Using the "secure server" protocol, https, to communicate with a website (web server) has long been considered a must when editing from unsecured networks and from locations considered insecure. Using https encrypts communications between a user's computer and the Wikimedia servers (for example), preventing the interception of plaintext username-password combinations during a browsing session. In the fallout from the release of the Firesheep Firefox extension (see previous Signpost coverage), however, it became clear that many felt this solution alone to be insufficient, since editors often forgot to switch from http to https when the need arose. As a result, there were calls to make https the default for all editors and, in preparation for such a switch, the process of making Wikimedia more https-friendly began.
This week, work on switching to https took a leap forward with the introduction of "protocol-relative" URLs onto a test wiki. This means that instead of internal links (both hyperlinks and file references, for example for images) pointing to locations prefixed with specific protocols, they will now not specify a protocol. The user's browser is then expected to fulfil the request using the same protocol it used for the originating page: links on a page loaded using the https protocol will point to the https (secure) site, while links on an http page will point to the http (insecure) site. According to the Wikimedia Foundation blog, the benefits are obvious:
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Of eight students selected earlier this year to receive funding from Internet giant Google to work on MediaWiki, seven are still with the project. This week their progress so far was published on the Wikimedia blog, including links to the project pages maintained by each student. Projects this year include Ajax login screens, citation archives and user script customisation.
In addition to factual information, the post also disclosed thoughts from the students about what they had learned so far. "True learning can happen only in an open environment and with a highly supportive community", noted Akshay Agarwal, whilst fellow student Devayon Das commented that "A 30 second chat with a community member can save you 30 minutes of scratching your head in frustration". Salvatore Ingala chose to highlight the importance of unit tests (see previous Signpost coverage): "unit testing is boooooring, but ends up saving you a lot of time!", he wrote.
LWN.net, a news site for Linux and other open source projects, recently carried a post addressing Semantic MediaWiki (for more information about SMW, see previous Signpost coverage). Its final paragraph concluded that:
| “ | Some academics have already proposed using SMW on Wikipedia to tackle the problem of the many lists that have to be created manually, but according to Wikimedia Foundation Deputy Director Erik Möller it's still unclear whether SMW is up to the task of supporting a web site on the scale of Wikipedia. So while Semantic MediaWiki already powers a lot of web sites and is quite user-friendly, it remains to be seen whether it will eventually bring semantics to the ultimate wiki, Wikipedia. | ” |
However, volunteer developer Simetrical used the opportunity to clarify that SMW's adoption by Wikimedia projects was not just unclear, but impossible:
| “ | The problem with deploying SMW on Wikimedia sites like Wikipedia has always been that it's a big codebase (tens of thousands of lines), which shares few to no active developers with MediaWiki proper, and which has never had thorough review by core MediaWiki developers for security or performance. ... it's an awesome project, and its functionality is absolutely make-or-break for countless small to medium MediaWiki installs. But it's not possible for a project of this scale to be usable on a site as large as Wikipedia unless it was written that way to begin with, and (like almost all software) it wasn't. | ” |
In unrelated news, those interested in SMW can now follow the project on Twitter or open-source alternative identi.ca (more information).
Not all fixes may have gone live to WMF sites at the time of writing; some may not be scheduled to go live for many weeks.
<math>This week, developers appealed for views on the rendering options available for <math>-tags. Does it affect you? Comment now!
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I'm going to switch to using the secure Wikipedia servers right away. I hope HTTPS reaches all users soon. --Nathan2055talk 00:11, 26 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]