Highlights

Semantic MediaWiki now comes with out-of-the-box faceted search via the new Special:FacetedSearch page.

Version 4.2 brings compatibility with MediaWiki 1.40, MediaWiki 1.41, and PHP 8.2. It also improves compatibility with MediaWiki 1.42, which is expected to mostly work.

You can now set the source for queries run via the "ask" or "askargs" API endpoints via the new source parameter.

Bug fixes

• Fixed ask queries with a conjunction of negations failing when using the Elasticsearch backend
• Fixed property linking for languages with fallback languages
• Fixed footer sorting on table results
• Improved handling of logos

Credits

Over 15 people contributed to this release. We would like to thank all contributors.

Special credits go to Bertrand Gorge, Niklas Laxström, Mark A. Hershberger, Jaider Andrade Ferreira, Youri van den Bogert and alistair3149.

Upgrading

Semantic MediaWiki 4.2 is a minor release. It contains new features, improvements, and bug fixes. Because it is a minor release, it does not contain any breaking changes, does not require running the update.php script, and does not drop support for older versions of MediaWiki.

We recommend that everyone running older versions of SMW upgrades. Especially if you are running SMW 4.0.1 or older, as these versions contain a known security vulnerability.

Get the new version via Composer:

• Step 1: if you are upgrading from SMW older than 4.0.0, ensure the SMW version in composer.json is ^4.2.0
• Step 2: run composer in your MediaWiki directory: composer update --no-dev --optimize-autoloader

Get the new version via Git:

This is only for those that have installed SMW via Git.

• Step 1: do a git pull in the SemanticMediaWiki directory
• Step 2: run composer update --no-dev --optimize-autoloader in the MediaWiki directory

Professional Semantic MediaWiki Services

At Professional Wiki, we provide Semantic MediaWiki services, including SMW hosting, SMW software development, SMW consulting, and various MediaWiki services.

You can try out Semantic MediaWiki via the free trial on ProWiki.

When to Consider Alternatives to Wikibase

1. Access Restriction Requirements

Wikibase is designed for either fully open or fully closed data environments. While editing restrictions can be implemented, viewing permissions are all-or-nothing: users who can access some data can access all data. Wikibase is thus less suitable for projects requiring granular access controls or a mix of open and restricted data within the same instance.

2. Real-time Data Processing

Wikibase is not suitable for real-time data processing or high-frequency updates. Stream processing systems or time-series databases are more appropriate for such cases. Wikibase's update speed limit is about 30 edits per second, depending on the underlying system resources.

When editing a Wikibase Item, the entire old version is kept. Thus, if you make many edits to large items, Wikibase ends up being wasteful with storage space.

Related: Fast Bulk Import Into Wikibase

3. Domain-Specific UIs

If your project requires forms or user interfaces with special restrictions or complex business logic for editing or viewing data, something other than Wikibase's standard interface may be required. However, custom development can address many of these needs.

At Professional Wiki, we've developed extensions like Wikibase Export for domain-specific data export and Automated Values for encoding business rules. If you wish to use Wikibase and need such customizations, check out our Wikibase software development services.

You might also wish to consider Semantic MediaWiki, a MediaWiki extension somewhat similar to Wikibase, that supports data-entry via domain-specific forms and more UI customization options. You can also check out our Wikibase vs. Semantic MediaWiki comparison.

4. Limited System Resources

Wikibase requires a relatively powerful server to run efficiently, especially for larger datasets or high-traffic scenarios. It's unsuitable for environments with minimal computing resources, such as serving data from a Raspberry Pi.

At Professional Wiki, we offer Wikibase hosting services that ensure optimal performance and reliability.

When Wikibase Excels

1. Collaborative Knowledge Creation

Because Wikibase is a layer on top of MediaWiki, the software developed for Wikipedia, it is fantastic for collaborative knowledge curation. Let your team(s) build and maintain your knowledge base together, or even open up your wiki to public editing. Wikibase comes with change logs, anti-vandalism tools, approval flows, and the ability to roll back changes.

2. Flexible Data Modeling

Create and evolve your own data model with Wikibase. Because Wikibase is built on top of a graph database, you avoid the artificial restriction of database tables. Define your properties and choose which ones you use on each item. Describe special cases, or do rapid prototyping without forcing your future self to live with a sub-optimal schema.

3. Interconnected Knowledge Representation

Wikibase excels at representing interconnected data. Its linked data model allows the creation of rich information networks with meaningfully connected entities. This structure enables intuitive navigation through complex datasets and supports powerful querying capabilities. By using external identifiers, you can connect your data to other data sets, such as Wikidata. Such connections enable federated queries that combine information from your and other Wikibases.

4. Multilingual and International Projects

With built-in support for multiple languages, Wikibase is ideal for international projects. It allows for seamless content management in various languages, including right-to-left scripts. Labels, descriptions, and aliases can be added in multiple languages for each entity, facilitating global collaboration and access.

5. Qualified and Referenced Data

Wikibase supports the addition of qualifiers and references to statements, providing context and provenance for each piece of information. This feature enhances data reliability and allows for a nuanced representation of complex or time-dependent facts, which is crucial for scientific, historical, or evolving datasets.

6. Version Control for Your Data

Every change in Wikibase is tracked and reversible. The system maintains a complete history of edits, allowing users to review past versions, compare changes, and revert to previous states if needed. This robust version control ensures data integrity and supports accountability in collaborative environments.

Common Wikibase Usecases

Wikibase's versatility makes it an ideal solution for various knowledge management needs. Here are some of the most common and impactful use cases we've seen among our clients:

Organizational Knowledge Management

Businesses increasingly turn to Wikibase to create flexible internal knowledge bases that can describe complex attributes and relationships. These knowledge bases can serve as a single source of truth for the entire organization and support analytics via complex queries against the knowledge graph.

Open Data Initiatives

Organizations leveraging Wikibase for open data initiatives benefit from its powerful combination of structured data management and accessibility. Government agencies, research institutions, and forward-thinking companies use Wikibase to create comprehensive data portals that foster transparency and innovation. A key advantage is Wikibase's adherence to open standards: through its Web API and SPARQL endpoint, data is easily retrievable in formats like JSON, RDF, and CSV, enabling seamless integration into various projects and applications.

Wikibase's structured data model facilitates complex queries, allowing users to uncover insights hidden in traditional databases. For instance, a city government could use Wikibase to publish urban planning data, enabling citizens to create custom visualizations of zoning changes or track infrastructure projects. Researchers might combine this with other sources to analyze urban development trends, while businesses could integrate it into location-based services.

Cultural Heritage Cataloging

GLAM institutions (Galleries, Libraries, Archives, and Museums) and historical research projects are harnessing Wikibase to revolutionize how cultural heritage is cataloged, linked, and explored. This versatile platform enables these organizations to create rich, interconnected knowledge bases that serve internal management needs and public engagement goals.

Libraries and archives use Wikibase to manage bibliographic records and metadata for diverse media, from ancient manuscripts to digital publications. For instance, a national library consortium might employ Wikibase to create a unified catalog that links books to authors and subjects to historical events, geographical locations, and related archival materials. This approach enhances resource discovery and facilitates advanced research by revealing hidden connections within collections.

Museums and galleries leverage Wikibase to catalog and manage their collections, including artworks, artifacts, and exhibits. A museum network could use the platform to build a comprehensive digital inventory that links objects across institutions, connecting them to their historical context, artistic movements, and conservation records. This linking streamlines curation processes and enables compelling narratives for public exhibitions and educational programs.

In historical research, Wikibase excels at managing and linking complex data. Projects focused on genealogy or local history can create vast information networks, connecting historical figures to events, places, and primary source documents. For example, a city archive might use Wikibase to organize and link historical photographs, census records, and maps, allowing researchers to trace the evolution of neighborhoods over time or track family histories over generations.

Research Data Management

Universities and research institutions harness Wikibase to create integrated research ecosystems. For example, a university might use Wikibase to build a repository that stores research outputs and maps the relationships between publications, datasets, researchers, and funding sources. This interconnected approach facilitates interdisciplinary collaboration, helps demonstrate research impact, and supports compliance with data management requirements from funding bodies.

Conclusion

Wikibase is a powerful solution for organizations dealing with complex, interconnected data requiring a flexible and robust management system. Its strengths in adaptable data modeling, support for qualified and referenced information, and comprehensive version control make it well-suited for cultural heritage projects, research data management, and open data initiatives.

However, Wikibase isn't the right fit for every project. Organizations needing real-time data processing, highly specific user interfaces, or granular access controls may need to look elsewhere or consider custom development on top of Wikibase.

If you're considering Wikibase for your project or looking to optimize your existing Wikibase implementation, Professional Wiki offers comprehensive Wikibase services to support your needs. Our team of Wikibase experts can guide you through the decision-making process, assist with importing into Wikibase, host your Wikibase, and even develop new Wikibase features.

Demo

Try out the extension yourself via the Wikibase Export demo wiki.

Documentation and Installation Instructions

Learn how to install, use, and configure the extension via the Wikibase Export documentation.

Development of Wikibase Export

Development of Wikibase Export was led by our Wikibase Developers Jeroen De Dauw and Morne Alberts. Learn more about our Wikibase software development services.

We thank our client Universität Mannheim for sponsoring the development of Wikibase Export.

Thanks also go to Renat Shigapov and Irene Schumm for conceptualizing the extension and to the Wikibase Stakeholder Group for their feedback.

Wikibase Hosting

Check out our tailored Wikibase hosting and Wikibase cloud hosting services.
Both include Wikibase Export and many other MediaWiki extensions.

Changes

• Improved compatibility with MediaWiki 1.38 and 1.39
• Improved compatibility with PHP 8.1 (not complete yet)
• Fixed type error occurring during specific number formatting on PHP 8.0+
• Fixed bug causing the job queue to be flooded with jobs
• Fixed issue with the pipe character in the Ask API
• Fixed rebuildData.php issue for the smw_ftp_sesp_usereditcntns table
• Fixed issue in the category result format
• Fixed upsert warning log spam
• Added user preference that allows enabling or disabling the entity issue panel
• Added support for partial ISO dates
• SMW now ships with updated vocabularies including Schema.org, Dublin Core, FOAF and SKOS
• Various grammar and spelling fixes
• Translation updates

Credits

Over 20 people contributed to this release. We would like to thank all contributors.

Special credits go to Abijeet Patro (and TranslateWiki), Bernhard Krabina from KM-A, Sébastien Beyou from WikiValley and Alexander from gesinn.it.

Upgrading

We recommend that everyone running older versions of SMW upgrades. Especially if you are running SMW 4.0.1 or older, as these versions contain a known security vulnerability.

No need to run "update.php" or any other migration scripts.

Get the new version via Composer:

• Step 1: if you are upgrading from SMW older than 4.0.0, ensure the SMW version in composer.json is ^4.1.0
• Step 2: run composer in your MediaWiki directory: composer update --no-dev --optimize-autoloader

Get the new version via Git:

This is only for those that have installed SMW via Git.

• Step 1: do a git pull in the SemanticMediaWiki directory
• Step 2: run composer update --no-dev --optimize-autoloader in the MediaWiki directory

Semantic MediaWiki hosting

If you are looking for a hosting provider for your wiki, we recommend ProWiki. We provide MediaWiki and Semantic MediaWiki hosting. Create your wiki instantly via the free trial.

Demo

Download and Installation

View the installation instructions and documentation.

External Content is available on our fully managed MediaWiki wikis.

Participate

Comment and like on YouTube

Comment and upvote on Reddit

Comment and share on LinkedIn

Comment and retweet on Twitter

The Yearly SMW Overview

You can find the slides on Google Slides.

Recordings on YouTube

You can find the recordings of the SMWCon Fall 2021 talks on the SMW YouTube channel.

A good place to start is the excellent keynote by Rich Evans:

Overview

Even today, there are not many choices when it comes to a mobile and responsive skin. I’ve done the research for you and in this blog post, I will look at the available alternatives serving the content of your wiki best for mobile devices.

All of the mobile and responsive skins to MediaWiki I will mention in this blog post both integrate with Semantic MediaWiki and VisualEditor. According to my opinion these two requirements need to be met. In addition, these skins are under active development, meaning that support for new major releases of MediaWiki is added within a short period of time. The latter is good to know if you would like the next major upgrade of your MediaWiki instance to be smooth when it comes to the skin used.

Let us now look at the selection of mobile and responsive skins for MediaWiki I made for you.

Chameleon

The Chameleon skin comes by default with a layout offering two navigation bars enclosing the wiki’s content at the top and bottom. The top bar holds the menu for editing and actions on the center right as well as the user menu on the very right. The bar at the bottom holds the tool menu.

It is the most versatile and flexible skin when it comes to customizing the look and feel of your wiki. Moreover it can easily be extened with further features from the Bootstrap framework. If you are into creating an unique impression of your wiki then this skin is your choice.

Medik

The Medik skin serves a fixed layout in four choosable variants resembling that of the established classic Vector and Monobook skins with a sidebar on the left side of the screen. The user menu is located in the very right of the top bar. The editing, the actions and the tools menu are merged together and are located on the top left of the content area.

This is one of the two mobile and responsive skins covered here offering the classic wiki appearance. At the same time it is clear and straigt. The Bootstrap framework it uses can easily be extended with the features provided by the BootstrapComponents extension. If you are into the classic wiki layout and just want to do a couple of configuration changes then this skin is your very best choice. Besides that no further changes need to be done.

Foreground

The Foreground skin serves a fixed layout providing one navigation bar at the top above the wiki’s content which holds the tool menu as well as the user menu. The menu for editing and actions is located at the top right of the content area.

It is one of the skins with a clear and straigt appearance and serves by default the features provided by the Foundation framwork. If you are happy with the layout and just want to do a couple of changes to the CSS then you should pick this skin.

Pivot

The Pivot skin serves a fixed layout resembling that of the well-known classic Vector and Monobook skins with a sidebar on the left of the screen. The user menu is toggled in and out on the right side of the screen. The menu for editing and actions is located at the top right of the content area.

This is the other one of the two mobile and responsive skins offering the classic wiki appearance. It serves by default the features provided by the Foundation framwork. If you are into the classic wiki layout and just want to do a couple of changes to the configuraion and the CSS then this skin is your pick.

Tweeki

The Tweeki skin brings a flexible layout by default providing one navigation bar at the top above the wiki’s content. It holds the menu for tools as well as for actions. The editing action was placed as a button on the top right of the content area.

It is a skin with a clean aesthetic layout by default bringing the features provided by the Bootstrap framwork. If you like the layout provided by the Tweeki skin and you just want to do a couple of changes to the CSS, then this skin is definitely something for you. If you would like to build intensely upon the skin, it is also a very nice choice.

Adoption

Let us now look at the basic data like usage numbers, web framework used, and other information:

The data was sourced from WikiApiary.com, MediaWiki.org and GitHub in March 2022.

The usage numbers of these mobile and responsive MediaWiki skins do not convey a relevant volume of serious adoption. However, we need to remember that private wiki instances running MediaWiki are not covered at all. From experience, these are much more likely using one of the skins mentioned here. Thus, these numbers do, indeed, provide a pretty good overview of how usages compare by skin. Moreover, their overall adoption is steadily increasing since their inception.

Interestingly, but not surprisingly, none of the mobile and responsive skins mentioned here is deployed on wikis run by the Wikimedia Foundation, the organization behind Wikipedia. One reason for that is due to the skins’ focus on being mobile and responsive, they provide features that may break content on Wikipedia. Moreover these features are even unwanted within the scope of Wikipedia. Think of features like accordions, carousels or tabs here. Another reason is that they were not developed by the Wikimedia Foundation, thus not assuring direct control over their code base and release process, which is also an important factor for Wikipedia and related projects.

This leads to the questions: Which mobile skin is used for Wikipedia, and why wasn’t it considered in this blog post? Well, the skin is called Minerva Neue, which is best used with the MobileFrontend extension. They piggy-back on the classic MediaWiki skins we all know - Vector and MonoBook. In my experience, this solution to a mobile skin for MediaWiki is generally viewed by users with a resigned acceptance. Also it lacks the possibility for adaptation to individual wiki’s requirements.

Conclusion

All mobile and responsive skins for MediaWiki I have covered in this blog post are recommended and can cheerfully be used for your wiki.

In the end your decision will not just depend on your individual use case for running a wiki but also on which kind of changes you would like to have for the skin and on either your personal technical skill level or on how much you would like to get involved yourself in doing these.

All of these skins can be used out of the box with you probably wanting to make only a few necessary adaptations regarding the visual appearance. Two of the skins, Chameleon and Tweeki allow for more or less invasive changes to the layout and visual appearance and require a medium to high level of technical skills to do them. The other three, Foreground, Pivot and Medik are fixed in their layout however still can be changed regarding their visual appearance. The adaptations needed here can be made by people with a medium and even low level of technical skills.

I hope you enjoyed reading this blog post and got something out of it. Please have a look at the follow-up blog posts covering the mobile and responsive skins mentioned here.

Hosting and Support

All of Professional Wiki’s hosting plans either offer or allow to optionally include the mobile and responsive skins for MediaWiki covered by this blog post. Also professional support is available to help you get the most out of your wiki. We will be very happy to assist you and make a difference for you!

Further reading

• Chameleon
• Foreground
• Medik
• Pivot
• Tweeki