RELEASE-NOTES-1.31

   1 == MediaWiki 1.31 ==
   2
   3 THIS IS NOT A RELEASE YET
   4
   5 MediaWiki 1.31 is an alpha-quality branch and is not recommended for use in
   6 production.
   7
   8 === Important pre-upgrade notes for 1.31 ===
   9 * If you're using MySQL, SQLite, or MSSQL, are not using update.php to apply
  10   schema changes, and cannot have downtime to run migrateArchiveText.php and
  11   apply patch-drop-ar_text.sql manually, you'll have to apply a default value
  12   to the ar_text and ar_flags columns of the archive table or make those
  13   columns nullable before upgrading to MediaWiki 1.31.
  14   maintenance/archives/patch-nullable-ar_text.sql shows how to do this for MySQL.
  15
  16 === Configuration changes in 1.31 ===
  17 * $wgEnableAPI and $wgEnableWriteAPI are now deprecated and will be removed in
  18   a future version. The API is now considered to be stable, secure and
  19   essential.
  20 * $wgUsejQueryThree was removed, as it is now the default. This was documented
  21   as a temporary variable during the migration period, deprecated since 1.29.
  22 * $wgLogoHD has been updated to support svg images and uses $wgLogo where
  23   possible for fallback images such as png.
  24 * (T44246) $wgFilterLogTypes will no longer ignore 'patrol' when user does not
  25   have the right to mark things patrolled.
  26 * Wikis that contain imported revisions or CentralAuth global blocks should run
  27   maintenance/cleanupUsersWithNoId.php.
  28 * The configuration settings $wgResourceLoaderMinifierStatementsOnOwnLine and
  29   $wgResourceLoaderMinifierMaxLineLength, deprecated since 1.27, were removed.
  30 * (T180921) $wgReferrerPolicy now supports having fallbacks for browsers that
  31   are not using the latest version of the Referrer Policy specification.
  32 * $wgFragmentMode is now set to [ 'legacy', 'html5' ] by default. This is a
  33   first step of migration to human-readable section IDs that will later result
  34   in 'html5' being the default mode.
  35 * CACHE_ACCEL now only supports APC(u) or WinCache. XCache support was removed
  36   as upstream is inactive and has no plans to move to PHP 7.
  37 * The old CategorizedRecentChanges feature, including its related configuration
  38   option $wgAllowCategorizedRecentChanges, has been removed.
  39 * (T188472) The 'comma' value for $wgArticleCountMethod is no longer supported
  40   for performance reasons, and installations with this setting will now work as
  41   if it was configured with 'any'.
  42 * (T185753) MediaWiki now defaults to using RemexHtml to tidy up user input,
  43   rather than being off by default. If you wish to disable HTML tidying
  44   entirely, set $wgTidyConfig to null; if you wish to use the old, deprecated
  45   Tidy external binary, both set $wgTidyConfig to null and $wgUseTidy to true.
  46 * $wgLogAutopatrol now defaults to false instead of true.
  47 * $wgValidateAllHtml was removed and will be ignored.
  48 * $wgScriptExtension, deprecated and ignored since 1.25, was removed. See the
  49   1.25 release notes for more information.
  50 * $wgUseAjax is now marked as deprecated, just like the deprecated AJAX
  51   framework that it enables. Some extensions mistakenly used this to check
  52   whether any AJAX functionality at all should be enabled, further making this
  53   problematic to retain.
  54
  55 === New features in 1.31 ===
  56 * (T76554) User sub-pages named ….json are now protected in the same way that
  57   ….js and ….css pages are, so that configuration options can safely be placed
  58   there.
  59 * Wikimedia\Rdbms\IDatabase->select() and similar methods now support joins
  60   with parentheses for grouping.
  61 * As a first pass in standardizing dialog boxes across the MediaWiki product,
  62   Html class now provides helper methods for messageBox, successBox, errorBox
  63   and warningBox generation.
  64 * (T9240) Imports will now record unknown (and, optionally, known) usernames in
  65   a format like "iw>Example".
  66 * (T20209) Linker (used on history pages, log pages, and so on) will display
  67   usernames formed like "iw>Example" as interwiki links, as if by wikitext like
  68   [[iw:User:Example|iw>Example]].
  69 * (T111605) The 'ImportHandleUnknownUser' hook allows extensions to auto-create
  70   users during an import.
  71 * Added a hook, ParserOutputPostCacheTransform, to allow extensions to affect
  72   the ParserOutput::getText() post-cache transformations.
  73 * Added a hook, UploadForm:getInitialPageText, to allow extensions to alter the
  74   initial page text for file uploads.
  75 * (T181651) The info page for File pages now displays the file's base-16 SHA1
  76   hash value in the table of basic information.
  77 * Style tags with a 'data-mw-deduplicate' attribute will be deduplicated as a
  78   ParserOutput::getText() post-cache transformation. This may be disabled by
  79   passing 'deduplicateStyles' => false to that method.
  80 * The identity of the logged-in or IP "actor" for logged actions is being moved
  81   into a new actor table, with the rows in tables such as revision and logging
  82   referring to the actor ID instead of storing the user ID and name/IP in
  83   every row.
  84   * This is currently gated by $wgActorTableSchemaMigrationStage. Most wikis
  85     can set this to MIGRATION_NEW and run maintenance/migrateActors.php as
  86     soon as any necessary extensions are updated.
  87   * Most code accessing rows for logged actions from the database should use
  88     the relevant getQueryInfo() methods to get the information needed to build
  89     the SQL query. The ActorMigration class may also be used to get feature
  90         -flagged information needed to access actor-related fields during the
  91         migration period.
  92 * Added Wikimedia\Rdbms\IDatabase::cancelAtomic(), to roll back an atomic
  93   section without having to roll back the whole transaction.
  94 * Wikimedia\Rdbms\IDatabase::doAtomicSection(), non-native ::insertSelect(),
  95   and non-MySQL ::replace() and ::upsert() no longer roll back the whole
  96   transaction on failure.
  97 * (T189785) Added a monthly heartbeat ping to the pingback feature.
  98 * The CLI installer (maintenance/install.php) learned to detect and include
  99   extensions. Pass --with-extensions to enable that feature.
 100 * (T184791) rc_patrolled now has three states: "0" for unpatrolled,
 101   "1" for manually patrolled and "2" for autopatrolled actions.
 102 * Extensions can now set their type to "editor" if they provide an editor or
 103   enhance the editing experience.
 104 * Extensions can use a PSR-4 autoloader by setting an "AutoloadNamespaces"
 105   property in extension.json. See the documentation at
 106   <https://mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:Extension.json/Schema#AutoloadNamespaces>
 107   for more details and an example.
 108
 109 === External library changes in 1.31 ===
 110
 111 ==== Upgraded external libraries ====
 112 * Updated jquery.chosen from v0.9.14 to v1.8.2.
 113 * Updated composer/spdx-licenses from 1.1.4 to 1.3.0 (development dependency).
 114 * Updated nikic/php-parser from 2.1.0 to 3.1.3 (development dependency).
 115 * Updated wikimedia/ip-set from 1.1.0 to 1.2.0.
 116 * Updated wikimedia/relpath from 2.0.0 to 2.1.1.
 117 * Updated wikimedia/running-stat from 1.1.0 to 1.2.0.
 118 * Updated wikimedia/wrappedstring from 2.2.0 to 2.3.0.
 119 * Updated mediawiki/at-ease from 1.1.0 to 1.2.0.
 120 * Updated wikimedia/php-session-serializer from 1.0.4 to 1.0.6.
 121 * Updated wikimedia/remex-html from 1.0.2 to 1.0.3.
 122 * Updated wikimedia/html-formatter from 1.0.1 to 1.0.2.
 123 * …
 124
 125 ==== New external libraries ====
 126 * Added wikimedia/object-factory 1.0.0
 127 * …
 128
 129 ==== Removed and replaced external libraries ====
 130 * (T17845) The deprecated 'jquery.badge' module was removed.
 131 * The deprecated 'jquery.autoEllipsis' module was removed. Use the CSS
 132   text-overflow property instead.
 133 * The deprecated 'jquery.placeholder' module was removed.
 134 * The deprecated 'jquery.appear' module was removed. Use the
 135   'mediawiki.viewport' module instead.
 136 * mediawiki/at-ease was replaced with wikimedia/at-ease.
 137
 138 === Bug fixes in 1.31 ===
 139 * (T90902) Non-breaking space in header ID breaks anchor.
 140 * (T189375) CSSMin now allows quoted urls in `url()` syntax to start with a space.
 141
 142 === Action API changes in 1.31 ===
 143 * (T185058) The 'name' value to tgprop for action=query&list=tags has been
 144   removed. It has never made a difference in the output, the name was always
 145   returned regardless.
 146 * The 'watch' and 'unwatch' parameters for action=move have been removed. They
 147   were deprecated and also accidentally nonfunctional since 1.17 in 2010. Use
 148   'watchlist' instead.
 149
 150 === Action API internal changes in 1.31 ===
 151 * ApiBase::getProfileDBTime, deprecated since 1.25,
 152  was removed
 153 * ApiBase::getModuleProfileName, deprecated since 1.25, was removed
 154 * ApiBase::getProfileTime, deprecated since 1.25, was removed
 155
 156 === Languages updated in 1.31 ===
 157 MediaWiki supports over 350 languages. Many localisations are updated
 158 regularly. Below only new and removed languages are listed, as well as
 159 changes to languages because of Phabricator reports.
 160
 161 * (T180052) Mirandese (mwl) now supports gendered NS_USER/NS_USER_TALK.
 162 * (T182305) New language support: Nyungar (nys).
 163 * (T186359) New language support: Siberian Tatar [cебертатар] (sty).
 164 * (T186635) New language support: Guianan Creole (gcr).
 165 * (T186647) New language support: Kumyk [къумукъ] (kum).
 166 * (T187750) New language support: Spanish formal address (es-formal).
 167 * (T187824) New language support: Hungarian formal address (hu-formal).
 168
 169 === Breaking changes in 1.31 ===
 170 * MessageBlobStore::insertMessageBlob(), deprecated in 1.27, was removed.
 171 * The OutputPage class constructor now requires a context parameter.
 172   Instantiating without context was deprecated in 1.18.
 173 * The mw.page JavaScript singleton, deprecated in 1.30, was removed.
 174 * Article::getLastPurgeTimestamp(), WikiPage::getLastPurgeTimestamp(), and the
 175   related WikiPage::PURGE_* constants, deprecated in 1.29, were removed.
 176 * The Article::selectFields(), ::onArticleCreate(), ::onArticleDelete(), and
 177   ::onArticleEdit() methods, deprecated in 1.24, were removed.
 178 * Installer::locateExecutable() and ::locateExecutableInDefaultPaths() were
 179   removed. Use ExecutableFinder::findInDefaultPaths() instead.
 180 * The deprecated MW_DIFF_VERSION constant was removed.
 181   DifferenceEngine::MW_DIFF_VERSION should be used instead.
 182 * Due to significant refactoring, method ContribsPager::getUserCond() that had
 183   no access restriction has been removed.
 184 * The Block class will no longer accept usable-but-missing usernames for
 185   'byText' or ->setBlocker(). Callers should either ensure the blocker exists
 186   locally or use a new interwiki-format username like "iw>Example".
 187 * The following methods and constants from the WatchedItem class, which were
 188   deprecated in 1.27, have been removed:
 189   * WatchedItem::getTitle()
 190   * WatchedItem::fromUserTitle()
 191   * WatchedItem::addWatch()
 192   * WatchedItem::removeWatch()
 193   * WatchedItem::isWatched()
 194   * WatchedItem::duplicateEntries()
 195   * WatchedItem::IGNORE_USER_RIGHTS
 196   * WatchedItem::CHECK_USER_RIGHTS
 197   * WatchedItem::DEPRECATED_USAGE_TIMESTAMP
 198 * The $statementsOnOwnLine parameter of JavaScriptMinifier::minify was removed.
 199   $wgResourceLoaderMinifierStatementsOnOwnLine, the corresponding configuration
 200   variable, has been deprecated since 1.27 and was removed as well.
 201 * The $maxLineLength parameter of JavaScriptMinifier::minify was removed.
 202   $wgResourceLoaderMinifierMaxLineLength, the corresponding configuration
 203   variable, has been deprecated since 1.27 and was removed as well.
 204 * The HtmlFormatter class, deprecated in 1.27, was removed. The namespaced
 205   HtmlFormatter\HtmlFormatter class should be used instead.
 206 * The driver 'mysql' for MySQL, deprecated in MediaWiki 1.30, has been removed.
 207   The driver has been deprecated since PHP 5.5 and was removed in PHP 7.0. The
 208   default driver for MySQL has been 'mysqli' since MediaWiki 1.22.
 209 * The following properties of PreparedEdit were deprecated in 1.21 and have
 210   been removed:
 211   * PreparedEdit->newText
 212   * PreparedEdit->oldText
 213   * PreparedEdit->pst
 214 * ParserOutput objects which are generated using a non-default value for
 215   ParserOptions::setWrapOutputClass() can no longer be added to the parser
 216   cache.
 217 * The following deprecated methods from the OutputPage class have been removed:
 218   * OutputPage::addExtensionStyle(); deprecated in 1.27
 219   * OutputPage::getExtStyle(); deprecated in 1.27
 220   * OutputPage::setETag(); deprecated in 1.28 (obsolete no-op)
 221   * OutputPage::setSquidMaxage(); deprecated in 1.27
 222   * OutputPage::readOnlyPage(); deprecated in 1.25
 223   * OutputPage::rateLimited(); deprecated in 1.25
 224   * Additionally, the protected OutputPage::$mExtStyles array, only accessed
 225     through the above and with no known uses, was removed.
 226 * The no-op method Skin::showIPinHeader(), deprecated in 1.27, was removed.
 227 * The following variables and methods in EditPage, deprecated in MediaWiki 1.30,
 228   were removed:
 229   * $isCssJsSubpage — use ::isUserConfigPage()
 230   * $isCssSubpage — use ::isUserCssConfigPage()
 231   * $isJsSubpage — use ::isUserJsConfigPage()
 232   * $isWrongCaseCssJsPage – use ::isWrongCaseUserConfigPage()
 233   * ::getSummaryInput() – use ::getSummaryInputWidget()
 234   * ::getSummaryInputOOUI() – use ::getSummaryInputWidget()
 235   * ::getCheckboxes() – use ::getCheckboxesWidget() or
 236       ::getCheckboxesDefinition()
 237   * ::getCheckboxesOOUI() – use ::getCheckboxesWidget() or
 238       ::getCheckboxesDefinition()
 239 * ResourceLoaderModule::getPosition(), deprecated in 1.29, has been removed.
 240 * In User, the cookie-related methods which were wrappers for the functions on
 241   the response object, and were deprecated in 1.27, have been removed:
 242   * ::setCookie()
 243   * ::clearCookie()
 244   * ::setExtendedLoginCookie()
 245   Note that User::setCookies() remains, and is not deprecated.
 246 * Also in User, some auth-related methods which were deprecated in 1.27 have
 247   been removed:
 248   * ::getEditTokenTimestamp() – use MediaWiki\Session\Token::getTimestamp()
 249   * ::getPasswordFactory() – create a PasswordFactory directly
 250   * ::passwordChangeInputAttribs()
 251 * The global functions wfProfileIn and wfProfileOut, deprecated in 1.25, have
 252   been removed.
 253 * SpecialPageFactory::getList(), deprecated in 1.24, has been removed. You can
 254   use ::getNames() instead.
 255 * OpenSearch::getOpenSearchTemplate(), deprecated in 1.25, has been removed. You
 256   can use ApiOpenSearch::getOpenSearchTemplate() instead.
 257 * The global function wfBaseConvert, deprecated in 1.27, has been removed. Use
 258   Wikimedia\base_convert() directly.
 259 * Calling Database::begin() explicitly during an implicit transaction or when
 260   DBO_TRX is set results in an exception. Calling Database::commit() explicitly
 261   for an implicit transaction also results in an exception. Previously these
 262   were logged as errors. The startAtomic() and endAtomic() methods, or
 263   AtomicSectionUpdate should be used instead.
 264 * The global function wfOutputHandler() was removed, use the its replacement
 265   MediaWiki\OutputHandler::handle() instead. The global function was only
 266   sometimes defined. Its replacement is always available via the autoloader.
 267 * ChangeTags::listExtensionActivatedTags and ::listExtensionDefinedTags,
 268   deprecated in 1.28, have been removed. Use ::listSoftwareActivatedTags() and
 269   ::listSoftwareDefinedTags() instead.
 270 * Title::getTitleInvalidRegex(), deprecated in 1.25, has been removed. You can
 271   use MediaWikiTitleCodec::getTitleInvalidRegex() instead.
 272 * HTMLForm & VFormHTMLForm::isVForm(), deprecated in 1.25, have been removed.
 273 * The ProfileSection class, deprecated in 1.25 and unused, has been removed.
 274 * The ResourceLoaderGetLessVars hook, deprecated in 1.30, has been removed. Use
 275   ResourceLoaderModule::getLessVars() to expose local variables instead of
 276   global ones.
 277 * As part of work to modernise user-generated content clean-up, a config option
 278   and some methods related to HTML validity were removed without deprecation.
 279   The public methods MWTidy::checkErrors() and the path through which it was
 280   called, TidyDriverBase::validate(), are removed, as are the testing methods
 281   MediaWikiTestCase::assertValidHtmlSnippet() and ::assertValidHtmlDocument().
 282   The $wgValidateAllHtml configuration option is removed and will be ignored.
 283 * Execution of external programs using MediaWiki\Shell\Command now applies
 284   the RESTRICT_DEFAULT Firejail restriction by default.
 285 * The ResourceLoaderModule::getHashMtime() and ::getDefinitionMtime() methods,
 286   deprecated in 1.26, were removed.
 287 * The deprecated 'mediawiki.widgets.CategorySelector' module alias was removed.
 288   Use the 'mediawiki.widgets.CategoryMultiselectWidget' module directly.
 289
 290 === Deprecations in 1.31 ===
 291 * The Revision class was deprecated in favor of RevisionStore, BlobStore, and
 292   RevisionRecord and its subclasses.
 293 * The global function wfBCP47 is deprecated in favour of LanguageCode::bcp47.
 294 * The global function wfCountDown is now deprecated in favor of
 295   Maintenance::countDown.
 296 * Several methods for returning lists of fields to select from the database
 297   have been deprecated in favor of similar methods that also return the tables
 298   to select from and the join conditions for those tables.
 299   * Block::selectFields() → Block::getQueryInfo()
 300   * RecentChange::selectFields() → RecentChange::getQueryInfo()
 301   * ArchivedFile::selectFields() → ArchivedFile::getQueryInfo()
 302   * LocalFile::selectFields() → LocalFile::getQueryInfo()
 303   * LocalFile::getCacheFields() with a prefix no longer works
 304   * LocalFile::getLazyCacheFields() with a prefix no longer works
 305   * OldLocalFile::selectFields() → OldLocalFile::getQueryInfo()
 306   * RecentChange::selectFields() → RecentChange::getQueryInfo()
 307   * Revision::userJoinCond() → Revision::getQueryInfo( [ 'user' ] )
 308   * Revision::selectUserFields() → Revision::getQueryInfo( [ 'user' ] )
 309   * Revision::pageJoinCond() → Revision::getQueryInfo( [ 'page' ] )
 310   * Revision::selectPageFields() → Revision::getQueryInfo( [ 'page' ] )
 311   * Revision::selectTextFields() → Revision::getQueryInfo( [ 'text' ] )
 312   * Revision::selectFields() → Revision::getQueryInfo()
 313   * Revision::selectArchiveFields() → Revision::getArchiveQueryInfo()
 314   * User::selectFields() → User::getQueryInfo()
 315   * WikiPage::selectFields() → WikiPage::getQueryInfo()
 316 * Revision::setUserIdAndName() was deprecated.
 317 * Access to TitleValue class properties was deprecated, the relevant getters
 318   should be used instead.
 319 * DifferenceEngine::getDiffBodyCacheKey() is deprecated. Subclasses should
 320   override DifferenceEngine::getDiffBodyCacheKeyParams() instead.
 321 * Use of Maintenance::error( $err, $die ) to exit script was deprecated. Use
 322   Maintenance::fatalError() instead.
 323 * Passing a ParserOptions object to OutputPage::parserOptions() is deprecated.
 324 * The RevisionInsertComplete hook is now deprecated; use instead the hook
 325   RevisionRecordInserted. RevisionInsertComplete is still called, but the second
 326   and third parameter will always be null. Hard deprecation is scheduled for 1.32.
 327 * The following methods that get and set ParserOutput state are deprecated.
 328   Callers should use the new stateless $options parameter to
 329   ParserOutput::getText() instead.
 330   * ParserOptions::getEditSection()
 331   * ParserOptions::setEditSection()
 332   * ParserOutput::getEditSectionTokens()
 333   * ParserOutput::setEditSectionTokens()
 334   * ParserOutput::getTOCEnabled()
 335   * ParserOutput::setTOCEnabled()
 336   * OutputPage::enableSectionEditLinks()
 337   * OutputPage::sectionEditLinksEnabled()
 338   * The public ParserOutput state fields $mTOCEnabled and $mEditSectionTokens
 339     are also deprecated.
 340 * License::getLicenses has been deprecated; use License::getLines instead.
 341 * QuickTemplate::setRef() was deprecated in favour of QuickTemplate::set().
 342   Setting template variables by reference allowed violating the principle of
 343   data being immutable once added to the skin template. In practice, this method
 344   was not being used for that. Rather, setRef() existed as memory optimisation
 345   for PHP 4.
 346 * QuickTemplate::setTranslator() and MediaWikiI18N::set() were deprecated in
 347   favour of Skin::msg() parameters.
 348 * MediaWikiI18N::translate() was deprecated in favour of Skin::msg() or
 349   wfMessage().
 350 * Passing false to ParserOptions::setWrapOutputClass() is deprecated. Use the
 351   'unwrap' transform to ParserOutput::getText() instead.
 352 * \ObjectFactory (no namespace) is deprecated, the namespaced class
 353   \Wikimedia\ObjectFactory from the wikimedia/object-factory library should be
 354   used instead.
 355 * CommentStore::newKey is deprecated. Instead, get an instance from
 356   MediaWikiServices.
 357 * The following CommentStore methods have had their signatures changed to
 358   introduce a $key parameter, usage of the methods on instances retrieved from
 359   CommentStore::newKey will remain unchanged but deprecated:
 360   * CommentStore::getFields
 361   * CommentStore::getJoin
 362   * CommentStore::getComment
 363   * CommentStore::getCommentLegacy
 364   * CommentStore::insert
 365   * CommentStore::insertWithTemplate
 366 * The following methods in Title have been renamed, and the old ones are
 367   deprecated:
 368   * Title::getSkinFromCssJsSubpage – use ::getSkinFromConfigSubpage
 369   * Title::isCssOrJsPage – use ::isSiteConfigPage
 370   * Title::isCssJsSubpage – use ::isUserConfigPage
 371   * Title::isCssSubpage – use ::isUserCssConfigPage
 372   * Title::isJsSubpage – use ::isUserJsConfigPage
 373 * The following methods related to caching of half-parsed HTML were deprecated:
 374   * Parser::serializeHalfParsedText()
 375   * Parser::unserializeHalfParsedText()
 376   * Parser::isValidHalfParsedText()
 377   * StripState::getSubState()
 378   * StripState::merge()
 379 * The DeferredStringifier class is deprecated, use Message::listParam() instead.
 380 * The type string for the parameter $lang of DateFormatter::getInstance is
 381   deprecated.
 382 * Wikimedia\Rdbms\SavepointPostgres is deprecated.
 383 * The DO_MAINTENANCE constant is deprecated. RUN_MAINTENANCE_IF_MAIN should be
 384   used instead.
 385 * The function wfShellWikiCmd() has been deprecated, use
 386   MediaWiki\Shell::makeScriptCommand().
 387
 388 === Other changes in 1.31 ===
 389 * Browser support for Internet Explorer 10 was lowered from Grade A to Grade C.
 390 * Browser support for Opera 12 and older was dropped entirely. Opera 15+
 391   continues at Grade A.
 392 * Multi-content-revision capability was introduced into the storage layer. See
 393   <https://mediawiki.org/wiki/Requests_for_comment/Multi-Content_Revisions>.
 394 * The "free" CSS class is now only applied to unbracketed URLs in wikitext.
 395   Links written using square brackets will get the class "text" not "free".
 396 * RFC 157418: Whitespace is trimmed from wikitext headings, wikitext list items,
 397   wikitext table captions, wikitext table headings, wikitext table cells. HTML
 398   headings, HTML list items, HTML table captions, HTML table headings, HTML
 399   table cells will not have this trimming behavior.
 400
 401 == Compatibility ==
 402 MediaWiki 1.31 requires PHP 7.0.0 or later. Although HHVM 3.18.5 or later is
 403 supported, it is generally advised to use PHP 7.0.0 or later for long term
 404 support.
 405
 406 MySQL/MariaDB is the recommended DBMS. PostgreSQL or SQLite can also be used,
 407 but support for them is somewhat less mature. There is experimental support for
 408 Oracle and Microsoft SQL Server.
 409
 410 The supported versions are:
 411
 412 * MySQL 5.5.8 or later
 413 * PostgreSQL 9.2 or later
 414 * SQLite 3.3.7 or later
 415 * Oracle 9.0.1 or later
 416 * Microsoft SQL Server 2005 (9.00.1399)
 417
 418 == Upgrading ==
 419 1.31 has several database changes since 1.30, and will not work without schema
 420 updates. Note that due to changes to some very large tables like the revision
 421 table, the schema update may take quite long (minutes on a medium sized site,
 422 many hours on a large site).
 423
 424 Don't forget to always back up your database before upgrading!
 425
 426 See the file UPGRADE for more detailed upgrade instructions, including
 427 important information when upgrading from versions prior to 1.11.
 428
 429 For notes on 1.30.x and older releases, see HISTORY.
 430
 431 == Online documentation ==
 432 Documentation for both end-users and site administrators is available on
 433 MediaWiki.org, and is covered under the GNU Free Documentation License (except
 434 for pages that explicitly state that their contents are in the public domain):
 435
 436        https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Documentation
 437
 438 == Mailing list ==
 439 A mailing list is available for MediaWiki user support and discussion:
 440
 441        https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/mediawiki-l
 442
 443 A low-traffic announcements-only list is also available:
 444
 445        https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/mediawiki-announce
 446
 447 It's highly recommended that you sign up for one of these lists if you're
 448 going to run a public MediaWiki, so you can be notified of security fixes.
 449
 450 == IRC help ==
 451 There's usually someone online in #mediawiki on irc.freenode.net.