Isn't there any way via the API to generate the same output as Special:Export? What query string can generate the same output as dumpBackup.php --current? OK, just for all pages in one Namespace. OK, just for all pages matching some prefix string. Or just for even one page. And what query string can take the same input as Special:Import to import pages? Don't worry. The wiki involved only has a handful of pages. Anyway, how could the mighty API lack the features of Special:Export, whose user interface requires cutting and pasting.

RK> I'll probably have time to implement these modules some time soon, though. OK, the outlines of this project are clear: The format to be produced is http://www.mediawiki.org/xml/export-0.3/ and up. The query string would be api.php?action=query&format=export ... That will finally give Special:Export an API. Probably no import API is needed as that could all be achieved with a HTTP GET with the existing Special:Import. The same could be said about Special:Export, but the latter lacks batch job generator capabilities.

RK> for other namespaces, use apnamespace Odd, http://radioscanningtw.jidanni.org/api.php?action=query&generator=allpa… http://radioscanningtw.jidanni.org/api.php?action=query&generator=allpa… seem to both give just namespace 0.

RK> Oops, that should be gapnamespace of course. Ah, and the vital words Parameters passed to a generator must be prefixed with a g. For instance, when using generator=backlinks, use gbltitle instead of bltitle. are missing from e.g., http://www.mediawiki.org/w/api.php That's right, nowhere in it are the two worlds (g and non g) linked. By the way, to generate the names of all the pages of a site, one needs some kind of recursive generation: for namespace in $(namespaces) do for page in $(pages namespace) dump $page I wonder if that is possible in a single URL.

RK> Currently, no. It's probably technically possible, but you'd still get RK> your pages ordered by namespace first, then title (i.e. the same order RK> as with separate requests) and paging through multiple namespaces screws RK> up all kinds of wonderful features like apprefix= and apfrom=. That would be fine, as we will only be feeding this into e.g., Special:Import (where order doesn't matter) on another computer. Anyway, the whole impetus here is that one sees all the Free copyright banners, and then thinks "OK, if it is so free, let me have a hunk of the raw data so I can try (making a wiki like yours) too", etc. Only to find Special:Export and its tiny ticket window of data export "yes Sir, which page would you like to export?" "What, you want more than one page well you'll have to list them one by one. No, you can't just 'have them all'". Also for small wikis that might drop dead, loyal followers could also keep a backup without anybody having to set up anything beyond just vanilla MediaWiki. Anyway, also an import feature would also be an answer to an earlier post: Michael Dale: api file uploading P.S., of course I favor limits. Any "Export this whole site!" button needs to note "must change &limit= by hand, max=... sorry".

RK> getting all namespace IDs, iterating over them and calling list=allpages RK> for each of them is quite painless. It's not worth going through a lot RK> of trouble on the server side just to make life on the client side a RK> tiny bit easier. Anyway, just like $ ssh example.org who $ ssh example.org ps aux $ ssh example.org last can be bundled to $ ssh example.org 'who; ps aux; last' or even $ ssh example.org <<EOF ... there in general should be a way __with one request URL__ to pack an unlimited amount of operations in, and get all the results back in __one reply__. Need some temporary storage $variables too. Hmmm, not exactly "just "su nobody" and do what they ask in the maintenance directory :-)". RK> You could of course request that such a feature be added to Special:Export http://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=9474 RK> Special:Export could just provide multiple dumps, each one RK> containing a portion of the wiki (cf. [[Special:Allpages]] at enwiki). For monster wikis probably the current Special:Export category helper button is the only way to go, as any larger slices of the wiki are probably mistaken slices of death for the user's modem. However on small wikis (triggered by a check of some $TOTAL_PAGES, nah, or better a new $wgWelcomeToDownload (default=false)) there could be: We're serious about openness. Welcome to download this whole wiki in portable export format. Namespaces desired: [*]Main [*]Main Talk ... [ ]Mediawiki... (boring, not checked by default) Filter rules: [___] Limit: [10] pages. Max 250. [*]Save to file []Browse as plain text http://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=16963 P.S. http://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=9889 However, as I don't really "have only one burnin' desire" (http://www.mp3lyrics.org/j/jimi-hendrix/fire/) about these features I'm recommending, I'll just er, like fade away for now...

Jools Smyth schreef: You could, of course, put all articles in a generic category like [[Category:A to Z]]. Roan Kattouw (Catrope)

jidanni(a)jidanni.org wrote: You could modify dumpBackup.php to work as a web script. It would be something like this: <?php define('MEDIAWIKI',true); $IP = realpath( dirname( __FILE__ ) . '/..' ) ); require_once( "$IP/includes/AutoLoader.php" ); require_once( $IP.'/includes/Defines.php' ); require_once("$IP/LocalSettings.php"); include "backup.inc"; $dumper = new BackupDumper( array() ); $dumper->reporting = false; $dumper->dump( WikiExporter::CURRENT, $textMode ); It will be very large, take too much memory, too much time... Daily crontab dumps would be a much better system.