README

   1 2003-11-08
   2
   3 MediaWiki
   4 ---------
   5
   6 MediaWiki is the software used for Wikipedia
   7 (http://www.wikipedia.org) and the other Wikimedia
   8 Foundation websites. Compared to other wikis, it has an
   9 excellent range of features and support for high-traffic
  10 websites. However, it is generally harder to install. Be
  11 sure to follow the INSTALL document closely. Installation on
  12 a Microsoft Windows system is not recommended, however it is
  13 possible. Documentation for installation on Windows may be
  14 found at:
  15
  16   http://meta.wikipedia.org/wiki/Running_MediaWiki_on_Windows
  17
  18 The MediaWiki software was written by:
  19
  20 * Lee Daniel Crocker
  21 * Magnus Manske
  22 * Jan Hidders
  23 * Brion Vibber
  24 * Axel Boldt
  25 * Geoffrey T. Dairiki
  26 * Tomasz Wegrzanowski
  27 * Erik Moeller
  28 * Tim Starling
  29 * Several others
  30
  31 These developers hold the copyright to this work, and it is
  32 licensed the terms of the GNU General Public License, version
  33 2 (see http://www.fsf.org/licenses/gpl.html). Derivative
  34 works and later versions of the code will also be considered
  35 free software licensed under the same terms.
  36
  37 The newly-founded Wikimedia Foundation currently has no
  38 legal rights to the software, although copyright may be
  39 assigned to it at a later date. Wikimedia has not funded
  40 any of the development work.
  41
  42 Sections of code written exclusively by Lee Crocker are also
  43 released into the public domain, wich does not impair the
  44 obligations of users under the GPL for use of the whole code
  45 or other sections thereof.
  46
  47 Many thanks to the Wikipedia regulars for testing and
  48 suggestions.
  49
  50 The code is currently maintained at Sourceforge under the
  51 project "wikipedia", module name "phase3". You can view the
  52 code in CVS, report bugs and make feature requests there:
  53
  54   http://wikipedia.sourceforge.net
  55
  56 Documentation and discussion on new features may be found
  57 at:
  58
  59   http://meta.wikipedia.org/wiki/MediaWiki_development
  60
  61 If you are setting up your own wiki based on this software,
  62 it is highly recommended that you subscribe to mediawiki-l:
  63
  64   http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/mediawiki-l
  65
  66 The mailing list is very low volume, and is intended primarily
  67 for announcements of new versions, bug fixes, and security
  68 issues.
  69
  70 PHP
  71
  72 The code is written in PHP. Version 4.3.2 or higher is
  73 recommended. There are known issues with early 4.2.x
  74 releases.
  75
  76 MySQL
  77
  78 MediaWiki requires MySQL 3.23 or later, and PHP-MySQL.
  79 Version 4.0 or later is strongly recommended
  80
  81 Operating system
  82
  83 The code was written on and for Linux, and no attempt
  84 has been made to make it portable to other OSs. The
  85 math support in particular has run-time dependencies on
  86 things like TeTeX and GhostScript that are generally
  87 found in  Linux but not other OSs. However, we have had
  88 reports of successful installation on Windows, albeit
  89 without TeX support.