RELEASE-NOTES-1.26

   1 Security reminder: If you have PHP's register_globals option set, you must
   2 turn it off. MediaWiki will not work with it enabled.
   3
   4 == MediaWiki 1.26 ==
   5
   6 THIS IS NOT A RELEASE YET
   7
   8 MediaWiki 1.26 is an alpha-quality branch and is not recommended for use in
   9 production.
  10
  11 === Configuration changes in 1.26 ===
  12 * $wgPasswordResetRoutes['email'] = true by default.
  13 * $wgEnableParserCache was deprecated, set $wgParserCacheType to CACHE_NONE
  14   instead if you want to disable the parser cache.
  15 * New-style continuation is now the default for API action=continue. Clients may
  16   use the 'rawcontinue' parameter to receive raw query-continue data, but the
  17   new style is encouraged as it's harder to implement incorrectly.
  18 * Deprecated API formats dump and wddx have been completely removed.
  19 * (T7645) The "Signature" button on the edit toolbar is now hidden by default
  20   in non-talk namespaces. A new configuration variable,
  21   $wgExtraSignatureNamespaces, controls in which subject (non-talk) namespaces
  22   the "Signature" button on the edit toolbar will be displayed.
  23 * $wgResourceLoaderUseESI was deprecated and removed. This was an experimental
  24   feature that was never enabled by default.
  25 * $wgResourceLoaderExperimentalAsyncLoading was deprecated and removed.
  26   This experimental feature was never enabled by default and is obsolete as of
  27   MediaWiki 1.26, in where ResourceLoader became fully asynchronous.
  28 * $wgMasterWaitTimeout was removed (deprecated in 1.24).
  29 * Fields in ParserOptions are now private. Use the accessors instead.
  30 * Custom LESS functions (defined via $wgResourceLoaderLESSFunctions)
  31   have been removed, after being deprecated in 1.24.
  32 * $wgAlwaysUseTidy has been removed.
  33 * ResetSessionID hook has been removed. Nothing seems to use it.
  34 * Certain AuthPlugin methods are deprecated in favor of new hooks:
  35 ** AuthPlugin::initUser() is replaced by LocalUserCreated.
  36 ** AuthPlugin::updateUser() is replaced by UserLoggedIn.
  37 ** AuthPlugin::updateExternalDB() is replaced by the existing UserSaveSettings.
  38 ** AuthPlugin::updateExternalDBGroups() is replaced by UserGroupsChanged.
  39 ** AuthPluginUser::isHidden() is replaced by UserIsHidden.
  40 ** AuthPluginUser::isLocked() is replaced by UserIsLocked.
  41 * The UserRights hook is deprecated in favor of the new UserGroupsChanged hook.
  42 * AuthPlugin::initUser() and AuthPlugin::updateUser() should no longer replace
  43   the passed User object.
  44
  45 === New features in 1.26 ===
  46 * (T51506) Now action=info gives estimates of actual watchers for a page.
  47   See $wgRCMaxAge, $wgWatchersMaxAge and $wgUnwatchedPageSecret
  48   to learn how to configure if needed.
  49 * Change tags can now be hidden in the interface by disabling the associated
  50   "tag-<id>" interface message.
  51 * ':' (colon) is now invalid in usernames for new accounts. Existing accounts
  52   are not affected.
  53 * Added a new hook, 'LogException', to log exceptions in nonstandard ways.
  54 * Revive the 'SpecialSearchResultsAppend' hook which occurs after the list of
  55   search results are rendered. The initial use case is to append a "give us
  56   feedback" link beneath the search results.
  57 * Added a new hook, 'RejectParserCacheValue', which allows extensions to
  58   reject an otherwise-successful parser cache lookup. The intent is to allow
  59   extensions to manage the eviction of archaic HTML output from the cache.
  60 * (T68699) The expiration of the UserID and Token login cookies
  61   ($wgExtendedLoginCookieExpiration) can be configured independently of the
  62   expiration of all other cookies ($wgCookieExpiration).
  63 * (T50519) Support for generating JPEG/PNG thumbnails from WebP images added
  64   if ImageMagick is used as image scaler ($wgUseImageMagick = true). Uploading
  65   of WebP images still disabled by default. Add $wgFileExtensions[] =
  66   'webp'; to LocalSettings.php to enable uploading of WebP images.
  67 * Added new hooks 'EnhancedChangesListModifyLineData' &
  68   'EnhancedChangesListModifyBlockLineData', to modify the data used to build
  69   lines in enhanced recentchanges and watchlist.
  70 * Caches that need purging ability now use the WANObjectCache interface.
  71   This corresponds to a new $wgMainWANCache setting, which defaults to using
  72   the $wgMainCacheType settings.
  73 * Added MWTimestamp::getTimezoneString() which returns the localized timezone
  74   string, if available. To localize this string, see the comments of
  75   $wgLocaltimezone in includes/DefaultSettings.php.
  76 * Callers needing fast light-weight data stores use $wgMainStash to select
  77   the store type from $wgObjectCaches. The default is the local database.
  78 * Interface message overrides in the MediaWiki namespace will now be cached in
  79   memcached and APC (if available), rather than memcached and local files.
  80 * Added a new hook, 'RandomPageQuery', to allow modification of the query used
  81   by Special:Random to select random pages.
  82 * $wgTransactionalTimeLimit was added, which controls the request time limit
  83   for potentially slow POST requests that need to be as atomic as possible.
  84 * ResourceLoader now loads all scripts asynchronously. The top-queue and
  85   startup modules are no longer synchronously loaded.
  86 * 'mediawiki.ui.button' styles are no longer unconditionally loaded on every
  87   page. During the deprecation period, the styles will only be loaded on pages
  88   which contain 'mw-ui-button' in their HTML. Starting in 1.28, the styles will
  89   only be loaded if explicitly required.
  90
  91 ==== External libraries ====
  92 * Update es5-shim from v4.0.0 to v4.1.5.
  93 * Update json2 from revision 2014-02-04 to 2015-05-03.
  94 * Update Sinon.JS from 1.10.3 to 1.15.4.
  95 * Upgrade jQuery Client from v1.0.0 to v2.0.0.
  96 * Added mediawiki/at-ease 1.0.0.
  97 * Update QUnit from v1.17.1 to v1.18.0.
  98
  99 === Bug fixes in 1.26 ===
 100 * (T53283) load.php sometimes sends 304 response without full headers
 101 * (T65198) Talk page tabs now have a "rel=discussion" attribute
 102 * (T98841) {{msgnw:}} now preserves comments even when subst: is not used.
 103 * (T104142) $wgEmergencyContact and $wgPasswordSender now use their default
 104   value if set to an empty string.
 105
 106 === Action API changes in 1.26 ===
 107 * New-style continuation is now the default for action=continue. Clients may
 108   use the 'rawcontinue' parameter to receive raw query-continue data, but the
 109   new style is encouraged as it's harder to implement incorrectly.
 110 * Deprecated API formats dump and wddx have been completely removed.
 111 * API action=query&list=tags: The displayname can now be boolean false if the
 112   tag is meant to be hidden from user interfaces.
 113 * action=import no longer allows both the namespace= and rootpage= parameters
 114   to be set. If they are both set, the value of rootpage= will be ignored.
 115 * prop=revision output in enum mode is now sorted by timestamp rather than
 116   revision ID. This usually won't make any difference.
 117 * (T102645) Namespace list from meta=siteinfo&siprop=namespaces is now an array
 118   with formatversion=2.
 119 * Various other output from meta=siteinfo will now always be arrays instead of
 120   sometimes being numerically-indexed objects with formatversion=2.
 121 * When errors about users being blocked are returned, they now include
 122   information about the relevant block.
 123 * (T99926) list=random has higher limits, in line with other API modules.
 124 * list=random's rnredirect parameter is deprecated in favor of a new
 125   rnfilterredir parameter that also allows for listing both redirects and
 126   non-redirects.
 127 * list=random now supports continuation.
 128 * API responses to GET requests may now include ETag and Last-Modified headers,
 129   and will honor corresponding If-None-Match and If-Modified-Since on such
 130   requests.
 131
 132 === Action API internal changes in 1.26 ===
 133 * New metadata item ApiResult::META_KVP_MERGE to allow for merging the KVP key
 134   into the value when the value is an assoc.
 135 * API action modules may now provide values for the RFC 7232 ETag and
 136   Last-Modified headers. The API will check these against If-None-Match and
 137   If-Modified-Since request headers on GET requests and avoid executing the
 138   module when appropriate.
 139
 140 === Languages updated in 1.26 ===
 141
 142 MediaWiki supports over 350 languages. Many localisations are updated
 143 regularly. Below only new and removed languages are listed, as well as
 144 changes to languages because of Phabricator reports.
 145
 146 * Languages added:
 147 ** ase (American sign language), thanks to translator Icemandeaf
 148 ** dty (डोटेली/Doteli), thanks to translators जनक राज भट्ट, बिप्लब आनन्द,
 149    मेश सिंह बोहरा, and राम प्रसाद जोशी
 150 ** luz (لئری دوٙمینی / Southern Luri)
 151
 152 === Other changes in 1.26 ===
 153 * ChangeTags::tagDescription() will return false if the interface message
 154   for the tag is disabled.
 155 * Added PageHistoryPager::doBatchLookups hook.
 156 * Added $wikiId parameter to FormatAutocomments hook.
 157 * Added ParserCacheSaveComplete to ParserCache
 158 * supportsDirectEditing and supportsDirectApiEditing methods added to
 159   ContentHandler, to provide a way for ApiEditPage and EditPage to check
 160   if direct editing of content is allowed. These methods return false,
 161   by default for the ContentHandler base class and true for TextContentHandler
 162   and it's derivative classes (everything in core). For Content types that
 163   do not support direct editing, an alternative mechanism should be provided
 164   for editing, such as action overrides or specific api modules.
 165 * mediaWiki.confirmCloseWindow now returns an object of functions, instead of
 166   one function. The callback can't be called directly any more. The callback
 167   function is replaced with confirmCloseWindow.release().
 168 * BREAKING CHANGE: Added an optional ResouceLoaderContext parameter to
 169   ResourceLoaderModule::getDependencies(). Extension classes that override that
 170   method should be updated. If they aren't updated, PHP Strict standards
 171   warnings will appear when E_STRICT error reporting is enabled. Note: in the
 172   near future, this parameter will probably become non-optional.
 173 * Removed maintenance script deleteImageMemcached.php.
 174 * MWFunction::newObj() was removed (deprecated in 1.25).
 175   ObjectFactory::getObjectFromSpec() should be used instead.
 176 * The parser will no longer randomize the string it uses to mark the place of
 177   items that were stripped during parsing. It will use a fixed string instead.
 178   This causes the parser to re-use the regular expressions it uses to search
 179   and replace markers rather than generate novel expressions on each parse.
 180   Re-using regular expressions will improve performance on HHVM and the
 181   forthcoming PHP 7. The interfaces changes accompanying this change are:
 182   - Parser::getRandomString() and Parser::uniqPrefix() have been deprecated.
 183   - The $uniq_prefix argument for Parser::extractTagsAndParams() and the
 184     $prefix argument for StripState::_construct() are deprecated and their
 185     value is ignored.
 186 * wfSuppressWarnings() and wfRestoreWarnings() were split into a separate library,
 187   mediawiki/at-ease, and are now deprecated. Callers should use
 188   MediaWiki\suppressWarnings() and MediaWiki\restoreWarnings() directly.
 189 * The Block class constructor now takes an associative array of parameters
 190   instead of many optional positional arguments. Calling the constructor the old
 191   way will issue a deprecation warning.
 192 * The jquery.mwExtension module was deprecated.
 193 * $wgSpecialPageGroups was removed (deprecated in 1.21).
 194 * SpecialPageFactory::setGroup was removed (deprecated in 1.21).
 195 * SpecialPageFactory::getGroup was removed (deprecated in 1.21).
 196 * DatabaseBase::ignoreErrors() is now protected.
 197 * BREAKING CHANGE: mediawiki.legacy.ajax has been removed, following
 198   a lengthy deprecation period.
 199 * The ScopedPHPTimeout class was removed.
 200 * Removed maintenance script fixSlaveDesync.php.
 201 * Watchlist tokens, SpecialResetTokens, and User::getTokenFromOption()
 202   are deprecated. Applications using those can work via the OAuth
 203   extension instead. New tokens types should not be added.
 204 * (T36948) The default file revert message's timestamp is now in $wgLocaltimezone,
 205   instead of UTC.
 206 * DatabaseBase::errorCount() was removed (unused).
 207 * $wgDeferredUpdateList was removed.
 208 * DeferredUpdates::addHTMLCacheUpdate() was removed.
 209 * The default name of the 'suppress' group page has been changed from
 210   'Project:Oversight' to 'Project:Suppress'.
 211 * (T84937) Free external links ("autolinked" urls) will now be terminated
 212   by &nbsp; and HTML entity encodings of &nbsp, <, and >.
 213
 214 == Compatibility ==
 215
 216 MediaWiki 1.26 requires PHP 5.3.3 or later. There is experimental support for
 217 HHVM 3.3.0.
 218
 219 MySQL is the recommended DBMS. PostgreSQL or SQLite can also be used, but
 220 support for them is somewhat less mature. There is experimental support for
 221 Oracle and Microsoft SQL Server.
 222
 223 The supported versions are:
 224
 225 * MySQL 5.0.3 or later
 226 * PostgreSQL 8.3 or later
 227 * SQLite 3.3.7 or later
 228 * Oracle 9.0.1 or later
 229 * Microsoft SQL Server 2005 (9.00.1399)
 230
 231 == Upgrading ==
 232
 233 1.26 has several database changes since 1.25, and will not work without schema
 234 updates. Note that due to changes to some very large tables like the revision
 235 table, the schema update may take quite long (minutes on a medium sized site,
 236 many hours on a large site).
 237
 238 If upgrading from before 1.11, and you are using a wiki as a commons
 239 repository, make sure that it is updated as well. Otherwise, errors may arise
 240 due to database schema changes.
 241
 242 If upgrading from before 1.7, you may want to run refreshLinks.php to ensure
 243 new database fields are filled with data.
 244
 245 If you are upgrading from MediaWiki 1.4.x or earlier, you should upgrade to
 246 1.5 first. The upgrade script maintenance/upgrade1_5.php has been removed
 247 with MediaWiki 1.21.
 248
 249 Don't forget to always back up your database before upgrading!
 250
 251 See the file UPGRADE for more detailed upgrade instructions.
 252
 253 For notes on 1.25.x and older releases, see HISTORY.
 254
 255 == Online documentation ==
 256
 257 Documentation for both end-users and site administrators is available on
 258 MediaWiki.org, and is covered under the GNU Free Documentation License (except
 259 for pages that explicitly state that their contents are in the public domain):
 260
 261         https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Documentation
 262
 263 == Mailing list ==
 264
 265 A mailing list is available for MediaWiki user support and discussion:
 266
 267         https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/mediawiki-l
 268
 269 A low-traffic announcements-only list is also available:
 270
 271         https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/mediawiki-announce
 272
 273 It's highly recommended that you sign up for one of these lists if you're
 274 going to run a public MediaWiki, so you can be notified of security fixes.
 275
 276 == IRC help ==
 277
 278 There's usually someone online in #mediawiki on irc.freenode.net.