[pmwiki-users] Annoying question: Why do people switch to PmWiki?

Kathryn Andersen kat_lists at katspace.homelinux.org
Thu Mar 8 19:53:05 CST 2007


On Thu, Mar 08, 2007 at 08:27:56PM -0500, Donald Z. Osborn wrote:
> I've asked this before without getting any echo, but since there are some
> folks who have apparently switched to PmWiki from other wiki software, I'm
> interested to hear what their rationale was and what they feel about their
> experience since.

I didn't switch from other wiki software, but I did evaluate other wiki
software before choosing PmWiki.

This is the document I wrote for my own reference when I was evaluating
wikis for our internal work website:

-------------------------------------------------------------------------

Evaluating Wiki Software
========================

Requirements
------------

Must-Have Requirements:

1. Must work in a Unix/Linux environment, with Apache.
2. user logins (to authorize and identify changes)
3. revision system with rollbacks
4. must be able to back up content (put on a dir which is backed up)
5. ease-of-use for users
6. ease-of-use for admin
7. search
8. categories/structure

Nice-to-have:

9. templateable/skinnable

TWiki
-----

1) Perl/CGI + rcs
2) login system
3) rcs
4) data is in text files, easily backed up
5) Usual Wiki level. Also can enable WYSIWYG editing.
6) web interface, and also, since config is done in text files,
   is easier to fix if something goes wrong
The documentation is nicely organized and included as a wiki "web" in
the installation.
Upgrading is not easy.
7) search, and jump-to-WikiWord
8) "Webs" (namespaces) which divide the Wiki into partitions.
New ones can be added, but I'm not sure that our information is disjoint
enough that multiple namespaces would be useful.

Categories can be built with a combination of (a) topic naming
conventions (b) linking to them from pages which are in that category
(c) special category pages with custom search calls.  They are not
automatic.  This could be considered a disadvantage or an advantage.

9) skins are available

Other comments:
Can rename a page in the interface and the links to it will be
corrected.

MediaWiki
---------

1) PHP + MySQL
2) MySQL with user logins
3) internal revision system
4) depends where the database is
5) Usual Wiki level.
6) web interface, plus editing certain php files, plus updating MySQL
db.
Has the overhead of MySQL administration to also take into account.
Upgrading is even less easy than TWiki.
7) search and "go"
8) The categories system is powerful, flexible and easier to use than
TWiki.
Automatic creation of categories by referencing them, can create
subcategories also (though the documentation of subcategories is a
little unclear).

9) skins are available

Other comments:
Used in Wikipedia, large user base, presumably reliable.

PhpWiki
-------

1) PHP
2) depends on the version; version 1.2 has "Bogo Login"
and 1.3 has real user logins with password
3) internal revision system; can restore old version by "editing" the
old version and saving it (which will make the content the current
version)
4) Depends where the data is;
data is stored in a backend database which can be chosen by
the administrator in setup -- this can be almost any database that
PHP understands (depending on the particular PHP installation); it
defaults to DBM files but can use MySQL or other SQLs.
5) Usual Wiki level.
6) configure by (a) settings in PHP files (b) web interface (c)
whichever database is used.
The documentation is not well organized.
7) has search, but interface slightly confusing
8) Categories are similar to TWiki (have to create category pages)
but a little easier, I think.

9) themes are available

Other comments:
The default URLs are less pretty, need to tweak the Apache setup
to get pretty ones, either with force types or rewrite rules.
Can be done, though.

Can't rename pages.

PmWiki
------

1) PHP
2) a few options
- password-only with forced "signatures" of changes
- AuthUser setup (which can support LDAP, but I couldn't get LDAP
  working)
- UserAuth module (which can have user-initiated registration)
3) PageHistory (with restore)
4) data in flat files, easily backed up
5) Usual Wiki level.
6) configure by (a) settings in PHP files (b) web interface.
The documentation is nicely organized and included as a wiki "group" in
the installation.
Plugins are generally easy to install.
Upgrading is easy.
7) search (not as pretty as MediaWiki)
8) Uses "groups" (namespaces)
Categories are almost as easy as MediaWiki, and one can also have
sub/super-categories.  Uses a special "Category" namespace.
Can force users to put categories on pages.

9) skins are available

Other comments:
There is a plugin for page renaming.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------

So that was what I knew when I chose PmWiki; and I haven't regretted the
decision.  Now I know more about it, it has powerful features that I
think I would miss if I used another wiki.

Kathryn Andersen
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