Manual:What is MediaWiki?/sco

Ye liklie ken Wikipædia, the free encyclipædia, n micht weel be ae wee bit confused bi siclik, but differant, wairds lik Wiki, Wikimedia or MediaWiki.

To avoid a possible confusion between the words you may first want to read the article about the names where the differences are explained.



General Owerview
MediaWiki is ae free server-based saffware that's licensed unner the GNU General Public License (GPL). It's designed tae be rin oan ae muckle server ferm fer ae wabsteid that gets millions o hits per day.

MediaWiki is aen extreamelie dochtfu, scalable saffware n ae feature-fouthie wiki implementation that uises PHP tae process n displey data stored in ae database, lik MySQL.

Pages uise MediaWiki's wikitex format, sae that uisers wioot knawledge o XHTML or CSS can eedit thaim easilie.

Whan ae uiser hauns aen eedit in til ae page, MediaWiki writes it til the database, bit wioot delytin the afore-gaun versions o the page, thus allouin easie reverts in case o vandaleesm or spammin. MediaWiki can manage eemage n multimedia files, aes weel, thir ar stored in the fileseestem. Fer muckle wikis with heaps o uisers, MediaWiki supports cachin n can easilie be coupled wi Squid proxie server saffware.



Whit MediaWiki is...

 * MediaWiki is wiki saffware.


 * Gif ye dinna ken whit ae wiki is, than please read this Wikipædia airticle afore gaun onie faurer!


 * MediaWiki is server saffware.


 * Aes wi onie saffware that ye expose til the internet, thaur micht be bugs or securitie quirks. Dinna install MediaWiki onless ye'r ettlin tae keep up wi security upgrades (please subscribe tae get propales o securitie updates).


 * MediaWiki is geared taewart the needs o the Wikimedia Foundation.


 * The program is primarilie developt tae rin oan ae muckle server ferm fer Wikipædia n its sister waurks. Featurs, performance, confeegurabeelitie, ease-o-uise, etc ar designed in this licht; gif yer needs ar radiclie differant the saffware micht na be richt fer ye.


 * MediaWiki is free saffware.


 * Nae guarantee or warrantie o onie kynd is provided.

Gie Wikitex ae shot
Ay, ye can easilie modifie pages n ye can (tempralie) publish dummie sentances, n ye can even (tempralie) compleatelie destroy ae page in ae wiki. Ye dinna need onie programmin skeels tae dae this.

We suggest that ye exerceese yersel wiin oor saunpit. Please isolate yer testin thaur, tho: the admeens micht na tak ower kyndlie til yer mischief itherwise.

Forby, ye can luik up the, this conteens basic formattin commaunds.

Some things that MediaWiki disna dae ower weel...

 * Cause MediaWiki wis designed fer apen-content, it's aften na suitable fer situations whaur ye want to restreect access til pert o the wiki.


 * MediaWiki haes been designed tae serve verra hei-traffeck wabsteids lik Wikipædia. It's been optimised fer this uise n michtna be ower suitable fer smawer steids, whaur disk space or memrie ar muckler restreections than baundwidth.


 * Fer ordinair, MediaWiki is na ae suitable replacemant fer dedicatit forum/bloggin saffware gif that's whit ye'r efter.

In the abuin cases thaur micht be ither wiki saffware (or non-wiki saffware) that better sers yer needs.

See aes weel

 * Decidin wether tae uise ae wiki aes yer wabsteid type
 * Decidin whit wiki saffware tae uise
 * Ful leet o MediaWiki featurs
 * Comparin wiki saffware
 * www.wikimatrix.org — compare syndrie wiki engines side-bi-side.