responses and reorg

[ikiwiki] / doc / setup.mdwn

So you want to set up your own wiki using ikiwiki? This tutorial will walk
you through setting up a wiki that is stored in [[Subversion]], [[Git]],
[[TLA]] or [[Mercurial]], and that has optional support for commits from the web.

1. [[Install]] ikiwiki. See [[download]] for where to get it.

2. Create the master rcs repository for your wiki.

                # Subversion
                svnadmin create /svn/wikirepo
                svn mkdir file:///svn/wikirepo/trunk -m create
                 
                # Git
                mkdir /git/wikirepo
                cd /git/wikirepo
                git init-db
                # Git requires something be in the repo to start with.
                cp /usr/share/ikiwiki/basewiki/index.mdwn .
                git add .
                git commit -m create -a
                # No need to keep files in the master repository; so at this
                # stage, you may want to remove all files (except .git) to
                # save disk space.

                # TLA
                mkdir /tla
                tla make-archive me@localhost--wiki /tla/wikirepo
                tla my-id "<me@localhost>"

                # Mercurial
                hg init /hg/wikirepo

3. Check out the repository to make the working copy that ikiwiki will use.

                # Subversion
                svn co file:///svn/wikirepo/trunk ~/wikiwc
                 
                # Git
                # Create a local clone to save disk space and also to
                # optimize performance. See git-clone(1).
                git clone -l -s /git/wikirepo ~/wikiwc

                # TLA
                mkdir ~/wikiwc
                cd ~/wikiwc
                tla archive-setup me@localhost--wiki/wiki--0
                tla init-tree me@localhost--wiki/wiki--0
                # Edit {arch}/=tagging-method and change the precious
                # line to add the .ikiwiki directory to the regexp.
                tla import

                # Mercurial
                # Mercurial uses a single repo approach, so no need to
                # clone anything. Because the following examples
                # refer to the ~/wikiwc working copy we symlink it:
                ln -s /hg/wikirepo ~/wikiwc

4. Build your wiki for the first time.

                ikiwiki --verbose ~/wikiwc/ ~/public_html/wiki/ \
                        --url=http://host/~you/wiki/

   Replace the url with the real url to your wiki. You should now
   be able to visit the url and see your wiki.

5. Customise your wiki. The files in `/usr/share/ikiwiki/basewiki/` are
   used if you don't have a custom version, so let's start by making a
   custom version of the wiki's index page:

                cd ~/wikiwc
                cp /usr/share/ikiwiki/basewiki/index.mdwn .
                $EDITOR index.mdwn
                 
                # Subversion
                svn add index.mdwn
                svn commit -m customised index.mdwn
                 
                # Git
                git add index.mdwn
                git commit -m customised index.mdwn
                git push origin

                # TLA
                tla add index.mdwn
                tla commit

                # Mercurial
                hg add index.mdwn
                hg commit -m customised index.mdwn

   You can also add any files you like from scratch of course.

6. Repeat steps 4 and 5 as desired, editing or adding pages and rebuilding
   the wiki. You can play around with other ikiwiki parameters such as
   `--wikiname` and `--rebuild` too. Get comfortable with its command line
   (see [[usage]]).

7. By now you should be getting tired of typing in all the command line
   options each time you change something in your wiki's setup. And it's
   also getting old to have to manualy rebuild the wiki each time you
   change a file. Time to introduce setup files. 
   
   A sample setup file is [[ikiwiki.setup]]. Download it (or copy it from
   `doc/ikiwiki.setup` in the ikiwiki sources), and edit it. 
   
   Most of the options, like `wikiname` in the setup file are the same as
   ikiwiki's command line options (documented in [[usage]]. `srcdir` and
   `destdir` are the two directories you specify when running ikiwiki by
   hand. `svnrepo` is the path to your subversion repository.  Make sure
   that all of these are pointing to the right directories, and read
   through and configure the rest of the file to your liking.

   If you want to use something other than subversion, comment out the
   subversion configuration, and uncomment and edit the configuration for
   your chosen RCS.

   Note that the default file has a block to configure an [[post-commit]] 
   wrapper to update the wiki. You need to uncomment the related block for
   whatever RCS you use and comment out the other rcs blocks.

   When you're satisfied, run `ikiwiki --setup ikiwiki.setup`, and it
   will set everything up and update your wiki.

8. Set up [[CGI]] to allow editing the wiki from the web.

   Just edit ikiwiki.setup, uncomment the block for the cgi wrapper, make
   sure the filename for the cgi wrapper is ok, run 
   `ikiwiki --setup ikiwiki.setup`, and you're done!

9. Add [[PageHistory]] links to the top of pages. This requires you to have
   setup a repository browser.  For Subversion, you may use [[ViewCVS]] or
   something similar to access your [[Subversion]] repository.  For Git,
   [[Gitweb]] can be used, etc.
   
   The `historyurl` setting makes ikiwiki add the links, and in that url,
   "\[[file]]" is replaced with the name of the file to view. So edit
   ikiwiki.setup and ucomment the appropriate `historyurl` setting and edit
   it for your setup.
   
   Then run `ikiwiki --setup ikiwiki.setup` again.

10. Enjoy your new wiki! Add yourself to [[IkiWikiUsers]]