MediaWiki:Local install

How to set up a local installation of MediaWiki (i.e. install Mediawiki on your own Windows PC)

1. Install WAMP.

WAMP is an all-in-one PHP/MySQL/Apache installation for Windows. Download WAMP from here. Install WAMP in the C:\wamp\ directory. (If you must install it elsewhere, make sure the folder you choose has no spaces or special characters in its name.) Check the Autostart option. When the installation is complete, visit http://localhost/ in your web browser to see the front page of your new web server.

2. Install MediaWiki, the software that powers Wikipedia.

Download MediaWiki from here. Unzip and untar the package using a utility like 7-Zip. Rename the resulting folder from "media-wiki-1.6.5" to "mywikipedia" and move the entire directory to c:\wamp\www\mywikipedia\.

4. Configure MediaWiki.

Access your new MediaWiki installation at http://localhost/mywikipedia/. Click on the "set the wiki up!" link. The next screen requires all of MediaWiki's configuration options. Be sure to choose a site name (for example, "BelieveTheSignTest") and a WikiSysOp password. Under the Database Configuration, set the Database User to root and the password to whatever you chose in step 2.

This seems like a long and complicated questionnaire, but it's not. Click here to see my full configuration screen all filled in. Then click the "Install!" button and let MediaWiki work its magic. All goes well, you'll get a message at the bottom of the screen that reads, "Move the config/LocalSettings.php file into the parent directory, then follow this link to your wiki." So let's do just that: Cut and paste the c:\wamp\www\mywikipedia\config\LocalSettings.php file to c:\wamp\www\mywikipedia\LocalSettings.php.

5. Visit your brand, spankin' new personal wiki at http://localhost/mywikipedia/.

Congratulations! You got MediaWiki up and running. You'll notice that the image in the upper lefthand corner isn't very personal.

To set it to something prettier than this:

Crop and resize an image of your choice to 135x135 pixels, and save it in C:\wamp\www\mywikipedia\skins\common\images\mywikilogo.jpg. Then, open the c:\wamp\www\mywikipedia\LocalSettings.php file and change the line that reads:

$wgLogo = "$wgStylePath/common/images/wiki.png";

to:

$wgLogo = "$wgStylePath/common/images/mywikilogo.jpg";

Refresh the page to see your new logo.

Now you've got a clean, new, customized local installation of MediaWiki all ready for you to play with. The main purpose for this is to allow you to play with skins, embedding audio/video/flash and other technical functions without having to mess with the actual BelieveTheSign website. Snapshots of the BelieveTheSign website (basically backup copies of the BelieveTheSign MySQL database) are available from BTS Admin. Just ask Bro. Rod and he will get you a copy. You simply restore the backup to your local version of Mediawiki and you will be running a snapshot of the BTS website.

More information on setting up a local installation of Mediawiki can be found here

Please note that BelieveTheSign is currently using the following version (see Special:Version for more detail):

MediaWiki: 1.6.5

PHP: 4.4.2 (cgi)

MySQL: 4.1.19-standard-log

Extensions:

Parser hooks:

Cite, adds <ref[ name=id]> and <references/> tags, for citations

Extension functions:

wfCite

Parser extension tags:

Hooks:

ParserClearState: (cite, clearState)