Manual:Pywikibot/Overview

Python Wikipedia Robot Framework
The Python Wikipedia Robot Framework is a collection of tools made to fit the maintenance need on Wikipedia, but it can also be used on other MediaWiki sites.

There is a trunk release that supports older mediawiki software.

There is the rewrite branch of the Python Wikipedia Robot Framework. It features several improvements, such as full API usage and a pythonic package layout.

Look at the matrix below, whether you should use the trunk or rewrite fork.

Requirements for a bot
To run a bot on your wiki, you will need Shell access to your hosting account. If you don't know whether you have Shell access or not, ask your hosting provider. You will need Python version > 2.5 and less 3.0 although Python 2.4.3 has also worked for at least one bot script. Preferred version is 2.7.2. or 2.7.3. To check whether you have Python installed and its version, just type "python" at the Shell prompt.

Licence
Copyright (c) 2005-2011 The PyWikipediaBot team

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.

The English-language wordlist is extended from the SCOWL-70 list from http://wordlist.sourceforge.net/. This source has as its licensing information:

Copyright 2000-2004 by Kevin Atkinson

Permission to use, copy, modify, distribute and sell these word lists, the associated scripts, the output created from the scripts, and its documentation for any purpose is hereby granted without fee, provided that the above copyright notice appears in all copies and that both that copyright notice and this permission notice appear in supporting documentation. Kevin Atkinson makes no representations about the suitability of this array for any purpose. It is provided "as is" without express or implied warranty.

The 'BeautifulSoup.py' module is Copyright (c) 2004-2007 Leonard Richardson, and is licensed under the terms of the Python Software Foundation license, which is available at http://www.python.org/download/releases/2.5/license/.