Are there any F/OSS projects that provide such functionality without requiring screen-scraping?
No, although the best-maintained screen-scraping product is pywikipediabot, it has many of the functions you want.
I'll look into it... though Python isn't really an option for now. I'm using PHP.
I see I'm not the only crazy guy who uses PHP for a bot. Good to know that.
I have the feeling that Michal is not actually trying to write a bot. Looking at his original posting, my interpretation suggests that he has already written a bot but is unhappy with it because he has direct access to the DB and there should therefore be better/ cleaner ways of achieving the effects he wants.
That's right, yes - I'm trying to treat MW as a library for use in a larger project. The wiki is intended to act as an annotation service for other resources. Pages are created on the fly when users want to make shared notes about a resource.
Michal, if I'm right, then I guess the best way would be to try to use the functions in the MediaWiki code. Yes, some of it uses globals, but there are scripts in the 'maintenance' directory that use the MediaWiki code to accomplish things outside an HTTP request. You might want to have a look at those.
Good pointer, I'll do this. I realize I'm asking RTFM-type questions here - mainly I'm looking for advice on which FM to R. Dariusz, I'll also have a look at your PHP bot.
-mike.
---------------------------------------------------------------- michal migurski- mike@stamen.com 415.558.1610