Frequently Asked Questions

OpenWikiNG F.A.Q.

Question List

How can I install OpenWikiNG on my server?

How do I make a new Page?

Why are there red question marks next to words?

How can I change the layout of the pages for all users?

How do I change the menu for all users?

How do I make a menu link to create a new page?

How you can revert to earlier page versions in the event of a defacement?

What are Sub Pages?

Are numbers treated by OpenWikiNG as lowercase or uppercase?

How can I stop my wiki users creating bad page names?

Why do I see weird characters like '%2F' in pagenames?

How can I link to a specific part of a page?

How do I stop a word linking to a page

How can I install OpenWikiNG on my server?

• Here is a page with quick and simple instructions

How do I make a new Page?

• There are at least 3 ways of making a new page:

1. Edit the URL in your browser
1. Substitute the text after 'ow.asp' with ?NewPageTitle, and hit 'Return' (where 'NewPageTitle' is the name of your new page)
2. Use the macros <CreatePage> or <CreateHomePage> somewhere on an existing page
3. Put a CamelCase word on an existing page, and click the red question mark displayed after it.

Why are there red question marks next to words?

• Each word on your page that is in CamelCase form is treated by OpenWikiNG as if it were a link to another page. This is quite automatic, and part of the wiki software. If the page does not yet exist, clicking the question-mark will prompt you to create it.
• If you want to suppress the question-mark for a particular word, it is possible.
• Take the word: 'CamelCase?'
1. You can surround it with 3 curly braces: {{{CamelCase}}}
2. You can surround it with the nowiki tags: <nowiki>CamelCase</nowiki>
3. You can precede it with a tilde character ~CamelCase

How can I change the layout of the pages for all users?

• In owconfig_default.asp, set:

OPENWIKI_ACTIVESKIN = "default_left" (or whichever skin you want)

• In order to test it, go to User Preferences, and click 'Clear Preferences'. This deletes your cookie, and the Wiki treats you like a new user, and should show the correct skin.

How do I change the menu for all users?

• If you want to display your own complete set of custom bookmarks, then in owconfig_default.asp, after the gDefaultPageBookmarks? = "" line, make a new line thus:

gDefaultBookmarks? ="YourPage1? YourPage2? YourPage3?" etc Note that the page names are seperated by a space. This will override the system ones. Try to make the pagenames CamelCase, as Wikis do not deal with Freelink names very well on the whole.

How do I make a menu link to create a new page?

1. Make a new page called MyTemplate?
2. If you want a boiler-plate layout for your users' new pages, put in on this page
3. Make a new page called CreateNewPage?
4. On that page, put the Macro <CreatePage(MyTemplate)>
5. Put the pagename CreateNewPage? on your bookmarks (as described above)

How you can revert to earlier page versions in the event of a defacement?

1. At he bottom of a defaced page will be the phrase 'view other revisions'. Click it.
2. There should be a list of earlier versions of the page, with the link 'view' next to each one. Click 'view' to see the earlier version.
3. If the earlier version is the one you want, put it into edit mode (double-click the page body) and [Save]. This will make it the 'current' version, and effectively wipe out later versions.

What are Sub Pages?

• If you like, you can ignore subpages altogether, in which case, every pagename would be unique
• A subpage name consists of 2 or more nomal pagenames separated by a forward-slash (/)
• Examples:
• PageOne/PageTwo?
• PageOne/PageOne/PageOne?
• PageOne/SubPageOne/SubSubPageOne?
• As you can see, the pages look rather like web folder names, which is the best analogy for subpages. The rules for naming are similar.
• Unlike web folders, though, you can make a subpage named "PageOne/PageTwo/PageThree?" even though the pages "PageOne?" and "PageTwo?" don't exist! This is not good wiki practice, and should be avoided.
• There is some jargon about subpages. In the subpage name "PageOne/PageTwo/PageThree?":
• PageTwo? is PageThree?'s parent
• PageThree? is PageTwo?'s child
• If another page existed with the name "PageOne/NewPage?" then it would be a sibling of the page ""PageOne/PageTwo?"
• There are some special wiki commands to make linking with subpages easier. see Child Sibling Syntax

• Subpages are a powerful feature of OpenWikiNG and enable you to organise your wiki site like a computer disk, with 'folder structures' based on parent pages with child pages, which themselves have children, and so on.
• The various search macros can be used to list subpages by using criteria such as:
• <TitleSearch(@this/,1)> will produce a list of all children of the current page
• <TitleSearch(@parent/,1)> will produce a list of siblings and their children.
• <TitleSearch(/SubpageName,1)> will produce a list of subpages with the name "SubpageName?" no matter what their parent page name is.

..and so on

Are numbers treated by OpenWikiNG as lowercase or uppercase?

• They are treated as lowercase. The underscore character (_) is also treated as lowercase.

How can I stop my wiki users creating bad page names?

• You have at least four options, all in the config file owconfig_default.asp:

1. Set cFreeLinks=0
• This will prevent pagenames which are not CamelCase
2. Set cAcronymLinks=0
• This will prevent pages like "TLAPage" being created
3. Set cSimpleLinks=1
• This will ban numbers and underscores in pagenames (not usually a good idea, but the option is there)
4. Set cAllowAnyPageName=0
• This will cause the wiki to try and 'fix' bad page names by inserting spaces and underscores intelligently

Why do I see weird characters like '%2F' in pagenames?

• Browsers have difficulty with URLs that contain the slash (/) character, and use the hexadecimal ASCII form of the character instead. It's perfectly normal, and doesn't affect the way the pagename displays.

How can I link to a specific part of a page?

• Use the <anchor(anyname)> macro, to mark the part of the page, then link to it using the hash (#) character.
• At the top of this page is the macro <anchor(topofpage)>

In order to link to it, I use the syntax: [@this#topofpage Go to the top of this page]

Here is the 'live demo': Go to the top of this page

• You can link to an anchor on another page my putting a '#anchorname' after the pagename.

How do I stop a word linking to a page

• use a tilde before the word if it is one-off e.g. ~DoNotLink
• use Nowiki tag e.g. <Nowiki>DoNotLink</Nowiki?>
• if it is a frequently used word across many pages, create a new page called StopWords and add the word into this page