Mediawiki on Windows...?

October 4, 2006 10:12 AM

WikiFilter: Like many of you, I am looking for a wiki solution for my personal notebook/data storage needs (i.e. running on a PC only, no server involved). I am bowled over by Mediawiki every time I visit Wikipedia. But is there any simple way to implement Mediawiki (or a comparable wiki engine) on a plain ol' Windows XP desktop?

I am not a Linux person (or a techie in general), but I could get to be one if that meant harnessing the power of a true wiki engine. Up to this point I have been using WikidPad, which works pretty well for text but has nowhere near Mediawiki's power--especially for displaying images in pages, revision control, categories, etc. Also, WP has no print function.

I've found that I can link to external Word or Excel files from within WikidPad--that way I can create pages with some tables and graphics and still be within a wiki framework. But this seems like a cumbersome way of doing it.

Also, I tried to run Mediawiki as a VMWare appliance, but this did not let me use images (images are important for me). It seems like I'll have to go the whole hog and just learn the darn thing. So is there any convenient way of doing it on Windows, should I set up a server of some kind, or is there another wiki engine that kicks butt in Windows?

posted by mjklin to computers & internet (7 comments total)

You may want to consider a TiddlyWiki solution as your wiki solution on your personal computing solution for your personal data storage solution needs.
posted by elmwood at 10:35 AM on October 4, 2006

It's not super simple, but there are installer packages for Windows XP that will let you run a local version of Apache/PHP/MySQL on your Windows XP box. XAMPP is one I'm familiar with.

Once up and running, you'd be able to install Media Wiki as you would on any Webserver.
posted by alan at 10:38 AM on October 4, 2006

I have found Wampserver to be a far smoother install than XAMPP, FWIW.

Are you averse to finding a desktop app to do a similar thing ? (as opposed to a web application running locally?) I don't know which ones are any good, but I know there are a ton of Wiki apps for Windows. e.g.: WikidPad, Zulupad, EverNote
posted by misterbrandt at 11:49 AM on October 4, 2006

Here are the official instructions for running MediaWiki on Windows. That page mentions Wiki On A Stick, which is an easy-to-install Windows distribution of MediaWiki.
posted by mbrubeck at 11:53 AM on October 4, 2006

Man, I should read the question more carefully. WikidPad is too wimpy. (I blame my eagerness to post before "Server Error 500" ate my draft...)
posted by misterbrandt at 12:50 PM on October 4, 2006

Another vote for TiddlyWiki!
posted by cklennon at 2:14 PM on October 4, 2006

Congrats on a successful first post, mjklin. I'm sure mbrubeck would appreciate it if you marked his post "best answer". It would also make it easier for future people with the same question to find the answer.
posted by Mr. Gunn at 8:24 PM on October 4, 2006