Join the Discussion Regarding MediaWiki's Minimum PHP Support

by Chris Koerner on 21 July 2015 16:59 (EDT)

Tags:	Core, PHP, Support, Upgrading

There's a great discussion on the wikitech-l mailing list discussing a change in the latest build of MediaWiki that drops support for PHP 5.3.3.

From Brain Wolff, the originator of the discussion,

"According to our docs/internal checks, our min php version is 5.3.3. However as of 6e283d394f31, MediaWiki doesn't work with php 5.3.3 (You aren't allowed to implement an interface using an abstract method, on that version of PHP so you get "Fatal error: Can't inherit abstract function IDatabase::getType() (previously declared abstract in DatabaseBase) in git/includes/db/Database.php on line 32").

Is it time we up'd our version requirements (And does anyone know if that would affect lots of third parties?) Or should that change be reverted?"

It's a great discussion with multiple angles.

David Gerard notes,

"I recall this has been the conclusion reached on this list previously - that this will cause problems for MW out in the world, and gain it an unwarranted reputation for insecurity as un-upgradeable installations get pwned. Thus, if newer MW still supports older PHP, this results in less pwned MW. The balance is up to you, of course."

I know that a few installs of Linux (like Red Hat) come bundled with what are now older version of PHP. Does an update to the minim version of PHP impact your use of MediaWiki? Join the discussion here:

http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.science.linguistics.wikipedia.technical/83348