Project:MediaWiki is not Wikipedia/ru

MediaWiki is used to run thousands of wikis on servers all over the world. The 800 wikis of the Wikimedia Foundation are important members of that family; and the English Wikipedia, the largest wiki in the world, is especially notable. But MediaWiki has a much wider userbase than those few projects. MediaWiki is used to run wikis whose goals are fundamentally different to the WMF wikis; to run wikis whose principles are morally objectionable, non-neutral or biased; to run wikis whose content is not open source; and thousands of wikis which are not free to edit. The MediaWiki developers make software changes to accommodate the needs of this entire family; they do not make judgements about which projects are or aren't worthy of support.

As such, the MediaWiki developers represent their own project with their own separate community, with their own goals and practices; and those goals and practices, while closely matching those of enwiki or whereverwiki, do not necessarily precisely align. There is nothing unrealistic, or wrong, with enwiki having goals which are very slightly different from those of the MediaWiki software as a whole. The WMF wikis have, and always will have, a particularly strong symbiotic relationship with the MediaWiki project, and often have the loudest voice in guiding MediaWiki development. But as a member of a Wikimedia project like Wikipedia, do not make the mistake of thinking that MediaWiki, or the MediaWiki developers, exist only to 'serve' your project, or to serve the WMF as a whole.

If you are a member of a Wikimedia project like Wikipedia, you should think of the developers in exactly the same way you would think of the Wikimedia Commons community. Most WMF wikis have a strong and healthy symbiotic relationship with Commons, and the Commons community generally does a fairly good job of balancing the needs of the many wikis it supports. But that relationship is usually not without its moments of tension, and sometimes wiki communities do not feel that they are getting everything they would like. But there is an instinctive recognition that those communities have no 'right' to expect any more cooperation than they get, because Commons is its own project with its own values, and that they will have to convince Commons that whatever it is that they want to do is in the best interests of *both* projects, in order to progress. If you treat the community of MediaWiki developers in the same way, you'll understand much better why things do not always appear to be going the 'right' way.

Как следует поступать

 * Do be proactive in letting the MediaWiki developers know when a change has had an impact on your wiki project, either positive or negative


 * Do suggest changes which would benefit your wiki.


 * Do keep in mind the 'big picture' when discussing changes.

Не следует ...

 * Никогда не следует ожидать, что разработчики MediaWiki обязаны проконсультироваться с вашим проектом перед внесением каких-либо изменений, особенно, если ваш проект большой и с большим самомнением.


 * Не думайте, что разработчики MediaWiki обязаны не совершать никаких изменений, которые наносят ущерб вашему проекту.


 * Не пытайтесь выдвигать аргумент, что некие изменения, якобы, должны быть сделаны, потому что в вашем проекте есть «консенсус» за то, чтобы это сделать. Консенсус пользователей MediaWiki будет тем более впечатляющим, что многие из них не смогли договориться о времени суток.