Help:Testing
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Testing new software
A new version of the software is usually first installed on http://test.wikipedia.org/. This allows developers and potential users to test it.
Testing features of existing software on the test project
An advantage is that is does not interfere with, or clutter, the regular projects; disadvantage is that differences in the software may interfere with the test; e.g., error messages may be shown, or the tested features work differently. Also, the project may be reset, or history may otherwise be lost, so one has to save elsewhere what one wants to keep.
Testing features of existing software on one of the regular projects
This applies anyway for tests that depend on settings which are different per project, such as:
- interlanguage links (software feature)
- case-sensitivity of the first character
- character encoding
- enabling of embedding images in other projects and images outside Wikimedia
- MediaWiki:Monobook.css, etc.
- any test depending on other content, which is not copied onto the test project, or on namespace prefixes, etc.
It can be done:
- in special pages such as en:Wikipedia:Sandbox
- on user pages and subpages
- using Preview - this can not be used to test how a change in a page affects another page, such as when changing a template; when used to test automatic conversion of wikitext it only shows the rendered webpage, not the new wikitext itself, except for automatic conversion of special characters to their decimal numeric codes.
A test involving variable {{PAGENAME}}, e.g. a link to an image or another page with a name containing {{PAGENAME}}, can be done on the Talk page, since the value of the variable is the same on that page.
Sysops testing the available links and how things work for ordinary logged-in users, can log in under another name, or in a project for which they are not a sysop.