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Removing permissions for the History page

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meghan.mahar at appian

Jul 18, 2012, 12:24 PM

Post #1 of 6 (147 views)
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Removing permissions for the History page

I currently have a set of internal users for our wiki that have
Administrator access. I also have a set of external users (our customers)
that can only read pages and create discussion pages.

I would like to remove the permission from our customers that allows them
to access the History tab. I looked into the
Extension:GroupPermissionsManager, but we use PHP 5.3.1 and we plan on
upgrading to Mediawiki 1.19 soon, so that doesn't work.

Is there an alternative you recommend? I have removed the history tab from
our CSS, but users could still access the direct url of the history page if
they wanted. I would like a resolution that denies them access, but still
allows myself and other admins to access it.

Thank you,

--
**
*Meghan Mahar*

Technical Writer

Appian Corporation <http://www.appian.com/> | 1875 Explorer Street, 4th
Floor | Reston, VA 20190
T: 703.442.8844 | C: 703.609.0306 | *meghan.mahar [at] appian*
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brion at pobox

Jul 19, 2012, 10:19 AM

Post #2 of 6 (134 views)
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Re: Removing permissions for the History page [In reply to]

On Wed, Jul 18, 2012 at 12:24 PM, Meghan Mahar <meghan.mahar [at] appian>wrote:

> I currently have a set of internal users for our wiki that have
> Administrator access. I also have a set of external users (our customers)
> that can only read pages and create discussion pages.
>
> I would like to remove the permission from our customers that allows them
> to access the History tab. I looked into the
> Extension:GroupPermissionsManager, but we use PHP 5.3.1 and we plan on
> upgrading to Mediawiki 1.19 soon, so that doesn't work.
>
> Is there an alternative you recommend? I have removed the history tab from
> our CSS, but users could still access the direct url of the history page if
> they wanted. I would like a resolution that denies them access, but still
> allows myself and other admins to access it.
>

Unfortunately for your case, read access to the wiki grants permission to
both current and old revisions -- it's simply assumed throughout the
system. I don't think there's really a good way to actually prevent access
to old revisions.

You might be able to track down all the output systems and disable them
though:

* action=view w/ oldid
* action=raw w/ oldid
* action=history
* API
* Special:Export

-- brion
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datzrott at alizeepathology

Jul 19, 2012, 10:25 AM

Post #3 of 6 (137 views)
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Re: Removing permissions for the History page [In reply to]

>Unfortunately for your case, read access to the wiki grants permission to
both
>current and old revisions -- it's simply assumed throughout the system. I
don't
>think there's really a good way to actually prevent access to old
revisions.
>
>You might be able to track down all the output systems and disable them
>though:
>
>* action=view w/ oldid
>* action=raw w/ oldid
>* action=history
>* API
>* Special:Export
>
>-- brion

Alternatively he could hunt down every spot that MediaWiki checks for a
"Read" permission and change it to check for a new "History" if needed.
Probably a bit (read lots) more difficult to do than just disabling the
history pages, but well worth the effort in your case.

Thank you,
Derric Atzrott

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agarrett at wikimedia

Jul 19, 2012, 10:34 AM

Post #4 of 6 (134 views)
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Re: Removing permissions for the History page [In reply to]

On Thu, Jul 19, 2012 at 10:19 AM, Brion Vibber <brion [at] pobox> wrote:

> On Wed, Jul 18, 2012 at 12:24 PM, Meghan Mahar <meghan.mahar [at] appian
> >wrote:
> Unfortunately for your case, read access to the wiki grants permission to
> both current and old revisions -- it's simply assumed throughout the
> system. I don't think there's really a good way to actually prevent access
> to old revisions.
>

We already have per-revision access restrictions. He can look at patching
Revision::userCan.

--
Andrew Garrett
Wikimedia Foundation
agarrett [at] wikimedia
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agarrett at wikimedia

Jul 19, 2012, 10:40 AM

Post #5 of 6 (137 views)
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Re: Removing permissions for the History page [In reply to]

On Thu, Jul 19, 2012 at 10:34 AM, Andrew Garrett <agarrett [at] wikimedia>wrote:

> On Thu, Jul 19, 2012 at 10:19 AM, Brion Vibber <brion [at] pobox> wrote:
>
>> On Wed, Jul 18, 2012 at 12:24 PM, Meghan Mahar <meghan.mahar [at] appian
>> >wrote:
>> Unfortunately for your case, read access to the wiki grants permission to
>> both current and old revisions -- it's simply assumed throughout the
>> system. I don't think there's really a good way to actually prevent access
>> to old revisions.
>>
>
> We already have per-revision access restrictions. He can look at patching
> Revision::userCan.
>

� and of course I've copied other people's pronouns without looking at the
name of the person I'm speaking to. For "He", read "She". My apologies.

--
Andrew Garrett
Wikimedia Foundation
agarrett [at] wikimedia
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datzrott at alizeepathology

Jul 19, 2012, 10:57 AM

Post #6 of 6 (136 views)
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Re: Removing permissions for the History page [In reply to]

>. and of course I've copied other people's pronouns without looking at
>the name of the person I'm speaking to. For "He", read "She". My apologies.

Yeah... sorry about that earlier. I usually don't pay much attention to the
names. I look at the first and last letter of the name to identify their
place in the conversation, and that is generally it. Helps me read things
faster and gives me less to keep track of. Unfortunately it does sometimes
lead to problems like this. It's much worse when two people with similar
looking names end up in a conversation.

My Apologies,
Derric Atzrott

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