📘 MediaWiki Appliance

A ready-to-use MediaWiki appliance built for simplicity, performance, and security. This installer prepares a clean Debian system to serve MediaWiki at the root path with modern defaults, file uploads enabled, Redis caching, self-signed HTTPS, and preloaded core extensions.

⚙️ How It Works

The appliance is built by running installer.sh on a clean Debian instance. It installs all required packages, downloads the latest stable version of MediaWiki, sets up MariaDB and Redis, configures NGINX with HTTPS, and preloads useful skins and extensions.

After installation, the wiki is fully functional at:

https://your-server-ip/

🧪 First-Time Setup

After installation, log into your wiki as:

Username: admin
Password: changeme

🔒 You must change this password immediately!

Visit:

https://your-server-ip/activate/

This setup screen allows you to securely define a new password. It is a one-time activation process.

📂 What’s Included

MediaWiki (latest stable)
Skins: Vector (default), MonoBook, Timeless
Extensions:
- Cite
- WikiEditor
- SyntaxHighlight_GeSHi
- CategoryTree
File uploads enabled
Redis server with MediaWiki cache integration
PHP tuned for media uploads
Self-signed HTTPS certificate for secure local access

🔧 Enabling Let’s Encrypt (Optional)

The appliance includes Certbot and is preconfigured for HTTPS. If you plan to serve your wiki publicly with a real domain name:

Update /etc/nginx/sites-available/mediawiki to use your actual server_name
Then run:
```
certbot --nginx -d your.domain.name
```

This will obtain a valid SSL certificate and reload NGINX.

🔁 Reinstalling or Removing

If the installer fails and you need to revert in order to try again, you can purge the appliance from your system:

./installer.sh --purge

This will:

Stop all related services
Remove MediaWiki files and NGINX config
Uninstall MariaDB, PHP, Redis, and Certbot
Leave the system clean for a rebuild

Note: This process assumes you are running the script on a dedicated appliance. Running this on anything but a dedicated appliance may destroy your system.

🔐 Backup Tips

To ensure your wiki can be restored, back up:

The database:

mysqldump -u root mediawiki > mediawiki.sql

The uploaded files and configs:

tar czf uploads_backup.tar.gz /var/www/html/images /var/www/html/LocalSettings.php

💬 Support

This appliance was built by Robbie Ferguson to provide a turn-key, modern MediaWiki experience. Contributions, forks, and enhancements are welcome.

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