Creating a new wiki

From Acorn

This is using our current MediaWiki server:

  1. Make a copy on the desktop of the "mediawiki" folder in the server software folder. Unzip the mediawiki-1.5.4.tar inside. This file is kept: in nutmeg HD and HD2, in tulip file share: DCC Archives 2/software/ and can be downloaded from SourceForge
  2. Rename the expanded directory to the new wiki name. Make it fairly short, and unix-friendly.
  3. Move directory to Library/WebServer/Documents folder
  4. Make the "config" subdirectory world-writable
  5. In web browser, go to http://nutmeg.conncoll.edu/...new-wiki-name
  6. Fill out the form, print it out before continuing to your wiki. See White Book for passwords.
  7. Move the LocalSettings.php file from the cofig directory to the main wiki directory. Change permissions?
  8. Delete the config directory
  9. Back up this file: yourwiki/skins/MonoBook.php, and move the same file over from the main wiki (to replace it), this will make the following changes (from here):
    1. Remove tabs for users that are not logged in
    2. Remove the toolbox for users that are not logged in
    3. Add an editable left menu
  10. Log in as WikiSysop. Only sysops can delete pages, create accounts and change left nav bar.
  11. Create this link at the bottom of your main page: [[MediaWiki:MenuNavigation]]
  12. Click on it to create your menu page, for starters, you can use this: 
 * [[Main Page| Main Page]]
 * [[Help| Help]]
 * [[SANDBOX| SANDBOX]]
 <hr>
 *  [http://www.conncoll.edu/is/info-resources/course-pages Course Web Pages]
 *  [http://www.conncoll.edu Connecticut College]

another example is 

  * [[Main Page]]
  * [[Special:Recentchanges| Recent changes]]
  * [[Special:Random| Random page]]
  ** [[an indented Link]]
<hr>
  * [[another Link]]
  * [http://www.Link.de a http link]


Permissions- These are determined in the yourwiki/includes/DefaultSettings.php file

Permission keys given to users in each group, after 

$wgGroupPermissions = array();
  1. All users are implicitly in the '*' group including anonymous visitors;
  2. logged-in users are all implicitly in the 'user' group. These will be combined with the permissions of all groups that a given user is listed in in the user_groups table.


As LocalSettings override DefaultSettings, you can make changes in LocalSettings. This may be better.

In LocalSettings.php, add the following lines above the "?>" line:

To disable account creation by logged in users: 

$wgGroupPermissions['user' ]['createaccount']   = false;

To disable account creation by anonymous visitors 

$wgGroupPermissions['*']['createaccount'] = false;

To require that users log in to edit 

$wgGroupPermissions['*']['edit'] = false;

This removes the link to the talk page in the header for non-logged in users. Check: the code seems to actually hide IP! 

$wgShowIPinHeader = false;

To change the time zone from UTC 

$wgLocalTZoffset = -5;

To enable uploads

Change the upload block in LocalSettings.php to: 

$wgEnableUploads		= true;
$wgFileExtensions = array('gif','png','jpg','mp3','mp4','m4a','mov','m4v','pdf');
$wgStrictFileExtensions = true;
$wgVerifyMimeType = true;
## Warn if uploaded files are larger than this
$wgUploadSizeWarning = 30000 * 1024;

Note, php. in is set to 50 MB upload max. To change this, go to /etc/php.ini and change upload_max_filesize = 50M

Check ./includes/DefaultSettings.php $wgMaxUploadSize = 1024*1024*100; # 100MB also

Make the images directory writable:

Owner: www, read and write, Group: nutmeg, read only, Others, read only


Changes have to be made to includes/mime.types: this line should read:

video/mpeg mpeg mpg mpe mp4 m4v

Change, in includes/mime.info:

video/quicktime [MULTIMEDIA] to video/quicktime [VIDEO]

The two files above, along with LocalSettings.php, and includes/defines.php, determine mime types you can upload, and alerts.

At the current time, no changes have to be made to defines.php

You can move mime.types and mime.info from this wiki to the new wiki, but LocalSettings.php has to be modified in the new wiki.


To change the logo in the upper left: Make a new 135x135 png graphic name it wiki.png, and replace the one in skins/common/images/wiki.png

(note, there is also one skins/monobook/ , this should not need replacement)

To change the default appearance

  1. Replace the skins/monobook/headbg.jpg file with one from wiki2
  2. Replace the skins/monobook/main.css file from wiki2
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