Fwd: [Mediawiki-l] table appearance in the mediawiki browser

Thu Nov 18 15:22:34 UTC 2004

[Forwarding my response to the list, since I seem to have accidentally
replied to sender only.]

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Rowan Collins <rowan.collins at gmail.com>
Date: Thu, 18 Nov 2004 15:19:04 +0000
Subject: Re: [Mediawiki-l] table appearance in the mediawiki browser
To: "vanibhat at comcast.net" <vanibhat at comcast.net>

On Wed, 17 Nov 2004 22:26:16 +0000, vanibhat at comcast.net
<vanibhat at comcast.net> wrote:
> I will put it in this way.. I have data in the with lots of column. So i
> created a table and added that data into the table. Now i want to access it
> with media wiki and edit it as and when chages required.How do i do this?

Well, from your original message I presume you mean a table within the
database, not just a table as in a grid with some rows and columns and
so on. In which case, as I say, I think you've misunderstood the
nature of MediaWiki, or at least its capabilities. [If I'm wrong on
that, please ignore the rest of this message and we'll start again!]

If you are entirely new to the software, and want to know what it can
be used for, and how, I suggest you to take a look at the
documentation at http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Help:Contents As I
say, it is not a "browser" for arbitrary data, but rather a system for
collaboratively creating and editing, and of course viewing, a website
- particularly a "reference book" style one, such as wikipedia.org.

If you already know this much (in which case I apologise if the above
seems condescending) I can only think that you have stumbled across
some reference to or discussion of the "Wikidata" proposal. (As
described at http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikidata) In which case, I
should clarify that so far this is *nothing more than a proposal*; as
far as I know, no actual code has actually been written, and it is
certainly not possible to do any database manipulation using the
current software.

The database is there only as a storage mechanism for the actual
content; there is no mechanism for the user to directly access
database structures through the software, or for content to be
generated from anything other than a page of special wiki-markup.
There might be in the future, but when that will be is, essentially,
anyone's guess. I'm sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but I don't
think what you are trying to do is currently possible with MediaWiki.

--
Rowan Collins BSc
[IMSoP]