Foswiki is an

enterprise wiki Enterprise (or the archaic spelling Enterprize) may refer to: Business and economics Brands and enterprises * Enterprise GP Holdings, an energy holding company * Enterprise plc, a UK civil engineering and maintenance company * Enterprise ...

, typically used to run a

collaboration platform Collaborative software or groupware is application software designed to help people working on a common task to attain their goals. One of the earliest definitions of groupware is "intentional group processes plus software to support them". As re ...

knowledge base A knowledge base (KB) is a technology used to store complex structured and unstructured information used by a computer system. The initial use of the term was in connection with expert systems, which were the first knowledge-based systems. Ori ...

document management system A document management system (DMS) is usually a computerized system used to store, share, track and manage files or documents. Some systems include history tracking where a log of the various versions created and modified by different users is r ...

. Users can create

wiki application Wiki software (also known as a wiki engine or a wiki application), is collaborative software that runs a wiki, which allows the users to create and collaboratively edit pages or entries via a web browser. A wiki system is usually a web application ...

s using the Topic Markup Language (TML), and developers can extend its functionality with plugins. The Foswiki project was launched in October 2008 when a dispute about the future direction of

TWiki TWiki is a Perl-based structured wiki application, typically used to run a collaboration platform, knowledge or document management system, a knowledge base, or team portal. Users can create wiki pages using the TWiki Markup Language, and dev ...

could not be settled, resulting in the decision of nearly all key TWiki contributors to fork. Since then the codebases have diverged significantly. However, Foswiki continues to maintain compatibility with content written for TWiki. Foswiki stands for "free and open source" wiki to emphasize its commitment to

open source software Open-source software (OSS) is computer software that is released under a license in which the copyright holder grants users the rights to use, study, change, and distribute the software and its source code to anyone and for any purpose. Open ...

. The project is governed by the

Foswiki Association e.V Foswiki is an enterprise wiki, typically used to run a collaboration platform, knowledge base or document management system. Users can create wiki applications using the Topic Markup Language (TML), and developers can extend its functionality with ...

, a volunteer run,

non-profit foundation A nonprofit organization (NPO) or non-profit organisation, also known as a non-business entity, not-for-profit organization, or nonprofit institution, is a legal entity organized and operated for a collective, public or social benefit, in co ...

. The Foswiki website is seen by some as one of the more popular Perl-related websites based upon Alexa rankings of all websites in the world.

Features

Foswiki features an

open architecture Open architecture is a type of computer architecture or software architecture intended to make adding, upgrading, and swapping components with other computers easy. For example, the IBM PC, Amiga 500 and Apple IIe have an open architecture support ...

programmed and implemented in the

Perl Perl is a family of two high-level, general-purpose, interpreted, dynamic programming languages. "Perl" refers to Perl 5, but from 2000 to 2019 it also referred to its redesigned "sister language", Perl 6, before the latter's name was offici ...

and

JavaScript JavaScript (), often abbreviated as JS, is a programming language that is one of the core technologies of the World Wide Web, alongside HTML and CSS. As of 2022, 98% of Website, websites use JavaScript on the Client (computing), client side ...

languages and runs on standard web servers such as

Apache The Apache () are a group of culturally related Native American tribes in the Southwestern United States, which include the Chiricahua, Jicarilla, Lipan, Mescalero, Mimbreño, Ndendahe (Bedonkohe or Mogollon and Nednhi or Carrizaleño an ...

Nginx Nginx (pronounced "engine x" ) is a web server that can also be used as a reverse proxy, load balancer, mail proxy and HTTP cache. The software was created by Igor Sysoev and publicly released in 2004. Nginx is free and open-source software ...

and

lighttpd lighttpd (pronounced "lighty") is an open-source web server optimized for speed-critical environments while remaining standards-compliant, secure and flexible. It was originally written by Jan Kneschke as a proof-of-concept of the c10k problem � ...

. With almost 70 contributors providing over 56,000 commits since its inception, the Foswiki team not only develops the code but also offers on-line support, including on

IRC Internet Relay Chat (IRC) is a text-based chat system for instant messaging. IRC is designed for group communication in discussion forums, called '' channels'', but also allows one-on-one communication via private messages as well as chat an ...

. Core features include a

TinyMCE TinyMCE is an online rich-text editor released as open-source software under the MIT License. It has the ability to convert HTML text area fields or other HTML elements to editor instances. TinyMCE is designed to easily integrate with JavaScript l ...

WYSIWYG In computing, WYSIWYG ( ), an acronym for What You See Is What You Get, is a system in which editing software allows content to be edited in a form that resembles its appearance when printed or displayed as a finished product, such as a printed d ...

editor, built-in search engine, default text database, and skinnable user interface, as well as

RSS RSS ( RDF Site Summary or Really Simple Syndication) is a web feed that allows users and applications to access updates to websites in a standardized, computer-readable format. Subscribing to RSS feeds can allow a user to keep track of many di ...

Atom Every atom is composed of a nucleus and one or more electrons bound to the nucleus. The nucleus is made of one or more protons and a number of neutrons. Only the most common variety of hydrogen has no neutrons. Every solid, liquid, gas, and ...

feeds, e-mail support, and database interfaces to support scalable database solutions such as

MongoDB MongoDB is a source-available cross-platform document-oriented database program. Classified as a NoSQL database program, MongoDB uses JSON-like documents with optional schemas. MongoDB is developed by MongoDB Inc. and licensed under the Serve ...

and

MySQL MySQL () is an open-source relational database management system (RDBMS). Its name is a combination of "My", the name of co-founder Michael Widenius's daughter My, and "SQL", the acronym for Structured Query Language. A relational database o ...

. Additional security-related features include an auditable

version control In software engineering, version control (also known as revision control, source control, or source code management) is a class of systems responsible for managing changes to computer programs, documents, large web sites, or other collections o ...

system, user authentication, an access control system,

cross-site request forgery Cross-site request forgery, also known as one-click attack or session riding and abbreviated as CSRF (sometimes pronounced ''sea-surf'') or XSRF, is a type of malicious exploit of a website or web application where unauthorized commands are submitt ...

protection, and improved spam-prevention extensions.

Extensions

Users have contributed over 300 extensions. Most of these extensions have been developed by or for corporate users, and are maintained by developers and users, as documented in the individual extension histories. Extensions have been developed to link into

database In computing, a database is an organized collection of data stored and accessed electronically. Small databases can be stored on a file system, while large databases are hosted on computer clusters or cloud storage. The design of databases sp ...

s, create

chart A chart (sometimes known as a graph) is a graphical representation for data visualization, in which "the data is represented by symbols, such as bars in a bar chart, lines in a line chart, or slices in a pie chart". A chart can represent tabu ...

s, tags, sort tables, write

spreadsheet A spreadsheet is a computer application for computation, organization, analysis and storage of data in tabular form. Spreadsheets were developed as computerized analogs of paper accounting worksheets. The program operates on data entered in cel ...

s, create image gallery and

slideshow A slide show (slideshow) is a presentation of a series of still images ( slides) on a projection screen or electronic display device, typically in a prearranged sequence. The changes may be automatic and at regular intervals or they may be manu ...

s, make

drawing Drawing is a form of visual art in which an artist uses instruments to mark paper or other two-dimensional surface. Drawing instruments include graphite pencils, pen and ink, various kinds of paints, inked brushes, colored pencils, crayons, ...

s, write

blog A blog (a truncation of "weblog") is a discussion or informational website published on the World Wide Web consisting of discrete, often informal diary-style text entries (posts). Posts are typically displayed in reverse chronological order ...

s, plot

graphs Graph may refer to: Mathematics *Graph (discrete mathematics), a structure made of vertices and edges **Graph theory, the study of such graphs and their properties *Graph (topology), a topological space resembling a graph in the sense of discre ...

, interface to many different

authentication Authentication (from ''authentikos'', "real, genuine", from αὐθέντης ''authentes'', "author") is the act of proving an assertion, such as the identity of a computer system user. In contrast with identification, the act of indicati ...

schemes, including

single sign-on Single sign-on (SSO) is an authentication scheme that allows a user to log in with a single ID to any of several related, yet independent, software systems. True single sign-on allows the user to log in once and access services without re-enterin ...

, track

Extreme Programming Extreme programming (XP) is a software development methodology intended to improve software quality and responsiveness to changing customer requirements. As a type of agile software development,"Human Centred Technology Workshop 2006 ", 2006, PD ...

projects, and others.

Application platform

Foswiki is a

structured wiki Wiki software (also known as a wiki engine or a wiki application), is collaborative software that runs a wiki, which allows the users to create and collaboratively edit pages or entries via a web browser. A wiki system is usually a web application ...

that acts as an application platform for web-based applications. Specifically it provides database-like manipulation of fields stored on pages, and offers a SQL-like query language to support the embedding reports in wiki pages. Wiki applications are often called

situational application In computing, a situational application is "good enough" software created for a narrow group of users with a unique set of needs. The application typically (but not always) has a short life span, and is often created within the group where it is us ...

s because they are created ad-hoc by users for very specific needs. For example, users have built Foswiki applications that include call center status boards, to-do lists,

inventory Inventory (American English) or stock (British English) refers to the goods and materials that a business holds for the ultimate goal of resale, production or utilisation. Inventory management is a discipline primarily about specifying the shap ...

systems,

employee handbook An employee handbook, sometimes also known as an employee manual, staff handbook, or company policy manual, is a book given to employees by an employer. The employee handbook can be used to bring together employment and job-related information wh ...

s, bug trackers,

applications, discussion forums, status reports with rollups and more.

User interface

The user interface is customizable through use of templates, themes and

CSS Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) is a style sheet language used for describing the presentation of a document written in a markup language such as HTML or XML (including XML dialects such as SVG, MathML or XHTML). CSS is a cornerstone techno ...

. It includes support for

internationalization In economics, internationalization or internationalisation is the process of increasing involvement of enterprises in international markets, although there is no agreed definition of internationalization. Internationalization is a crucial strateg ...

, with support for multiple character sets, UTF-8 URLs etc. The English user interface has been translated by users into Bulgarian, Chinese, Czech, Danish, Dutch, French, German, Greek, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, Swedish, Turkish and Klingon.

Deployment

Foswiki is expected to be used primarily at the workplace as a

corporate wiki Wiki software (also known as a wiki engine or a wiki application), is collaborative software that runs a wiki, which allows the users to create and collaboratively edit pages or entries via a web browser. A wiki system is usually a web application ...

to coordinate team activities, track projects, implement

workflow A workflow consists of an orchestrated and repeatable pattern of activity, enabled by the systematic organization of resources into processes that transform materials, provide services, or process information. It can be depicted as a sequence of ...

s and as an Intranet Wiki, for example in academia. Foswiki (among other components) was used in several research programs including Data Integration Platform for Systems Biology Collaborations, an interactive data integration platform supporting collaborative research projects, based on Foswiki, Solr/Lucene, and custom helper applications.

Implementation

Foswiki is implemented in Perl and JavaScript (using

jQuery jQuery is a JavaScript library designed to simplify HTML DOM tree traversal and manipulation, as well as event handling, CSS animation, and Ajax. It is free, open-source software using the permissive MIT License. As of Aug 2022, jQuery is used ...

), though it can be used without JavaScript being enabled in the browser. By default, wiki pages are stored on the server in plain text files. Everything, including meta-data such as access control settings, are version controlled using

RCS RCS may refer to: Organisations *Racing Club de Strasbourg Alsace * Radio Corporation of Singapore *Radcliffe Choral Society * Rawmarsh Community School *Red Crescent Society *Red Cross Society * Representation of Czechs and Slovaks, a football t ...

. RCS is optional since an all-Perl version control system is provided. Other server-side databases, such as MongoDB, are supported through use of extensions. Informal user reports suggest that Foswiki scales reasonably well even though it uses plain text files and no

relational database A relational database is a (most commonly digital) database based on the relational model of data, as proposed by E. F. Codd in 1970. A system used to maintain relational databases is a relational database management system (RDBMS). Many relatio ...

to store page data, especially where load balancing and caching are used to improve performance.

Support

Foswiki is an entirely community-driven project, and has no controlling commercial interest behind it. User support is provided by the community, via the mechanisms of

and the main website.

History

Foswiki started life as a fork of the TWiki project. Since the fork it has been worked on continuously by a relatively large development team. Notable developments since the fork include adoption of the jQuery JavaScript user interface framework, interfacing to the MongoDB NoSQL database, interfacing to the

Solr Solr (pronounced "solar") is an open-source enterprise-search platform, written in Java. Its major features include full-text search, hit highlighting, faceted search, real-time indexing, dynamic clustering, database integration, NoSQL features an ...

search system, page caching and a modified editing interface.

References

{{Use mdy dates, date=September 2012 Free software programmed in Perl Free software programmed in JavaScript Free wiki software Enterprise wikis Free content management systems Groupware Cross-platform software