Steve VanSlyck wrote :
Who exactly is the "dbuser"? Is it some live
human user? Or is it an
internal name and password that the wiki uses to connect to and interact
with the database?
It's a mysql database user (so it's "an internal name and password that the
wiki uses to connect to and interact with the database".)
db user is NOT a wiki user, nor a user of your local host. it's a mysql user.
On the other hand, Site config username is the name of the first user of your wiki
(normally it's prefilled as WikiSysop) (NB : he will be bureaucrat and sysop of the
wiki)
I don't understand what you mean by "If you
fill in the superuser
section with valid credentials, the database and database user do not
have to be precreated,...." How can they be 'valid' if they're not
already pre-existing??
the superuser is the superuser of your mysql install (he is named "root" on many
default mysql install. I don't know about your local install since you said that
"root" wasn't working but you should have a user with who you connect to
your mysql database, don't you ?).
Of course this superuser must be pre-existing, it has been created at the time you
installed mysql
When you fill the superuser fields with valid credentials (for that superuser), it will be
able to create a mysql database (default value : wikidb) and a database user (default :
wikiuser) that will be used by your wiki.
Note that these superuser information will not be used by the wiki after that and they
won't be stored anywhere, they are used only at installation time to create mysql
database and user for the wiki.
Also note that if you're installing on some hosting service, you probably do not have
access to the database as "root", therefore you must use a pre-existing database
in the "Database name:" field and a pre-existing user in the "DB
username:" field (see your host provider for these information)