Right needed to access this page: extensions (given by default to bureaucrats)

Same as Special:Configure, but for extensions. You need to put extensions in the extensions directory of your MediaWiki install or this extension won't detect them.

Special:ViewConfig

 * Right needed to access this page: viewconfig (given by default to sysops)

This special page allows sysop (by default) to see the current configuration of the wiki. You can see any version of the configuration, diffs between versions and edit specific versions.

Users with configure or extensions rights will also see links to Special:Configure and/or Special:Extensions if they can access these pages.

Hints
Although this extension allows you to configure all settings, it's recommended to keep the original LocalSettings.php file. You can simply add the extension after the default settings. If you don't want a setting to be modified, simply redeclare it after calling efConfigureSetup, it will still be customizable in Special:Configure but changes won't have any effect.

This extension uses an extended class of SiteConfiguration, for "normal" installation, it isn't useful, but for some wiki farms, it will allow to multiple with only one copy of the software. To change the configuration you want to load, pass an argument to. A user with 'configure-all' right will also be able to change any configuration.

Troubleshooting
If an admin changed the settings in a way that the wiki can't work anymore, you can simply drop the conf-now.ser file you'll find in $wgConfigureFilesPath directory. Then it will fall back to the default configuration that is in LocalSettings.php. It's why it's important to keep that file.

You can also use the manage.php maintenance script to revert it to an older version. This script should work even if the configuration is broken.

Bugs
Please report bugs on bugzilla, with Product=MediaWiki extensions and Component=Configure. Thank you.

To do

 * Some settings are still uneditable because of their array usage, this will need to develop some specific method to change them.