I'm planning on starting a free wiki hosting service to replace Wikkii after the owners went completely AWOL after an ownership transfer. We're still looking into what we might do, but I plan that we would use Google Adsense to help offset the cost as it grows. Anyway, there's a real issue of how new wikis will get created. The best thing would be for there to be a script that would automatically create wikis from the web from a form that users fill out, but I don't know how to create one. I've seen extensions, Farmer and WikiFactory. Farmer is near impossible to get running and you can't add extensions that require database changes. WikiFactory is used by Wikia, but I can't find any documentation for setting it up. The only other option would be to create wikis on request. In such a case I'd use a central directory of extensions and a config file so that all wikis would be able to be configured easily. A request system would still require sysadmin action to create new wikis, which would not be desirable for a popular wiki host.

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I use pmwiki.org to good advantage. I have found it to be very reliable over a number of years. It is well supported and maintained. However, it does not have a wysiwyg editor and you would have to develop an automated deployment system yourself. You could check in their recipe area for the features you might need.

Jeff

Thanks.

Is that a wiki software? I was planning on using MediaWiki, since it's what I have experience with and is fairly standard. Lack of a WYSIWYG editor is a problem, but I'm not planning on implementing one unless the one that Wikimedia is working on gets a stable version. I expect that they'll come through, since lack of a WYSIWYG editor has been a serious problem for MediaWiki, as it gives new users the impression that they need to learn a coding language to use it.

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me | voltaireMC

Thanks. I have that on everything, but it's not actually a WYSIWYG editor. It just adds the code. There's also another one that I use that creates links that you can use to add templates and more complex code. ~~~~

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// Is that a wiki software?

pmwiki is a wiki software engine. You can check it out at: http://pmwiki.org

jeff

Pmwiki is a flat file wiki app, so it would be very simple to script out setting up a new instance via a web form request (which is what I think the OP is asking). Change the default wiki name and default wiki admin password in a single config file then copy the files into new subdirectory. Assuming that all your spawned wikis will be a subfolder under your main domain name.

Since there are quite a few big name cloud wiki's offering free wiki's (Wikispaces and PB Wiki just to name a couple), not sure why you want to do this.

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Either provide enough details for people to help, or sit back and listen to the crickets chirp.
Security thru obscurity is a myth - and really really annoying.

If you do want to host your own, I use MoinMoin on one of my Linodes. The main requirement is to have python installed and it does have a basic GUI mode. It uses a flat file format for the backend. It has the ability to host multiple wiki datasets using one main install, or host them separately using different install folders (I tested using the latter config).

A comparison of the major wiki engines is available on the MoinMoin site at

http://moinmo.in/WikiEngineComparison

Gary Thorne

I've seen some of the other wiki hosts, but the problem is that they're mostly just project management wikis that are aimed at schools or work groups. Once Wikkii died after ownership was transferred to a company called "Gunggo" who abandon it, there seems to be an absence good, legitmate wiki hosts. There's Wikia, which would be great except all they care about is advertising money. I'd like to be able to provide people with a good, basic, and communal wiki hosting service.

What I'm planning to use is MediaWiki, since it's fairly standard, plus I have experience with it. I'm also going to be using subdomains, instead of having the name of the wiki in the directory. It's possible that a directory system might work for some people, but what people expect from services like this is subdomains. I thought about creating a script, and I thought that I could do it just by having the app copy the files and a database, but the problem is that you'd also need to change a lot of settings, such as the wiki name, database connection, and administrator account. You'd also need a way to map the subdomain automatically.

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I like the sound of your wiki service. I would be interested in your results if you don't mind posting your progress. I have used mediawiki for a couple of sites. It is excellent software but overkill for my needs.

Jeff

I have it here: http://community.wikihub.ssu.lt

I have the form completed, although I wasn't able to embed it in the wiki page with an iframe as I wanted by using Widgets or HTMLets... Very strange. I'll make sure the HTMLets directory is in a webserver, if it needs to be.

Also, I need to get Google AdSense to work on the wiki. I tried adding a banner to Vector.php, but it isn't displaying. It displays fine on a plain web page though.

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