README

MediaWiki extension that allows embedding external content, specified by URL, into your wiki pages.

External Content has been created and is maintained by Professional Wiki.

• Usage
• Installation
• Configuration
• Development
• Release notes

Usage

Embedding external content

External content can be embedded via the #embed parser function. This function takes a URL. Markdown and code syntax highlighting are supported. No additional parameters are needed to render the markdown. To use code syntax highlighting, refer to the parameters below.

Example:

{{#embed:https://example.com/fluffy/kittens.md}}

There is special handling for GitHub URLs, removing the need to provide the raw file URL:

• github.com/org/repo/blob/master/hi.md => raw.githubusercontent.com/org/repo/master/hi.md
• github.com/org/repo/tree/master/src => defaults to README.md in the directory
• github.com/org/repo => defaults to the README.md in the repository root on the master branch

Embedding Bitbucket content

Content from Bitbucket can be embedded via the #bitbucket parser function.

This function takes a URL and includes the following Bitbucket-specific behavior:

• Validation that the URL matches the Bitbucket repository structure
• /browse URLs are automatically turned into /raw URLs
• Pointing to the repository root will automatically retrieve README.md

Example:

{{#bitbucket:https://git.example.com/projects/HI/repos/cats/browse}}
{{#bitbucket:https://git.example.com/projects/HI/repos/cats/raw/README.md?at=refs%2Fheads%2Fmaster}}

Display parameters

Both #embed and #bitbucket can be customized with these parameters:

• lang: (Optional) One of the supported languages. Only necessary if the language is not detected from the file extension.
• lineNumbers: (Optional) Show line numbers.
• showLines: (Optional) Show only specific lines. It can be a single line number or a range separated with a hyphen (-). Multiple line numbers or ranges can be separated by commas.
• render: (Optional) render Markdown (this is the default behavior unless $wgExternalContentRenderMarkdownByDefault is changed)

Examples:

Show Markdown file contents in a code block:

{{#embed:https://example.com/fluffy/kittens.md|lang=markdown}}

Show code block with line numbers:

{{#embed:https://example.com/fluffy/kittens.php|lang=php|line}}

Show only specific lines in a code block:

{{#embed:https://example.com/fluffy/kittens.php|lang=php|showLines=1-3,8}}

Render file as Markdown:

{{#embed:https://example.com/fluffy/kittens.php|render}}

Refreshing external content

To refresh all the pages containing one of the parser functions added by this extension, run

php extensions/ExternalContent/maintenance/RefreshExternalContent.php

Parameters: none

Installation

Platform requirements:

• PHP 8.0 or later (tested up to 8.3)
• MediaWiki 1.39 or later (tested up to 1.43 and master)

The recommended way to install External Content is using Composer with MediaWiki's built-in support for Composer.

On the commandline, go to your wikis root directory. Then run these two commands:

COMPOSER=composer.local.json composer require --no-update professional-wiki/external-content:~3.0

composer update professional-wiki/external-content --no-dev -o

Then enable the extension by adding the following to the bottom of your wikis LocalSettings.php file:

wfLoadExtension( 'ExternalContent' );

You can verify the extension was enabled successfully by opening your wiki's Special:Version page in your browser.

Configuration

Configuration can be changed via LocalSettings.php.

Rendering markdown

By default, markdown is rendered rather than shown in a code block.

Variable: $wgExternalContentRenderMarkdownByDefault

Default: true - markdown is rendered (unless otherwise specified by the user)

Example: false - markdown is shown as a code block (unless otherwise specified by the user)

Domain whitelist

List of allowed domains to embed content from. Leave empty to have no restriction.

Variable: $wgExternalContentDomainWhitelist

Default: []

Example: [ 'git.example.com', 'another.example.com' ]

File extension whitelist

List of allowed file extensions. Leave empty to have no restriction.

Variable: $wgExternalContentFileExtensionWhitelist

Default: []

Example: [ 'md', 'txt' ]

Caution: The extension currently only supports markdown: any retrieved file content will be rendered ask markdown.

Enable embed function

If the #embed parser function should be enabled.

Variable: $wgExternalContentEnableEmbedFunction

Default: true

Example: false - disables the #embed parser function

Enable bitbucket function

If the #bitbucket parser function should be enabled.

Variable: $wgExternalContentEnableBitbucketFunction

Default: true

Example: false - disables the #bitbucket parser function

Basic Auth credentials

Per-domain Basic Auth credentials.

Variable: $wgExternalContentBasicAuthCredentials

Default: []

Example:

$wgExternalContentBasicAuthCredentials = [
	'git.example.com' => [ 'ExampleUser', 'ExamplePassword' ],
	'another.example.com' => [ getenv( 'BITBUCKET_USER' ), getenv( 'BITBUCKET_PASSWORD' ) ]
];

The above example shows how you can get credentials from ENV vars, which might be preferred over storing them as plaintext in LocalSettings.php.

Connection details

The content of files is fetched via MediaWiki's native HTTP client. This process is affected by various HTTP client variables.

Search

In stock MediaWiki with no extensions, embedded content is not searchable. To make embedded content show up in search results, install Elasticseach and the CirrusSearch extension.

Development

To ensure the dev dependencies get installed, have this in your composer.local.json:

{
	"require": {
		"vimeo/psalm": "^4.10",
		"phpstan/phpstan": "^0.12.99"
	},
	"extra": {
		"merge-plugin": {
			"include": [
				"extensions/ExternalContent/composer.json"
			]
		}
	}
}

Running tests and CI checks

You can use the Makefile by running make commands in the ExternalContent directory.

• make ci: Run everything
• make test: Run all tests
• make cs: Run all style checks and static analysis

Alternatively, you can execute commands from the MediaWiki root directory:

• PHPUnit: php tests/phpunit/phpunit.php -c extensions/ExternalContent/
• Style checks: vendor/bin/phpcs -p -s --standard=extensions/ExternalContent/phpcs.xml
• PHPStan: vendor/bin/phpstan analyse --configuration=extensions/ExternalContent/phpstan.neon --memory-limit=2G
• Psalm: php vendor/bin/psalm --config=extensions/ExternalContent/psalm.xml

Release notes

Version 3.0.1 - 2025-04-06

• Fixed compatibility with MediaWiki 1.43 and above (IDatabase TypeError)

Version 3.0.0 - 2025-04-04

• Raised minimum MediaWiki version from 1.35 to 1.39
• Added support for MediaWiki 1.40, 1.41, 1.42, and 1.43
• Translation updates

Version 2.0.1 - 2023-11-02

• Fixed behavior of the copy button for code blocks with line numbers and/or only specific lines shown
• Improved display of long lines in code blocks by adding line wrapping

Version 2.0.0 - 2023-10-30

• Raised minimum PHP version from 7.4 to 8.0
• Added code syntax highlighting
  • Added lang parameter
  • Added lineNumbers parameter
  • Added showLines parameter
  • Added render parameter
  • Added copy button to code blocks
  • Added edit link to Bitbucket code blocks

Version 1.3.0 - 2022-01-08

• Improved handling of relative links. They now point to the "browse" version when embedding using a "browse" URL, rather than using the "raw" version.

Version 1.2.0 - 2021-12-02

• Added support for extended syntax markdown

Version 1.1.0 - 2021-11-01

• Added normalization for github.com URLs to the #embed parser function

Version 1.0.0 - 2021-09-30

Initial release for MediaWiki 1.35+ with these features:

• Embedding of markdown files via #embed parser function
• Special support for Bitbucket URLs via the #bitbucket parser function
• Restricting of source domains via the $wgExternalContentDomainWhitelist setting
• Restricting of file extensions via the $wgExternalContentDomainWhitelist setting
• Support for Basic Auth via the $wgExternalContentBasicAuthCredentials setting
• Ability to turn off #embed via the $wgExternalContentEnableEmbedFunction setting
• Ability to turn off #bitbucket via the $wgExternalContentEnableBitbucketFunction setting
• Ability to refresh all embedded content via the RefreshExternalContent.php maintenance script
• Ability to view pages with embedded content via the Pages with external content category
• Ability to view pages with broken embedded content via the Pages with broken external content category