Extension:AjaxComments

MediaWiki extensions manual

AjaxComments Release status: stable
Implementation	User interface
Description	Replace Talk page functionality with comments at the bottom of the page.
Author(s)	Aran Dunkley, Igor Absorto
Latest version	2.9.0
MediaWiki
License	GNU General Public License 2.0 or later
Download	GitLab: project page git repository URL [help ] commit history Note: No localisation updates are provided by translatewiki.net .
Parameters $AjaxCommentsLikeDislike $AjaxCommentsLikeDislike $AjaxCommentsPollServer $AjaxCommentsEmailNotify $AjaxCommentsAdmins
Hooks used ArticleViewHeader UserGetRights BeforePageDisplay MakeGlobalVariablesScript
Hooks provided AjaxCommentsCheckTitle AjaxCommentsCheckWritable AjaxCommentsChange

The AjaxComments extension replaces the Talk page functionality with comments at the bottom of the page.

Installation

• Download (Use the REL1_35 branch for version 1.35) and place the file(s) in a directory called AjaxComments in your extensions/ folder.
• Add the following code at the bottom of your LocalSettings.php :

  wfLoadExtension( 'AjaxComments' );
  

• Run the update script which will automatically create the necessary database tables that this extension needs.
• Configure as required.
•  Done – Navigate to Special:Version on your wiki to verify that the extension is successfully installed.

Usage

This extension replaces the normal MediaWiki talk page functionality by allowing comments to be added at the bottom of the page or replies made to existing comments. Authors can edit or delete any of their comments as long as no replies have been made to them, and sysops can edit or delete any comments at all (deleting a comment with replies will also remove all the replies). The system is mainly JavaScript and jQuery and all updates are done via Ajax. The discussion data is stored in a new table named ajaxcomments and has the following structure.

MariaDB [-]> DESCRIBE ajaxcomments;
+-----------+------------------+------+-----+---------+----------------+
| Field     | Type             | Null | Key | Default | Extra          |
+-----------+------------------+------+-----+---------+----------------+
| ac_id     | int(10) unsigned | NO   | PRI | NULL    | auto_increment |
| ac_type   | int(10) unsigned | NO   |     | NULL    |                |
| ac_parent | int(10) unsigned | YES  |     | NULL    |                |
| ac_user   | int(10) unsigned | YES  |     | NULL    |                |
| ac_page   | int(10) unsigned | YES  |     | NULL    |                |
| ac_time   | int(10) unsigned | YES  |     | NULL    |                |
| ac_data   | text             | YES  |     | NULL    |                |
+-----------+------------------+------+-----+---------+----------------+
7 rows in set (0.134 sec)

To learn more about the project history, please see https://organicdesign.nz/AjaxComments for historical info.

Configuration

Here are some global variables which affect the operation of the extension. These should be set in your LocalSettings file after the extension is registered.

Variable	Default value	Meaning
$AjaxCommentsLikeDislike	false	Add a like/dislike link to each comment
$AjaxCommentsAvatars	true	Use the Gravatar service for users icons
$AjaxCommentsPollServer	0	Poll the server to see if any changes to comments have been made and update if so
$AjaxCommentsEmailNotify	true	If set, sends notification of replies and activity on watched pages to users by email
$AjaxCommentsAdmins	sysop	List of groups that have admin priviliges for comments

Hooks

Comments extension adds three hooks, AjaxCommentsCheckTitle, AjaxCommentsCheckWritable and AjaxCommentsChange.

Hook name	When is it called	Parameters
AjaxCommentsCheckTitle	Called when user rights are set. Allows for external conditions to manipulate if comments should be shown in the passed title.	$userpage (page title) &$ret (boolean - whether comments should be shown in a given page, defaults to true)
AjaxCommentsCheckWritable	Just before the content is loaded to allow adding external conditions for whether comments can be added or replied to.	$title (page title) &$canComment (boolean - defaults to true if user is logged in)
AjaxCommentsChange	Called in AjaxComments::add, AjaxComments::reply, and AjaxComments::delete. Called after inserting the comment or reply and before deletion.	$text (either 'add', 'reply', or 'delete') $page (page id) $id (user id)