1 This tutorial will walk you through setting up a wiki with ikiwiki.
3 1. [[Download]] and [[install]] ikiwiki.
5 2. Decide where your wiki's files will go.
7 As a wiki compiler, ikiwiki builds a wiki from files in a source directory,
8 and outputs the files to a destination directory. If you keep your wiki in
9 a version control system, the source directory will contain a working copy
10 checked out from the version control system.
12 For the purposes of this tutorial, we'll set shell variables
13 for these locations, and use those variables in the commands that follow.
16 DESTDIR=~/public_html/wiki/
18 Note that ikiwiki owns the working copy directory; do not perform your own
19 edits in ikiwiki's working copy.
21 3. Create the beginnings of your wiki.
23 This will create a simple main page for the wiki.
29 In the editor, you could start by entering a simple page like
30 [[toggle id=page text="this one"]].
32 [[toggleable id=page text="""
33 Welcome to your new wiki.
34 All wikis are supposed to have a [[SandBox]],
37 This wiki is powered by [ikiwiki](http://ikiwiki.info).
40 See [[HelpOnFormatting]] for details about the markup language.
42 Note that several [[standard_wiki_pages|basewiki]] will be added to your
43 wiki, from files in `/usr/share/ikiwiki/basewiki/`, so your wiki will
44 automatically get a [[SandBox]], and some other useful pages.
46 4. Build your wiki for the first time.
48 ikiwiki --verbose $SRCDIR $DESTDIR --url=http://example.org/~you/wiki/
50 Replace the url with the real url to your wiki. You should now
51 be able to visit the url and see your wiki.
53 5. Repeat steps 3 and 4 as desired, editing or adding pages and rebuilding
56 To quickly get started on a common task like blogging with ikiwiki, you
57 can copy in files from the [[examples]]. The examples are located in
58 `doc/examples/` in the ikiwiki source package.
60 You can play around with other ikiwiki parameters such as `--wikiname`
61 and `--rebuild` too. Get comfortable with its command line (see
64 6. By now you should be getting tired of typing in all the command line
65 options each time you change something in your wiki's setup. Time to
66 introduce setup files.
68 A sample setup file is [[ikiwiki.setup]]. Download it (or copy it from
69 `doc/ikiwiki.setup` in the ikiwiki sources), and edit it. Note that this
70 file should *not* be put in your wiki's directory with the rest of the
71 files. A good place to put it is in a ~/.ikiwiki/ subdirectory.
73 Most of the options, like `wikiname` in the setup file are the same as
74 ikiwiki's command line options (documented in [[usage]]. `srcdir` and
75 `destdir` are the two directories you specify when running ikiwiki by
76 hand. Make sure that these are pointing to the right directories, and
77 read through and configure the rest of the file to your liking.
79 When you're satisfied, run `ikiwiki --setup ikiwiki.setup`, and it
80 will set everything up.
82 7. Turn on additional features.
84 Now you have a basic wiki with a configuration file. Time to experiment
85 with ikiwiki's many features.
87 Let's first enable a key wiki feature and set up [[CGI]] to allow
88 editing the wiki from the web. Just edit ikiwiki.setup, uncomment the
89 block for the cgi wrapper, make sure the filename for the cgi wrapper
90 is ok, run `ikiwiki --setup ikiwiki.setup`, and you're done!
92 There are lots of other configuration options in ikiwiki.setup that you
93 can uncomment, configure, and enable by re-running
94 `ikiwiki --setup ikiwiki.setup`. Be sure to browse through all the
97 8. Put your wiki in revision control.
99 At this point you might want to check your wiki in to a revision control
100 system you can get history of past changes and revert edits. Depending
101 on the revision control system you choose, the way this is done varies.
103 There's little that's ikiwiki specific about these instructions; this is
104 just how you put a directory under revision control using the various
105 systems that ikiwiki supports. Note that the .ikiwiki subdirectory is
106 where ikiwiki keeps its state, and should be preserved, but not checked
107 into revision control.
109 [[toggle id=subversion text="Subversion"]]
110 [[toggleable id=subversion text="""
111 REPOSITORY=~/wikirepo
112 svnadmin create $REPOSITORY
113 svn mkdir file://$REPOSITORY/trunk -m "create trunk"
115 svn co file://$REPOSITORY/trunk .
117 svn commit -m "initial import"
120 [[toggle id=git text="Git"]]
121 [[toggleable id=git text="""
122 When using Git, you probably want to set up two repositories, of which
123 one should be bare (meaning that it does not have a working tree
124 checked out). We call the bare repository the "repository" and the
125 other will be the "srcdir" (which `ikiwiki` uses to compile the wiki).
127 ways](http://blog.madduck.net/vcs/2007.07.11_publishing-git-repositories)
128 to do the following, but this might be easiest:
130 REPOSITORY=~/wiki.git
131 GIT_DIR=$REPOSITORY git --bare init --shared
134 echo /.ikiwiki > .gitignore
136 git commit -m "initial commit"
137 git remote add origin $REPOSITORY
138 git config branch.master.merge refs/heads/master
141 It is **paramount** that you **never** push to the Git repository in
142 `$SRCDIR` ([this FAQ entry explains
143 why](http://git.or.cz/gitwiki/GitFaq#head-b6a3d85f677763313159eb39f7dbf4579d4ee28b)).
144 Instead, if you want to work on the wiki from a remote machine, clone
145 `$REPOSITORY`, using either the `git` transport (if available), or
148 If at any point you commit changes in `$SRCDIR`, make sure to `git
149 push` them to the `$REPOSITORY`. ikiwiki will do this automatically
150 for any changes made via the web.
152 Finally, see [[Git_pitfalls]] if you experience problems.
155 [[toggle id=tla text="TLA"]]
156 [[toggleable id=tla text="""
157 REPOSITORY=~/wikirepo
158 tla make-archive me@localhost--wiki $REPOSITORY
159 tla my-id "<me@localhost>"
161 tla archive-setup me@localhost--wiki/wiki--0
162 tla init-tree me@localhost--wiki/wiki--0
163 # Edit {arch}/=tagging-method and change the precious
164 # line to add the .ikiwiki directory to the regexp.
169 [[toggle id=mercurial text="Mercurial"]]
170 [[toggleable id=mercurial text="""
175 hg commit -m "initial import"
178 [[toggle id=monotone text="Monotone"]]
179 [[toggleable id=monotone text="""
180 # These instructions are standard instructions to import a directory into monotone
181 # and set it up so that you don't need any passwords to use it
182 REPOSITORY=~/.ikiwiki/mtn.db
183 BRANCH=com.company.wikiname
184 # remember the password you use in the next step and
185 # substitute it for 'wikiKeyPass' in the get_passphrase() hook below
186 # note the you should never generate two monotone keys with the same name
187 mtn genkey web@machine.company.com
188 mtn db init --db=$REPOSITORY
189 mv $SRCDIR $SRCDIR-old
191 echo ".ikiwiki" > $SRCDIR-old/.mtn-ignore
192 mtn --db=$REPOSITORY --branch=$BRANCH import . -m "initial import"
194 mtn --db=$REPOSITORY --branch=$BRANCH checkout $SRCDIR
195 mv $SRCDIR-old/.ikiwiki $SRCDIR
196 cat << EOF > $SRCDIR/_MTN/monotonerc
197 function get_passphrase (branchname)
204 9. Configure ikiwiki to use revision control.
206 Once your wiki is checked in to the revision control system,
207 you should configure ikiwiki to use revision control. Edit your
208 ikiwiki.setup, and uncomment the lines for the revision control system
209 you chose to use. Be sure to set `svnrepo` to $REPOSITORY, if using
210 subversion. Uncomment the block for the wrapper for your revision
211 control system, and configure the wrapper path in that block
212 appropriately (for Git, it should be `$REPOSITORY/hooks/post-update`).
214 Once it's all set up, run `ikiwiki --setup ikiwiki.setup` once more.
215 Now you should be able to edit files in $SRCDIR, and use your revision
216 control system to commit them, and the wiki will automatically update.
217 And in the web interface, RecentChanges should work, and files changed
218 by web users will also be committed using revision control.
220 10. Enjoy your new wiki! Add yourself to [[IkiWikiUsers]]. And check out
221 [[tips]] to find out how to get more out of ikiwiki.