Manual talk:FAQ/LQT Archive 1

=2006=

Languages
hi folks... is it ok to set up an own "FAQ"-page in another language (e.g. german..), here ? --80.138.186.52 18:24, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
 * Yes, there is already a rough german start, see Help:FAQ/de. I'm not sure if it makes sense to develop pages in different languages with completely other content, but we'll see. -- :Bdk: 20:47, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

GFDL in PD?
Hi! i contributed the sites m:Help:Wiki family and m:Hilfe:Wiki family into Meta under terms of GFDL. As i am the only author of both, is it possible to publish them here under terms of PD, too ? --Produnis 18:43, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
 * Yes, it definitely is possible to do so, as long as you are the only author. A little note in the summary like "I'm the only author of the text, copied it from meta:xy and hereby released it in the public domain" or close is recommended to clarify the license state. Thanks a lot :-) -- :Bdk: 20:47, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
 * This page is not released as Public Domain anyway. It is GFDL. The move described above does not involve any relicensing.
 * There is only a relatively small area, everything under the 'Help' namespace, which is released as public domain. The reasoning for this is given on: Project:PD help.
 * In the past there was some confusion, but I think everyone's clear on this now. The massive copyright free logo in the background on the help namespace is a clue! I think the above comments were made during this confused period, so just to be clear.... This page and most of mediawiki.org is GFDL licensed and thus compatible with all other wikimedia projects. -- Harry Wood 16:37, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Wiki farm page missing
"For information on setting up a small wiki farm, see the wiki farm page on Meta. (May 1 2006: Page missing)" Apparently related:
 * http://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Help:Wiki_family&diff=301852&oldid=300701 Help:Wiki_farm moved to Help:Wiki_family ... and wiki farm content later deleted.
 * m:Talk:Wiki farm
 * m:Help:Wiki farm
 * MediaWiki_FAQ
 * http://wp.wikidev.net/Wiki_farm

207.195.192.52 14:11, 2 May 2006 (SPb)

One way to change the logo
To change the MediaWiki logo (Linux instructions): Crop an image to 135 x 135 px using the GIMP (or create a logo of that size) and save it to .png format, such as the filename wiki-logo.png Create a /var/www/html/images folder: Copy the image to this folder. Go to /usr/share/mediawiki/ Back up your LocalSettings.php file: cp LocalSettings.php LocalSettings.php.ori Open LocalSettings.php Before the last line in the file ("?>"), type (or paste in) $wgLogo = "/images/wiki-logo.png"; Save the LocalSettings.php file. Refresh the browser. Your new MediaWiki logo should appear.

Admins: Let's add something like this to the FAQ, or create a gui interface in MediaWiki for doing this.

Thanks! MediaDoc 18:15, 9 December 2007 (UTC)
 * You can also put your logo in skins/common/images/ (avoiding to create a new directory), and your variable will be : :$wgLogo = '../skins/common/images/mylogo.png'; --Papa6 14:45, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

Another way to change the logo

 * Upload your logo to the directory "/common/images/" which you will find inside the "skins" directory one the same level as the "monobook" directory.

$wgStylePath           = "$wgScriptPath/skins"; $wgStyleDirectory  = "$IP/skins";
 * Add the following lines to your Localsettings.php":

$wgLogo                     = "$wgStylePath/common/images/mywikilogo.png";
 * Add the following line to your Localsettings and replace "mywikilogo.png" with the name of your logo:

rs 09:41, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

Added section 7.4 which I copied from the meta.mediawiki FAQ
This section from the meta.mediawiki site FAQ entitled "Is it somehow possible to use a "file" URI-qualifier for local intranets e.g. ?" was very helpful to me so I copied it over to this site as section 7.4 under section "7. Customizing Further". Second reason for copying over was that the meta.mediawiki FAQ pages are supposed to migrate here. I also want to add some clarification on local files.
 * Sorry, I removed this section because it didn't fit our license policy, see Project:PD Help for clarification. -- :Bdk: 18:57, 12 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Since Mediawiki Ver. 1.6 it is possible to simply add  to the LocalSettings.php (in the root of your Wiki-Folder). File-Links are regarded as a security problem. Many browsers (e.g. Mozilla Firefox and Opera) won't open "file://"-Links, if the document containing the file-link was loaded from a non-localhost-server (i.e. normally). There's a FAQ stating some possibilities of configuring browsers to open these links anyway or working around the security feature.
 * Before Ver. 1.6 the Syntax was slightly different. --VVA 12:54, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

Why is the non-meta page missing information found on meta?
Why is the meta version of this page http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/MediaWiki_FAQ much better (i.e. much more comprehensive) than this page? For example, I was looking for ages for info on how to create a multi-lingual site, of course read this page, then via the forums got the answer from the Rob Church and Rotem Liss posts (13th May 2006) that I should check:

http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/MediaWiki_FAQ#How_do_I_create_a_small_wiki_farm.3F

If the old meta page is really supposed to be replaced by this mediawiki version then shouldn't we just stick a redirect on it? Otherwise we have the classic horror of duplicated data.

As it is, the information which I was looking for appears to be only on the (supposedly replaced) meta page and not on the (supposedly better) replacement page. I also made a minor correction to the old version because the correction had nowhere else to go. 217.136.7.181 15:52, 13 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Good point. I have added a note to the top of the page to let people know the current situation.  In time, this page should completely replace the one on meta, but due to incompatible licences we are not able to simply the copy information directly.  There is still a way to go before it becomes a complete replacement, and any help is always appreciated.  --HappyDog 14:42, 26 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Well the whole MediaWiki FAQ page has now been moved, except it wasn't moved. It was just deleted. Did lots of useful information get lost there? I only noticed because I had some links to a useful old FAQ entry about file links which has now disappeared. Only seems to be available by digging in the old versions here: MediaWiki FAQ old version. Possibly a rescue operation is needed for some of this info. All these detailed notes shouldn't really appear one humungous FAQ page (as it used to be on Meta). For example stuff about file links deserves its own page I guess. It needs reorganising as well as moving, but I hope we can avoid losing people's valuable contributions -- Harry Wood 12:10, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

Interwiki
The section that talks about interwiki links doesn't tell me how I can make a link i.e. from my personal wiki to Wikipedia.

http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special_page_to_work_with_the_interwiki_table

Changing the footer
Hi,

I'm going o change the footer of my wiki. footer tells me to modify the footerlinks-array in the skins php file. I've added an new item called imprint. Where ca i define the imprint item? --80.128.16.198 08:42, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

I put in small section giving a start of how to change the footer, but it was abruptly deleted by the anonymous user 86.133.51.101 -- should I put it back in or will this just result in a revert skirmish? Note that this isn't the only text I considered possibly useful that 86.133.51.101 deleted. My stub section as follows (with one minor tweak I just gave it):

===How do I change the footer?=== This is done on a skin-by-skin basis. For monobook, edit monobook.php and find the following text:

 $footerlinks = array(                      'lastmod', 'viewcount', 'numberofwatchingusers', 'credits', 'copyright',                       'privacy', 'about', 'disclaimer', 'tagline',               ); 

Editing this, however, is trickier than as presented at http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Footer - - -

I note that it's trickier because in editing this on my company's internal Wiki it now displays NOTHING in the footer other than the MediaWiki logo. Not what I left that I wanted it to display, nothing. --Strangelv 19:59, 6 July 2006 (UTC)


 * I have added this info back to the FAQ. It works for me. -- Barrylb 15:07, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Where are the used items (lastmod, viewcount, etc.) defined? --80.128.7.104 21:44, 8 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Good question. We should have that in the FAQ and how to customize each one. For now though in the file includes/SkinTemplate.php the values of each one are set. If you do a search in that file for each of the names you can see how they are implemented. -- Barrylb 04:53, 9 July 2006 (UTC)
 * I've now added info on how to customize each of the items to the FAQ. -- Barrylb 05:39, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

This was useful info, but now I've edited my footer the formatting needs adjustment. Specifically I get one very long line and a very short line underneath (disclaimers). How can I add a line break to even up the lines a little? Visctrix 00:39, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Could the array be split into 2 arrays to solve this problem? Visctrix 23:26, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Why was much of "Changing the Interface" removed?
Lots of useful information deleted by Robchurch. Why? -- Barrylb 16:28, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
 * I am going to revert for now, until there is an explanation. -- Barrylb 16:41, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

I removed it because it belongs in a separate page or series of such relating to changing the interface. These are slightly more advanced alterations and are not FAQ material. robchurch | talk 12:56, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Add a Troubleshooting section
This FAQ is missing a troubleshooting section, which should among other things include the blow section from the old FAQ at meta. I don't quite feel at home here, so i'm not being quite as bold as usual :P -- de:Benutzer:Duesentrieb 00:46, 12 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Troubleshooters belong on separate pages, not lumped into the FAQ. robchurch | talk 13:15, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

"pretty" URLs
An entry regarding "pretty" urls is badly needed. It should point to Eliminating index.php from the url I guess, but that page would have to be rewritten. -- meta:User:Duesentrieb 23:54, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

Passing a space to an extension - Solution found
Ok ... it drove me crazy not being able to pass a space to an extensions argument. So I digged into the code. Boy this is a lot of code and not easy to understand. But I finally found the function where attribute handling is done.

You can find it in Sanitizer.php, line 745ff, function.

I don't know why in line 767 the value is trimmed. Perhaps it is necessary but I removed the  and a first test worked just fine.

So perhaps someone with more knowledge about the mediawiki internal workings and wonders can shed some light on this.

And perhaps a developer can just remove the  or make it optional with default to true and a rule on how extensions can switch off that behaviour.

--83.171.153.127 21:36, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Notes for editors

 * 1) Please keep information project-neutral
 * 2) Please use language which will make us look like we have a reading age of more than six
 * 3) Please don't link to third parties or extensions or code which aren't maintained in Subversion; such code won't have been vetted by a developer, and if anything goes wrong because someone installed an extension which no longer works with the current code, etc. then we're bound to get the blame
 * 4) Be sensible about what level of detail is being included and don't add reams of similar information, e.g. detailed skin tweaks should go somewhere else

Cheers, robchurch | talk 21:24, 26 August 2006 (UTC)


 * (sigh) I've just had to remove one chunk in response to a bug report posted in good faith against a hack that appeared here. Please do not post random bits of unverified, unofficial code here, it leads to bad things happening and more headache for the real development team. Cheers, robchurch | talk 02:39, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

bread crumbs FAQ entry
What happened to the entry pointed at http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Help:FAQ#How_do_I_implement_a_.27breadcru ?

There are links to it around, and it was in google cache earlier this week, but now it seems to be gone. Why? Is there better information somewhere? Is this not a FAQ?


 * See the note I posted above, about a "bit of code leading to a bug report" etc. etc. robchurch | talk 01:05, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Noted. So how about a FAQ entry for the "limited BreadCrumb support when using subpages"? Also maybe one for "subpages" in general?

program language & server expected
i looked in the FAQ for info on what programming language MediaWiki is written in and it doesn't say. if anybody wants to put another question & answer in the FAQ this would help me out a lot.
 * see How does MediaWiki work? please. -- :Bdk: 22:21, 10 October 2006 (UTC)
 * thanks.

Access control
hi,

From the article:'''In particular, users should remember that it is designed to allow open-editing, and doesn't provide very complex per-page access restrictions. Users seeking such functionality ought to consider using software dedicated to that purpose, such as document or content management software'''


 * Why is that? I love media wiki and I would like to keep using it as an internal wiki system in my organization. Some information in the organization is sensitive and the lack per-page access control prevents us from using it. How can we overcome this problem? thanks, Ori Mosenzon 14:49, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

Korean language page for Manual:FAQ
meta:미디어위키 FAQ

This is Korean language page for Manual:FAQ.

I can't link to Manual:FAQ. help~!!

-- WonYong ( Talk / Contrib ) 04:59, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

=2007=

open my_wiki from my_root directory (my_domain).
I had hard time figuring it out as I couldn't find any reference to this. MediaWiki help and manuals assume that you upload file to /wiki/ directory. But, then the index.php resides within /wiki/ directory and users have to type http://my_domain/wiki/ to get to my_wiki main page. I had to spend hours to find out what I had to do to allow users to just type my_domain name and get to my_wiki main page. Here is what you can do:
 * create an index.php, and type this:


 * upload it to the root directory of my_domain (e.g., if you own a domain name such as www.my_domain.com, that is the name of your root directory)

That's it! My Wiki page is at http://taichiwiki.org You can contact me with further questions - I am a non-techy who has a patience to make research and read mannuals. I have been spending unacountable amount of hours to find right tips and codes for this wonderful program and some others. I personally feel that MediaWiki should have a special page called MediaWiki help for non-techies. There are so many great functions and extensions for MediaWiki, but the average installation instructions seem to be written by and for the techies. I guess techies don't understand the problems of non-techies... Don't get me wrong techies, I really appreciate what you are doing, and doing it for free. You guys are awesome! --Kohyin 07:00, 27 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Um, that's what we are working on here... any further help would be much appreciated. ;) By the way, you could have done that just by messing around with the Apache rewrite rules, but that isn't linked from anywhere here. Hmm. Titoxd (?!?) 19:12, 28 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Yes, I realized it later as my learning progressed. This one is a round-about not-so fluent solution, but it gets a message passed to the machine :) I have struggled and still am struggling, I don't want all the time and energy go wasted just for my personal goal. I will keep posting what I find difficult and confusing as well as beginner's solutions that I come up with...I love learning languages and it's like learning new languages. Need to read lots of grammer books and go through dictionaries, but solution will be there as it isn't an appreciation of a literature (literature is another fascinating subject, though)Kohyin 08:57, 17 February 2007 (UTC)

Typo
theres a typo in this section causing the information box to be displayed wrong. === How can I create Interwiki Links in my Wiki? ===

DB Expert Answer
Bouncingmolar 15:53, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

Update Why section for new version
In the "Why..." section the part about "...can't I download MediaWiki 1.10?" should be updated or removed, now that MediaWiki 1.10 is avaliable from the Download page. --24.20.69.240 01:43, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Anyone home? It's still there.  It should just be removed entirely rather than having to update it. 67.98.226.13 17:30, 1 June 2007 (UTC)

Requested title change
This heading is not grammatically correct. Can somebody please change it to "How can I suppress MediaWiki from formatting urls, tags, etc." Thanks, 203.217.47.76, aka Jeremy 22:41, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

spam blocking HOWTO
It'd be great if this could be added to the Anti-Spam section: http://wiki.evernex.com/index.php?title=Blocking_Spam_in_Mediawiki --Neurophyre 16:12, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

Suggested change to "How can I prevent editing by anonymous users?"
EdK added a comment in the section titled "How can I prevent editing by anonymous users?" suggesting an alternate way of writing the PHP example listed: use if (condition) continue; and the user doesn't have to remember the closing brace? I can't say I can see how this would solve the same problem, but probably I'm just misunderstanding the pseudo-code. EdK (or anyone else who groks this), please clarify. --Jarsyl 09:49, 3 October 2007 (UTC)


 * I think I know what this person is suggesting. They are saying that instead of telling people to do this:

if ( $this->data['loggedin'] == 1 ) { foreach($this->data['content_actions'] as $key => $tab) { ... } }
 * we could tell them to do this:

foreach($this->data['content_actions'] as $key => $tab) { if ( $this->data['loggedin'] == 1 ) continue; ... }
 * Here  causes each iteration of the   loop to be aborted.
 * The advantage is that it does not require users to look for the closing brace of the  block, which is always tedious. The disadvantage is that it's not very elegant code, but it's a nice hack if the goal is improving the success rate of this customization.
 * Disclaimer: I do not know PHP, I'm only using cognate constructs from other language that have a  keyword. I'm further speculating that PHP has a   keyword that would abort the entire   loop. If that's the case (someone please confirm) then we could suggest this:

foreach($this->data['content_actions'] as $key => $tab) { if ( $this->data['loggedin'] == 1 ) break; ... }
 * Thibgc 23:27, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

=2008=

How do I add more buttons on the edit page? - Does not work
Hello,

i added in two different wikis the same for additional buttons in MediaWiki:Common.js, but in one the buttons do not appear. is there any variable that needs to be added to local setting to support additional buttons or what else might be the reason? thanks in advance kind regards --TurboKanne 11:22, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

Delete article and restore just last version does not really make the database smaller, does is?
To make the database in MySQL smaller I read the point 4.3 of your FAQ. I do not like to install the maintenance script "maintenance/deleteOldRevisions.php", because I don't have a direct access to the webserver, so I tried the following:

"How do I delete an old version of a page?"

"Administrators can delete an old revision of a page by deleting the page, and then selectively undeleting revisions to be kept "

As far as I know, the old version of the articles will still be stored in the database, so I think of course the article itself (after deleting, then restoring just the last version) will be smaller, but I think the opposite happens to the database. The size of the complete database rizes, instead of getting smaller, or am I wrong?

Is it possible to remove already deleted articles from the database? Maybe by using the phpmyadmin-Tool and editing the database? --FSLEP 06:09, 25 April 2008 (UTC)
 * It is not possible from the web through MediaWiki. This is intentional. No irrevokable loss of information should be possble through the web interface, ever.
 * You can of course delete anything using phpmyadmin, but you have to be very carefull not to delte the wrong thing, or cause inconsistencies. I recommend against it. To make your database smaller, look into options for compressing old revisions, or storing them externally (that that means "another database server", usually - not sure if there are other options). -- Duesentrieb ⇌ 11:08, 25 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Thank you for your answer--FSLEP 06:44, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

Heading error
In How do I administrate/manage my users? The noun is administration, the verb it comes from is administer.

Manual:How to use DjVu with MediaWiki
Explanations needed.

Split this page
How about splitting the FAQ into subpages so its a decent readable length again. Also, this talk page should be archived with the support questions moved to the support desk. --Cneubauer 19:50, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

Purge information accurate?
The FAQ for purging a cached page says you must use the /w path rather than the /wiki path. Is this still true or outdated information? Seems to work fine for me with /wiki in 1.12.0. Maiden taiwan 01:45, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
 * It works fine, you just have to use ?action=purge instead of &action=purge. -- Skiz zerz  02:16, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

What is the Database host
i have all the files of the wiki Site on there and i am configuring now but it says there is no connection.. and it says i need a database host.. where can i find the name of my database host? - June 22nd 2008

$wgLogo's relative path
The FAQ wrongly claims that the path is relative to LocalSettings.php, while Manual:$wgLogo is correct by saying that it is relative to the document_root. The FAQ is protected so I can't fix it. 89.1.59.224 16:52, 16 August 2008 (UTC)


 * $wgLogo = 'photoname.jpg';
 * In this example, the photo is in the same folder as the LocalSettings.php file.
 * This is incorrect because it assumes that the photo is in the root directory. My wiki is in /wiki/ so it would have to be /wiki/photoname/jpg
 * 30 August 2008

Browser Crasher
This page crashes my browser, Mozilla 1.2.1 under Mac OS 9.2.2. This is unusual since I very rarely experience browser crashes under MediaWiki -- one reason I'm so faithful to the tool. I suspect it is due to the multiple links to interlanguage versions of the page, which display as metacharacters, as I don't have all the proper fonts properly loaded and encoded. I find the page does render under iCab 3.0.5 but that browser is substandard. No, it is not possible to upgrade to Firefox.

Suggest an alternate method of displaying interlanguage links, such as the popular and widely understood row of flags. While the current method may have wide support, I don't see the value in excluding a user base of older machines. &rarr;Xiong 17:47, 17 August 2008 (UTC)

How do I remove tabs for users who are not logged in? - Incorrect explanation!
There is an incorect explanation in discussed article, in section How do I remove the article/edit etc tabs for users who are not logged in?! Please note that there is "(...) for users who are not logged in" in the question. Provided solution (setting #ca-edit { display: none; }) actually removes edit tab for all kind of users, also those logged in. It is obvious and natural - how CSS should know if user is logged in or not? It hides (display-none) mentioned element in all kind of situation. Dot. End. Actually there isnt't correct solution on how to remove tabs for only those users, who are not logged in in this FAQ. Sad but true. Trejder 11:19, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Happens to both old version. Newest vesion gave blank frontpage. Whats happening? I'm a n00b
Warning: set_time_limit [function.set-time-limit]: Cannot set time limit in safe mode in /customers/pokertilsynet.no/pokertilsynet.no/httpd.www/install-utils.inc on line 27 * PHP 4.4.9: ok   * Warning: PHP's safe mode is active. You may have problems caused by this, particularly if using image uploads. * PHP server API is cgi-fcgi; using ugly URLs (index.php?title=Page_Title) * Have XML / Latin1-UTF-8 conversion support. * PHP's memory_limit is 16M. If this is too low, installation may fail! Attempting to raise limit to 20M... failed. * Have zlib support; enabling output compression. * Neither Turck MMCache nor eAccelerator are installed, can't use object caching functions * GNU diff3 not found. * Found GD graphics library built-in, image thumbnailing will be enabled if you enable uploads. * Installation directory: /customers/pokertilsynet.no/pokertilsynet.no/httpd.www * Script URI path: * Warning: $wgSecretKey key is insecure, generated with mt_rand. Consider changing it manually. * Connecting to pokertilsynet_n on localhost as pokertilsynet_n...success. * Connected to 5.0.32-Debian_7etch6-log; using enhancements for mySQL 4. * Warning: $wgSecretKey key is insecure, generated with mt_rand. Consider changing it manually. * Database pokertilsynet_n exists * Creating tables... using MySQL 3/4 table defs...Query "CREATE TABLE wiki_categorylinks ( cl_from int(8) unsigned NOT NULL default '0', cl_to varchar(255) binary NOT NULL default , cl_sortkey varchar(86) binary NOT NULL default , cl_timestamp timestamp NOT NULL, UNIQUE KEY cl_from(cl_from,cl_to), KEY cl_sortkey(cl_to,cl_sortkey), KEY cl_timestamp(cl_to,cl_timestamp) ) TYPE=InnoDB" failed with error code "Specified key was too long; max key length is 1000 bytes".

hard to search
If you are having trouble finding things in the more lengthy articles all i can say is that if you use the FIND function on your computer it makes it so much easier to search for a specific sentence or phrase in the article.

mentioning software appliances as a deployment option for MediaWiki
I edited the installation guide to mention  software appliances as a deployment option for MediaWiki and since the FAQ touches on installation issues I think it would be a good idea for it to at least mention software appliances a possibility since it allows users to skip installation altogether and deploy a ready-to-use self contained system that just works, which many users find to be a very convenient option.

LirazSiri 04:52, 7 November 2008 (UTC)
 * MediaWiki.org is not a place to advertise. While I do believe these appliances may be useful to some users, it is not acceptible to go around promoting them on every single page as the recommended way of installing MediaWiki. If anything, they should be linked to in a "See Also" section, if applicable to the page itself. Before you try to say that "well, the page you linked to says that we're allowed to advertise MediaWiki," allow me to clarify the meaning of what that sentence means. It means you're allowed to promote the software itself, not any 3rd-party packages that bundle it, etc. By mentioning "When you can, install ", you are advertising that software package. To be honest, if I didn't see you earlier on mwusers, I probably would have blocked you for a while for just signing up and starting to advertise your product all over the place. -- Skiz zerz  22:25, 1 December 2008 (UTC)


 * Skinnerz has a point. We moved the discussion to User talk:Skizzerz -- LirazSiri 15:55, 6 December 2008 (UTC)