User:Fram/Sandbox

Academic wikis are [|third-party wikis] meant to be used in an academic context with a greater emphasis on features like access control, content approval, and research analysis.

For other third-party uses of MediaWiki, please see [|Sysadmin hub].

Knowledge Sharing
Many academic wikis are using [|Extension:Semantic MediaWiki] and leveraging the semantic web to share data. The [|Mediawiki API] can also be used to mine data from other sites; combined with an scheduler program like Cron this can lead to semi-automated data distribution.

Vampire Model
The vampire model consists of two rules: This method of account-creation removes the burden of making all accounts from single user/admin, this greatly simplifies matters. Because trust of peers is relatively high in an academic setting, a single account can be made for a P.I., who then can make accounts for his/her students. Because Mediawiki logs all account activity it is (relatively) easy to track accountability for creation of spam/bot accounts.
 * 1) only registered users may edit
 * 2) only registered users may create accounts

Authentication

 * [|Extension:LDAP_Authentication]
 * Leverage an existing LDAP (including Microsoft Active Directory, Kerberos) as a single sign-on
 * Alternatives:
 * [|Extension:Windows_NTLM_LDAP_Auto_Auth]

Authorization

 * [|Manual:Preventing_access]
 * [|Manual:Block_and_unblock]
 * [|Extension:EditSubpages]
 * [|Security issues with authorization extensions]

Editing

 * [|Extension:ParserFunctions]
 * Bundled with core, required for complex templating including most WP templates.


 * [|Extension:WikiEditor]
 * WYSIWYG editor sponsored by WikiMedia.


 * Vector
 * A Polished skin for MediaWiki that comes bundled by default. Enable [|Extension:Vector] for advanced functionality for this skin.


 * [|Extension:Cite]
 * Display

citations to show where information originated. This is particularly useful when merging data from a single document on multiple wiki pages to indicate why the information is authoritative.


 * [|Extension:TableEdit]
 * Forms-based editor for wiki-tables.

Navigation & Search

 * [|Extension:BreadCrumbs2]
 * Navigation aid when traversing the wiki, usually used to display and highlight a category hierarchy.


 * [|Extension:CategoryTree]
 * Improve category listings with counters for contained pages of sub-categories.


 * [|Extension:SphinxSearch]
 * An

alternative to the default search engine, lightweight but allowing more robust indexing of content through the third-party Sphinx engine.
 * Alternatives:
 * [|Extension:Lucene-search] -- more complicated but more robust still, used by large wikis like Wikipedia


 * Extension:Semantic MediaWiki
 * Allows

you to add meta data to content in wiki articles and providing a query language for dynamically retrieving content including properties and lists of articles.
 * Alternatives:
 * [|Extension:DynamicPageList]