Is Wikipedia related to other programs Wiki help?

Question

I know wikipedia is a pretty big resource for information. And i have seen a lot of programs using a wiki type web page for their help.

Are these software companies using wikipedia for their help information? Or are they using their own site and just using the wiki name and layout.

Even the layouts and design mimic the actual wikipedia.org website.
So just wondering if they use the main wikipedia to support their help pages.

Just another random thought for the day.

Answer 1

Wikipedia, which is run by the Wikimedia Foundation, uses wiki software called "MediaWiki". MediaWiki is developed in-house by the Wikimedia Foundation developers, but is released as open source software.



Anyone can download the software (from < http://www.mediawiki.org >) and run their own copy. In fact, if you can configure your computer to work as a web server with PHP and MySQL, you can have your own personal wiki on your computer! The default skin, "Monobook", is used by Wikipedia, so other sites might look reminiscent of Wikipedia when they use the Monobook skin. (This might eventually change; a new skin is in the works that's better, see it e.g. at < http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Plutonium&useskin=vector >)



To summarize the explanation: the software companies aren't using Wikipedia for their wikis, but they are using Wikipedia's software.

Answer 2

You were correct to assume that these places are just using the term "Wiki" and the standard "Wiki Layout."



Most companies are building their own "Wiki" to address FAQ's and to allow access to public information. People can also create websites that use the "wiki layout" for their web communities and personal websites. A good example of these would be:



http://encyclopediadramatica.com/Main_Page



or WoW Wiki (for World of Warcraft)

Answer 3

They use the same software on their server that Wikipedia does. The "MediaWiki" software.



http://mediawiki.org/