Thanks Rob for you comprehensive answer.
If I decide to use multiple media wiki engines (like en.mysite.org, ru.mysite.org) for different languages, is it possible to use a single user authentication some how?
Best regards,
Umidjon B. Rahmonberdiev
NINP, Web Manager, CACAARI P.O. Box 4564,6, Murtazaev St., Tashkent 700000, Uzbekistan Tel.: (998-71) 137-21-30/69; Fax: (998-71) 120-71-25 E-mail: u.rahmonberdiev@cgiar.org WWW: http://www.cacaari.org
-----Original Message----- From: mediawiki-l-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org [mailto:mediawiki-l- bounces@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Rob Church Sent: Wednesday, April 04, 2007 12:05 PM To: MediaWiki announcements and site admin list Subject: Re: [Mediawiki-l] multilanguage in single project
On 04/04/07, Umidjon Rahmonberdiev u.rahmonberdiev@cgiar.org wrote:
Is that possible to use Multilanguage feature in single wiki project, or
it
is a "must" to have a multiple wiki projects installed for every
language
used?
MediaWiki "out of the box" contains no special support for storing content in multiple languages in the same wiki; it assumes that all content is in the same language, although the user interface language can be set according to users' preferences.
There are various schemes in use to provide varied content languages, ranging from subpages (e.g. "Subject/en", "Subject/fr", etc.) and different namespaces per language ("English:Subject", "French:Subject") to the more usual choice, which is to establish different logical wikis (separate databases, or different table prefixes in the same database - the code itself can be shared to reduce maintenance hassle), often on separate subdomains or in different directories.
One example of using the "subpage" method can be found on our own web site, MediaWiki.org, e.g. http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/MediaWiki contains the main page in English; a navigation template (which uses some parser function cleverness to determine which translations exist, and so which links to show) at the bottom provides links to the same page in other languages, e.g. http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/MediaWiki/fr for the French version.
A classic example of the multiple databases, multiple subdomains approach, of course, is the Wikimedia setup; the English Wikipedia, for instance, is available at http://en.wikipedia.org, whereas the French Wikipedia is at http://fr.wikipedia.org.
At this time, there are several variants of a "Multilang" extension available, some of which work, some of which are experimental and might not work at present. You could investigate these as a further option, although I would discourage it as being a more complex route from the point of view of editors. There are also some new extensions regarding the language issue in Subversion, which might be worth examining for useful functionality.
Overall, the exact method you choose really depends on what's best for you (in terms of technical ability or availability, e.g. of a flexible configuration for databases and subdomains, which typical shared/commercial hosting packages often limit, not to mention maintenance), as well as what you consider easiest to understand and use for your editors and, of course, readers.
Rob Church
MediaWiki-l mailing list MediaWiki-l@lists.wikimedia.org http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/mediawiki-l