RELEASE-NOTES

   1 = MediaWiki release notes =
   2
   3 Security reminder: MediaWiki does not require PHP's register_globals
   4 setting since version 1.2.0. If you have it on, turn it *off* if you can.
   5
   6 == MediaWiki 1.8 ==
   7
   8 THIS IS NOT A RELEASE YET.
   9
  10 MediaWiki is now using a "continuous integration" development model with
  11 quarterly snapshot releases. The latest development code is always kept
  12 "ready to run", and in fact runs our own sites on Wikipedia.
  13
  14 Release branches will continue to receive security updates for about a year
  15 from first release, but nonessential bugfixes and feature development happen
  16 will be made on the development trunk and appear in the next quarterly release.
  17
  18 Those wishing to use the latest code instead of a branch release can obtain
  19 it from source control: http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Download_from_SVN
  20
  21 == Configuration changes ==
  22
  23 * $wgUseETag, to enable/disable sending of HTTP ETag headers
  24   (default: disabled)
  25
  26
  27 == Major new features ==
  28
  29 * (bug 7098) Add an option to disable/enable sending of HTTP ETag headers,
  30   as it seems to result in broken behaviour in combination with Squid 2.6
  31   (disabled by default).
  32 * (bug 550) Allow blocks on anonymous users only.
  33 * (bug 6420) Render thumbnails for DJVU images, support multipage DJVU display
  34   on image pages. Added new 'page=' thumbnail option to select a page from a
  35   multipage djvu for thumbnail generation.
  36 * Full Postgres support is now enabled. It requires version 8.0 or better, and
  37   needs to have both plpgsql and tsearch2 already installed.
  38
  39 == Changes since 1.7 ==
  40
  41 * Introduced AjaxResponse object, superceding AjaxCachePolicy
  42 * Changes to sajax_do_call: optionally accept an element to fill instead of a
  43   callback function; take the target function or element as a third parameter;
  44   pass the full XMLHttpRequest object to the handler function, instead of just
  45   the resultText value; use HTTP response codes to report errors.
  46 * (bug 6562) Removed unmaintained ParserXml.php for now
  47 * History paging overlap bug fixed
  48 * (bug 6586) Regression in "unblocked" subtitle
  49 * Don't put empty-page message into view-source when page text is blank
  50 * (bug 6587) Remove redundant "allnonarticles" message
  51 * Block improvements: Allow blocks on anonymous users only. Optionally allow
  52   or disallow account creation from blocked IP addresses. Prevent duplicate
  53   blocks. Fixed the problem of expiry and unblocking erroneously affecting
  54   multiple blocks. Fixed confusing lack of error message when a blocked user
  55   attempts to create an account. Fixed inefficiency of Special:Ipblocklist in
  56   the presence of large numbers of blocks; added indexes and implemented an
  57   indexed pager.
  58 * (bug 6448) Allow filtering of Special:Newpages according to username
  59 * (bug 6618) Improve permissions/error detection in Special:Lockdb
  60 * Quick hack for extension testing: parser test doesn't create new message
  61   cache object.
  62 * (bug 6299) Maintain parser's revision ID across recursive calls to fix
  63   {{REVISIONID}} when Cite extension is used
  64 * (bug 6622) Removed deprecated function Image::newFromTitle
  65 * (bug 6627) Fix regression in Special:Ipblocklist with table prefix
  66 * Removed forced dereferencements (new() returns a reference in PHP5)
  67 * Note about $wgUploadSizeWarning using byte
  68 * (bug 6592) Add most viewed pages summary to Special:Statistics
  69 * Pre-strip characters ignored in IDNs from URLs so they can't be used
  70   to break the blacklists for regular URLs
  71 * Fix regression in blocking of user accounts
  72 * (bug 6635) Fix regression searching for range blocks on Ipblocklist
  73 * Fix regression searching Ipblocklist with ugly URLs
  74 * (bug 6639) Use a consistent default for upload directories
  75 * Preserve entered reason when reporting unconfirmed lock on Special:Lockdb
  76 * (bug 6642) Don't offer to unlock the database when it isn't locked
  77 * cleanupTitles.php changed from --dry-run option to --fix, so default
  78   behavior is now a non-invasive check as with namespaceDupes.php
  79 * (bug 6660) Fix behaviour of EditPage::blockedPage() when the article does
  80   not exist; now doesn't show the source box if the user hasn't provided it
  81   (blocked mid-edit) and the page doesn't exist
  82 * Improve default value of "blockedtext"
  83 * (bug 6680) Added localisation for Dutch bookstore list (nl)
  84 * Renamed maintainace script redundanttrans.php to unusedMessages.php - clearer usage
  85 * Fix regression which allowed some blocked users to create additional accounts
  86 * (bug 6657) Fix Hungarian linktrail
  87 * (bug 6751) Fix preview of blanked section with edit on first preview option
  88 * (bug 5456) Separate MediaWiki:Search into messages for both noun and verb,
  89   introduced 'MediaWiki:Searchbutton'
  90 * Made lines from initialiseMessages() appear as list items during installation
  91 * Moved the bulk of the localisation data from the Language*.php files to the
  92   Messages*.php files. Deleted most of the Languages*.php files.
  93 * Introduced "stub global" framework to provide deferred initialisation of core
  94   modules.
  95 * Removed placeholder values for $wgTitle and $wgArticle, these variables will
  96   now be null during the initialisation process, until they are set by index.php
  97   or another entry point.
  98 * Added DBA cache type, for BDB-style caches.
  99 * Removed custom date format functions, replacing them with a format string in
 100   the style of PHP's date(). Used string identifiers instead of integer
 101   identifiers, in both the language files and user preferences. Migration should
 102   be transparent in most cases.
 103 * Simplified the initialisation API for LoadBalancer objects.
 104 * Removed the broken altencoding feature.
 105 * Moved default user options and toggles from Language to User. Language objects
 106   are still able to define default preference overrides and extra user toggles,
 107   via a slightly different interface.
 108 * Don't include the date option in the parser cache rendering hash unless
 109   $wgUseDynamicDates is enabled.
 110 * Merged LanguageUtf8 with Language. Removed LanguageUtf8.php.
 111 * Removed inclusion of language files from the bottom of Language.php. This is
 112   now consistently done from Language::factory().
 113 * Add the name of the executing maintenance script to the debug log. Start the
 114   profiler during maintenance scripts.
 115 * Added "serialized" directory, for storing precompiled data in serialized form.
 116 * Fix regression in auto-set NS_PROJECT_TALK namespace
 117 * Fix regression in ordering of namespaces
 118 * (bug 6806, 6030) Added several global JS variables for article path, user name,
 119   page title, etc.
 120 * hooks registered with addOnloadHook are now called at the one of the html body
 121   by all skins.
 122 * Split ajax aided search from core ajax framework. Use wgUseAjax to enable the
 123   framework and wgAjaxSearch to enable the suggest feature for the search box.
 124 * Added experimental installer for extensions.
 125   See maintenance/installExtension.php
 126 * Added Tajic (tg) language file.
 127 * (bug 6903) Added Cantonese localisation (zh-yue)
 128 * Fix regression in Korean and Japanese date formatting (day of week)
 129 * (bug 6919) Add English alias magic words for Tatar (tt) language file.
 130 * (bug 6753) Fixed broken Kazakh linktrail (kk)
 131 * (bug 6700) Added Kazakh language variants to Names.php
 132 * (bug 6827) some i18n specific maintenance scripts fails after merge of localisation-work branch
 133 * Throwed an exception for the deprecated functions OutputPage::sysopRequired and
 134   OutputPage::developerRequired - use OutputPage::permissionRequired instead.
 135 * Removed the deprecated functions User::isSysop, User::isBureaucrat and User::isDeveloper -
 136   use User::isAllowed instead.
 137 * (bug 769) OutputPage::permissionRequired() should suggest groups with the needed permission
 138 * (bug 6971) Fix regression in Special:Export history view
 139 * Revamped Special:Imagelist
 140 * (bug 7000) updated MessagesPl.php
 141 * (bug 6946) Fix unexpected behavior change with GET hits to Special:Export
 142 * (bug 1866) Improve navigation on Special:Listusers; user now a starting
 143   point as with Special:Allpages, rather than a pure limit.
 144 * Clean up tab order on Special:Blockip
 145 * (bug 5969) Clean up tab order on Special:Userlogin forms
 146 * (bug 3512) namespaceDupes now handles spaces and initial caps properly
 147 * (bug 7037) Fix regression in login tab order
 148 * (bug 7031) Report missing email on 'email password' instead of false success
 149 * (bug 7010) Don't send email notifications for watched talk pages when user
 150   has selected to receive only updates for their own talk page
 151 * Added {{CURRENTHOUR}}
 152 * Added [[:Image:Foo.png]] style links to the pagelinks table
 153 * Avoid duplicate revision imports with Special:Import
 154 * (bug 7054) Validate email address before sending email confirmation message
 155 * (bug 7061) Format title on "from (page)" links on Special:Allpages
 156 * (bug 7044) Introduce "padleft" and "padright" colon functions
 157 * Pass page title as parameters to "linkshere" and "nolinkshere" and update
 158   default message text
 159 * Allows to upload from publicy accessible URL. Set $wgAllowCopyUploads = true ; in LocalSettings.php
 160   Limited to $wgMaxUploadSize (default:100MB); URL upload is limited to sysops by default
 161 * (bug 832) Return to user page after emailing a user
 162 * (bug 366) Add local-system-timezone equivalents for date/time variables
 163 * (bug 7109) Fix Atom feed version number in header links
 164
 165
 166 == Languages updated ==
 167
 168 * Albanian (sq)
 169 * Belarusian (be)
 170 * Bishnupriya (bpy) stub file
 171 * Brazilian Portuguese (pt-br)
 172 * Catalan (ca)
 173 * Cantonese (zh-yue)
 174 * Dutch (nl)
 175 * English (en)
 176 * French (fr)
 177 * German (de)
 178 * Georgian (ka)
 179 * Hebrew (he)
 180 * Hungarian (hu)
 181 * Indonesian (id)
 182 * Korean (ko)
 183 * Polish (pl)
 184 * Portuguese (pt)
 185 * Ripuarian (ksh)
 186 * Romani (rmy)
 187 * Russian (ru)
 188 * Spanish (es)
 189 * Tajic (tg)
 190 * Tatar (tt)
 191 * Telugu (te)
 192
 193 == Compatibility ==
 194
 195 MediaWiki 1.8 requires PHP 5 (5.1 recommended). PHP 4 is no longer supported.
 196
 197 MySQL 3.23.x is no longer supported; some older hosts may need to upgrade.
 198 At this time we still recommend 4.0, but 4.1/5.0 will work fine in most cases.
 199
 200
 201 == Upgrading ==
 202
 203 Several changes to the database have been made from 1.6:
 204
 205 * A new "langlinks" table tracks interlanguage links
 206 * A new "filearchive" table stores information on deleted files
 207 * A new "querycache_info" table stores information on query page updates
 208
 209 To ensure that these tables are filled with data, run refreshLinks.php after
 210 the upgrade.
 211
 212 If you are upgrading from MediaWiki 1.4.x or earlier, some major database
 213 changes are made, and there is a slightly higher chance that things could
 214 break. Don't forget to always back up your database before upgrading!
 215
 216 See the file UPGRADE for more detailed upgrade instructions.
 217
 218
 219
 220 === Caveats ===
 221
 222 Some output, particularly involving user-supplied inline HTML, may not
 223 produce 100% valid or well-formed XHTML output. Testers are welcome to
 224 set $wgMimeType = "application/xhtml+xml"; to test for remaining problem
 225 cases, but this is not recommended on live sites. (This must be set for
 226 MathML to display properly in Mozilla.)
 227
 228
 229 For notes on 1.5.x and older releases, see HISTORY.
 230
 231
 232 === Online documentation ===
 233
 234 Documentation for both end-users and site administrators is currently being
 235 built up on Meta-Wikipedia, and is covered under the GNU Free Documentation
 236 License:
 237
 238   http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Documentation
 239
 240
 241 === Mailing list ===
 242
 243 A MediaWiki-l mailing list has been set up distinct from the Wikipedia
 244 wikitech-l list:
 245
 246   http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/mediawiki-l
 247
 248 A low-traffic announcements-only list is also available:
 249
 250   http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/mediawiki-announce
 251
 252 It's highly recommended that you sign up for one of these lists if you're
 253 going to run a public MediaWiki, so you can be notified of security fixes.
 254
 255
 256 === IRC help ===
 257
 258 There's usually someone online in #mediawiki on irc.freenode.net