Life isn't slow on a farm, but this list needs a kick.
To that end, I've started a project page on MediaWiki.org:
https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Project:WikiFarm
Have a look and see what needs to be filled out.
With that said, I really want to dig into MediaWiki's configuration
system[1]. Putting the configuration in the DB (with a wiki column
acting as the key so farming would be easier) really seems to be the
right thing to do. Larger users (like Wikimedia) would want to use CDBS
or something snappy like that, but I'd like to start out with a
DB-backed config.
I haven't had time to really do anything with any of this, but I did
want to check in with you all to see if there was any news.
[1] http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.org.wikimedia.wikifarm/11
--
Mark A. Hershberger
NicheWork LLC
717-271-1084
We currently have just over 35 subscribers. I figure it is time for me
to say something.
First of all, thanks for subscribing to the list.
This list started with a conversation that began at Wikimania. When
Markus Glaser and I held a MediaWiki meetup one of the recurring themes
was Wikifarms.
It seems that farms are relatively common. WikiApiary lists around 100
farms that have just two wikis all the way up to Wikki's 2000+.
(WikiApiary is just starting out, so I'll forgive them that they miss
Wikia's thousands.)
Despite the wide use of farms, there doesn't seem to be a "standard" way
of setting one up. So I've created https://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/52721
("Create a Wikifarm profile for MediaWiki-Vagrant") that will help us
capture the "best practices" way of setting up a wiki farm.
Of course, it would help to have some best practices first. My
observation -- please correct me if I'm wrong -- is that there we seem
to create MediaWiki ghettos. Developers and administrators in the Wikia
ghetto don't communicate (much) with their counterparts in the Wikimedia
ghetto or the Semantic MediaWiki ghetto.
So, best practices. MediaWiki-Vagrant and maybe the WikiFarm extension
(does anyone use it?).
Maybe we can start the discussion by describing how we set up wikis on
our farms?
--
Mark A. Hershberger
NicheWork LLC
717-271-1084
Dear all,
First of all thanks for Mark A.Hershberger for creating this mailing list!
I'll try (as an author of the WikiFarm extension) to make it helpfull.
The *WikiFarm* extension
(http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:WikiFarm) is a tool designed to
assist wiki administrators in maintaining their sites: single or
multiple individual wikis or wiki farm(s). It uses MediaWiki API to
obtain information for every wiki in the list and provides some usefull
links and statistics.
The extension does not do any DB modification.
The current version has 7 modules:
* *WikiFarmStatistics* - shows the following information for each wiki:
o wiki name (What API returns)
o number of pages
o number of articles
o number of views
o number of edits
o number of files
o number of users
o number of categories
o number of templates
o interwiki prefix, if exists in interwiki table
The following is visible in debug info level only:
* wiki URL and API URL
* list of wikis for each DB
* table prefix in DB
* DB name
* DB server
* *WikiFarmLinks* - gathers usefull administrative links for every wiki.
* *WikiFarmChanges* - shows recent changes from all wikis.
* *WikiFarmPages* - shows all articles in the project from all wikis.
* *WikiFarmUsers* - list all users of administrative wiki with useful
links for each of them. So it is good to have an admin wiki as one
of wiki farm.
* *WikiFarmLog* - provides links to log pages. Bots can write to the
log, which is useful to trace their work. The log is a page(s) in
the "project" namespace.
* *WikiFarmSearch* - search for string in titles and text in all wikis.
* + You can find special scripts for batch-renaming MySQL tables in
*tools* directory.
The official extension page
(http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:WikiFarm) provides some
screenshots and additional information.
With best regards
Pavel Malakhov
author of WikiFarm
Hi, and this is great, thanks to Mark for putting the list together I think
it's going to be very helpful.
Ray King here, the .wiki guy. What about starting a "WikiFarming Best
Practices Wiki" to accumulate all of this thinking? Does something like
that already exist? - R
On Sat, Aug 17, 2013 at 5:01 AM, <wikifarm-request(a)lists.wikimedia.org>wrote:
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> Today's Topics:
>
> 1. Re: Welcome to WikiFarm (Tyler Romeo)
> 2. Re: Welcome to WikiFarm (Mark A. Hershberger)
> 3. Re: Welcome to WikiFarm (Tyler Romeo)
> 4. Re: Welcome to WikiFarm (Hydriz Scholz)
>
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Message: 1
> Date: Fri, 16 Aug 2013 19:52:46 -0400
> From: Tyler Romeo <tylerromeo(a)gmail.com>
> To: Discussion for managers of Wiki Farms
> <wikifarm(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
> Subject: Re: [Wikifarm] Welcome to WikiFarm
> Message-ID:
> <CAE0Q5osUuDJUn5iXAaUTaj4KL=
> QaC7CoOWLuSyaf4WHxLTx73w(a)mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"
>
> On Fri, Aug 16, 2013 at 7:47 PM, Mark A. Hershberger <mah(a)nichework.com
> >wrote:
>
> > It isn't clear to me what the problem is with the setup you've
> > described. Could you provide more detail for what you mean by
> > "sysadmins shouldn't have to go that far"?
> >
> > What would a sysadmin need to do to use this?
> >
>
> Basically, take a look at this file:
>
>
> https://github.com/Orain/ansible-playbook/blob/master/roles/mediawiki/files…
>
> You shouldn't have to write a 619 line configuration file just to get your
> wiki farm up and running. Also, there's literally no documentation for how
> to use SiteConfiguration.
>
> *-- *
> *Tyler Romeo*
> Stevens Institute of Technology, Class of 2016
> Major in Computer Science
> www.whizkidztech.com | tylerromeo(a)gmail.com
>