}}{{For|the home 'meta' wiki used for discussion, help, development, and advice regarding use of the actual MediaWiki (MW) software and extensions, <u>and</u> MW software downloads|MediaWiki.org}}
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'''MediaWiki''' ('''MW''') software is the {{tag|Wiki engine|wiki engine}} software package that runs this [[WikiIndex]] wiki site. Originally created, designed, and developed for the then fledgling [[:Category:Wikipedia|Wikipedia]] in {{tag|Founded in 2002|2002}} (though <u>not</u> the [[Nostalgia Wikipedia|original Wikipedia]] wiki engine from [[:Category:Founded in 2001|2001]], that was the [[:Category:Perl|Perl]]-based [[:Category:UseMod Wiki|UseMod Wiki]] software); MediaWiki is now used by the most active and [[Wikis with the most pages|largest wikis]], it is also used extensively, ''and'' exclusively by other {{tag|Wikimedia Foundation}} (WMF) {{WMF-Meta|Wikimedia projects|projects}}; along with many, many other [[:Category:Independent|independently]]-hosted [[:Category:All|wiki sites]]. MediaWiki is also the software of first choice to power many different [[:Category:Free MediaWiki wiki farm|free]] and commercial [[:Category:MediaWiki wiki farm|wiki farms]].