Richard Cooper wrote:
I installed XAMPP whilst trying to set up a MediaWiki wiki on my website, but I don't actually know what it's for. I found the instructions for setting up my wiki quite confusing and I think I was looking at the wrong page for what I wanted to do. It also seems to have slowed down my PC a great deal. Can someone explain what XAMPP does so I can judge whether I need to keep it or not, as if not I'd like to uninstall it.
XAMPP is one of the many package that are supposed to easily install : Apache (the web server software), MySQL, PHP, Perl
See : http://www.apachefriends.org/en/xampp.html (first answer on Google by the way).
These (except Perl) are the softwares (or tools, or "bricks") you need for MediaWiki to work on your local computer.