Foswiki Site-Level Preferences

This topic defines site-level settings that apply to all users and webs on this site.

Default Web Preferences

• Web-specific background color: (is overwritten by web preferences)
  • Set WEBBGCOLOR = #FFD8AA

• favicon: Attach a favicon.ico to a web's Web Preferences or add a FAVICON setting to Web Preferences
  • Set FAVICON = /pub/System/ProjectLogos/favicon.ico

• Image, URL and alternate tooltip text of web's logo.
  • Set WEBLOGOIMG =
  • Set WEBLOGOURL = https://thedatamine.co.uk/Users/WebHome
  • Set WEBLOGOALT = Powered by Foswiki, The Free and Open Source Wiki

• List this web in the Site Map:
  • If yes, set SITEMAPLIST to on, do not set NOSEARCHALL, and add the "what" and "use to..." description for the site map. Make sure to list only links that include the name of the web, e.g. System.Topic links.
  • Set SITEMAPLIST = on
  • Set WEBSUMMARY =

• Copyright notice:
  • Set WEBCOPYRIGHT = Copyright © by the contributing authors. All material on this collaboration platform is the property of the contributing authors.
    Ideas, requests, problems regarding Foswiki? Send feedback

• Simplified Copyright notice for the Web Rss feed (don't use any special characters, html tags, entities, wiki markup or Wiki Words)
  • Set WEBRSSCOPYRIGHT = Copyright 2024 by contributing authors

• Exclude web from a web="all" search: (Set to on for hidden webs; is overwritten by web preferences) Note it is much better to use AccessControls in individual webs to control who can and can't view the contents of a web. NOSEARCHALL is retained for compatibility, but you should avoid using it.
  • Set NOSEARCHALL =
• Prevent automatic linking of WikiWords and acronyms (if set to on); link WikiWords (if empty); can be overwritten by web preferences:
  • Set NOAUTOLINK =
  • Note: Use the [[...][...]] syntax to link topics in case you disabled WikiWord linking. The <noautolink> ... </noautolink> syntax can be used to prevents links within a block of text.

• Warn if %INCLUDE{}% of topic fails: Fail silently if empty or off. Output warning message (defined in templates/oopsalerts.tmpl) if set to on. Otherwise output specific text (use $topic for topic). You can override this in web preferences, or by using a warn="..." parameter with %INCLUDE{}% :
  • Set INCLUDEWARNING = on

• Generated Table of Contents (TOC) settings
  • The first header level to appear in the TOC:
    • Set TOC_MIN_DEPTH =
      • If not set: 1
      • Possible values: 1 to 6
  • The last header level to appear in the TOC:
    • Set TOC_MAX_DEPTH =
      • If not set: 6
      • Possible values: 1 to 6
      • Can be overridden by depth parameter of TOC
  • The default TOC title:
    • Set TOC_TITLE =
      • If not set: nothing
      • Possible values: any string, for example On this page:
      • Can be overridden by title parameter of TOC
  • Do not show a TOC if the topic it contains is included in another topic:
    • Set TOC_HIDE_IF_INCLUDED =
      • If not set: included TOC is shown
      • Possible values: on or nothing

Default User Settings

• Show tool-tip topic info on mouse-over of Wiki Word links. Setting can be on, off, or customized. An empty setting or off setting disables the tool-tips (for better performance). The setting can contain $summary to show the topic summary, $date for the last change date, $rev for the revision, $username for the login name of the last editor, $wikiname for the WikiName, $wikiusername for Users.WikiName, $topic for the topic name, and $web for the web name
  • Set LINKTOOLTIPINFO = off
  • #Set LINKTOOLTIPINFO = $username - $date - r$rev: $summary
    • This is exactly equivalent to:
  • #Set LINKTOOLTIPINFO = on

• Style of text edit box. Set to width: 99% for full window width (default; this will override the EDITBOXWIDTH setting), or width: auto to disable. This setting works for IE and some other recent browsers. (can be overwritten by user preferences)
  • Set EDITBOXSTYLE = width:99%

• Style of the user signature
  • Set SIGNATUREFORMAT = -- Wiki Guest - 01 Nov 2024

• Default state of the Force New Revision check box in preview. Check box is initially checked if Set FORCENEWREVISIONCHECKBOX = checked="checked", or unchecked if empty: (can be overwritten by user preferences)
  • Set FORCENEWREVISIONCHECKBOX =

• Default state of the Minor Changes, Don't Notify check box in preview. Check box is initially checked if Set DONTNOTIFYCHECKBOX = checked="checked", or unchecked if empty: (can be overwritten by user preferences)
  • Set DONTNOTIFYCHECKBOX =

• Default state of the link check box in the attach file page. Checkbox is initially checked if Set ATTACHLINKBOX = checked="checked", or unchecked if empty (Set ATTACHLINKBOX =). If checked, a link is created to the attached file at the end of the topic: (can be overwritten by user preferences)
  • Set ATTACHLINKBOX =

• Format of file link when the link check box is checked: (can be overwritten by user preferences)
  NOTE: Keyword $filename gets expanded to filename; $fileurl gets expanded to the urlencoded filename; $comment to comment; \t to tab (3 spaces for bullets).

        * Set ATTACHEDFILELINKFORMAT = \n   * [[%ATTACHURL%/$fileurl][$filename]]: $comment
  

• Format of images when the link check box is checked: (can be overwritten by user preferences)
  NOTE: Keyword $filename gets expanded to filename; $fileurl gets expanded to the urlencoded filename; $comment to comment; $size to width="..." height="..." attribute of img tag; \t to tab and \n to linefeed (3 spaces for bullets).

        * Set ATTACHEDIMAGEFORMAT = \n   * $comment: <br />\n     <img src="%ATTACHURLPATH%/$fileurl" alt="$filename" $size />
  

Platform Settings

• Site name:
  • Set WIKITOOLNAME = Foswiki

• Image, URL and alternate tooltip text of the logo for this installation: you should change these settings for your site, or they can be overwridden in WebPreferences for individual webs by defining these settings there.
  • Set WIKILOGOIMG =
  • Set WIKILOGOURL = https://thedatamine.co.uk/Users/WebHome
  • Set WIKILOGOALT = Powered by Foswiki, The Free and Open Source Wiki

• Home page of this site
  • Set WIKIHOMEURL = /

• List of Foswiki webs - on the first line of the upper toolbar (to add a new web, see Managing Webs and Site Map):
  • Set WIKIWEBLIST = Users  |  System  |  Sandbox
  • NOTE: To automatically list all non-hidden webs in alphabetical order, use the %WEBLIST{}% macro instead:
    Events | Misc | Organizations | Sandbox | Software | System | Users

• Maximum size of File Attachments in KB, 0 for no limit:
  • Set ATTACHFILESIZELIMIT = 10000

• Broadcast message for skins supporting a %BROADCASTMESSAGE% at the top of the page: (IMPORTANT: Set to empty message if not used; #Comment out unused messages)
  • Set BROADCASTMESSAGE =
  • #Set BROADCASTMESSAGE = NOTE: Edit and Attach will be disabled today between 05:00 PM and 06:00 PM PDT (00:00 to 01:00 GMT) for a scheduled Foswiki maintenance.
  • Note: if you need to block all user access (view included) the easiest way it to change the configure AccessControl option to AdminOnlyAccess (see the Security and Authentication section)

• Users or groups allowed to create new top-level webs: (ex: Web Creators Group). If set to nothing, only administrators will be able to do this.
  • Set ALLOWROOTCHANGE = Admin Group

Search Settings

• Default type for search bin script, one of: keyword (for search engine like syntax), regex (for Regular Expression search), or literal (for verbatim search). It does not influence the default for the Web Search
  • Set SEARCHDEFAULTTTYPE = keyword
• Default for %SEARCH{}% macro, one of: keyword, regex, or literal
  • Set SEARCHVARDEFAULTTYPE = literal
• Stop words, e.g., common words and characters to exclude from a keyword search:
  • Set SEARCHSTOPWORDS = a, all, am, an, and, any, as, at, b, be, by, c, d, e, for, from, g, h, how, i, i'm, i.e., in, is, isn't, it, it's, its, j, k, l, m, n, o, of, on, or, p, q, r, s, t, that, that's, the, this, to, u, v, w, was, wasn't, what, what's, when, where, who, who's, will, with, x, y, z
• Default page size for Index topics - such as Web Index, Web Search
  • Set DEFAULTPAGESIZE = 50

E-mail Settings

• 'Mail this topic' mailto: link - can be included in topics, templates or skins
  • Set MAILTHISTOPIC = Send a link to this page

• 'Mail this topic' link text
  • Set MAILTHISTOPICTEXT = Send a link to this page

• URL for current topic
  • Shortcut TOPICURL -- absolute URL for the current topic
  • Set TOPICURL = https://thedatamine.co.uk/System/DefaultPreferences

Registration configuration options

Add user to group during registration

Note, this feature also must be enabled on the User Registration page by adding extraField_groups to the optionalFields section. See User Authentication#Custom registration page for more information.

• Group type settings during registration:
  • automatic: users will be automatically added to eligible groups
  • one: users can select one of the groups
  • multiple: users can select from multiple groups to join
  • none: user cannot be added to groups while registering
• Set REGISTRATIONGROUPTYPE = none

• If REGISTRATIONGROUPS is set to a comma separated list of groups, only those listed groups will be shown in the User Registration form. If it is unset, then group change permissions will be used to create the list of groups eligible for selection during registration. (When using "self-registration" by guest users, the RegistrationAgent's permissions are used. If the registration is entered by another logged in user, that user's permissions are used).
  • #Set REGISTRATIONGROUPS =

• Implementation Notes:
  • If the Registration Agent or logged in user does not have permission to change one of the listed groups, then that group will be silently skipped. The user will not be added to the group.
  • Group permissions are stored in Topic Settings, not inline in the group topic. Edit the Group Topic Settings to change permissions.

Change of Password Message

• If password management is not handled by Foswiki, this message will be displayed on Change Password and Reset Password. If email is disabled, it will also be displayed on Reset Password. Replace this generic text with a reference to how to change or reset password within your organisation.
  • Set CHANGEPASSWORDDISABLEDMESSAGE = Resetting and setting password is not available.

HTTP-EQUIV Settings

• NOTE: The current values of these preferences are not displayed in view mode (values are <link>-tags).

• http-equiv meta tags for view, rdiff, attach, search* scripts:
  • #Set HTTP_EQUIV_ON_VIEW =
  • Set HTTP_EQUIV_ON_VIEW =

• http-equiv meta tags for edit script:
  • Set HTTP_EQUIV_ON_EDIT =

• http-equiv meta tags for preview script:
  • Set HTTP_EQUIV_ON_PREVIEW =

Extension Settings

• Skin overriding the default templates: (can be overwritten by Web Preferences and user preferences)
  • Set SKIN = natedit,pattern

• Note: See Skin Browser for currently installed skins

JQuery

• List of Foswiki preferences, the values of which are made available through the foswiki.getPreference() javascript function. Note: Plugin authors can extend this list in their initPlugin using the following simple code fragment. Say you want to add 'MYPREF' to the list:

      my $pref = Foswiki::Func::getPreferencesValue('EXPORTEDPREFERENCES')||'';
      my @list = split(/[,\s]+/, $pref);
      unless (grep { /^MYPREF$/ } @list) {
          push(@list, 'MYPREF');
      }
      Foswiki::Func::setPreferencesValue(
          'EXPORTEDPREFERENCES', join(',', @list));
      

• Set EXPORTEDPREFERENCES = PUBURL, PUBURLPATH, SCRIPTSUFFIX, SCRIPTURL, SCRIPTURLPATH, SERVERTIME, SKIN, SYSTEMWEB, TOPIC, USERNAME, USERSWEB, WEB, WIKINAME, WIKIUSERNAME, NAMEFILTER

Pattern Skin

• Global skin styles. To change the look of the site, point these variables to custom CSS attachments.
  • Set FOSWIKI_LAYOUT_URL = /pub/System/PatternSkinTheme/layout.css
  • Set FOSWIKI_STYLE_URL = /pub/System/PatternSkinTheme/style.css
  • Set FOSWIKI_COLORS_URL = /pub/System/PatternSkinTheme/colors.css

• Themes that add upon the global skin styles. See the Theme Browser in Pattern Skin.
  • Set PATTERNSKIN_JQUERY_THEME = Pattern Skin Theme
  • Set PATTERNSKIN_THEME_VARIANT = /pub/System/PatternSkinTheme/variant_foswiki_noframe.css
  • Set PATTERNSKIN_COLUMNS = /pub/System/PatternSkinTheme/column_left.css
  • #Set PATTERNSKIN_NAVIGATION_TOPIC = Pattern Skin Horizontal Navigation Example
• Deprecated (use PATTERNSKIN_THEME_VARIANT):
  • Set PATTERNSKIN_THEME = /pub/System/PatternSkinTheme/variant_foswiki_noframe.css

• Overriding styles that add upon the global and theme styles. Enabled by default but empty to prevent browsers from fetching %USERLAYOUTURL%-style URLs.
  • Set USERLAYOUTURL =
  • Set USERSTYLEURL =
  • Set USERCOLORSURL =

• Top bar background image and color
  • Set WEBHEADERART = /pub/System/PatternSkin/header5.gif
  • Set WEBHEADERBGCOLOR = #ffffff

Skin icons

• Topic containing the icon graphics library. Icons can easily be rendered with %ICON{name}%.
  • Set ICONTOPIC = Document Graphics
  • to use the Foswiki 1.0 iconset, set the ICONTOPIC to Document Graphics

Tiny MCEPlugin

• Topic containing a section named INIT which will hold the default initialisation parameters for the TinyMCE editor.
  • #Set TINYMCEPLUGIN_INIT_TOPIC = Tiny MCEPlugin
    Not set in this topic, the plugin assumes this value if missing

Twisty Plugin

• Show/hide animation speed: 'fast', 'slow', or integer milliseconds | 0 (no animation)
  • Set TWISTYPLUGIN_TWISTYANIMATIONSPEED = fast

Legacy support

• Support for legacy "EDITTOPIC", used to be hard-coded, now replaced by TMPL:P conditional instantiation
  • Set EDITURL = /bin/edit/System/DefaultPreferences?t=1730428171
  • Set EDITTOPIC = Edit
• Support for MAINWEB which is often used in older legacy webs that have been upgraded to Foswiki
  • Set MAINWEB = Users

Plugins Settings

• You can enable/disable Plugins using the configure interface.
• You can also disable installed plugins in individual webs/topics by defining the DISABLEDPLUGINS preference setting to be a list of plugins to disable e.g.
  • Set DISABLEDPLUGINS = Spread Sheet Plugin,EditTablePlugin
  • Currently, %DISABLEDPLUGINS% is set to "%DISABLEDPLUGINS%"
• Currently activated Plugins: Spread Sheet Plugin, Slide Show Plugin, Auto View Template Plugin, Comment Plugin, Compare Revisions Addon Plugin, Configure Plugin, Edit Row Plugin, History Plugin, Home Page Plugin, Interwiki Plugin, J Query Plugin, Mailer Contrib Plugin, Nat Edit Plugin, Preferences Plugin, Render List Plugin, Smilies Plugin, Spaced Wiki Word Plugin, Subscribe Plugin, Table Plugin, Tiny MCEPlugin, Twisty Plugin, Updates Plugin, Wysiwyg Plugin

• Detailed diagnostics can be found in Installed Plugins
• Legacy settings:
  • Set INSTALLEDPLUGINS = The INSTALLEDPLUGINS macro is no longer supported. You can set the Plugins execution order using the configure interface.

Rendering Shortcuts Settings

• Line break: Note that the setting has an intentional trailing space
  • Shortcut BR -- line break
  • Set BR =
    

• Clear floats:
  • Shortcut CLEAR -- clear floats
  • Set CLEAR =

• Bullet sign:
  • Shortcut BULLET -- •
  • Set BULLET = •

• Vertical bar / pipe symbol:
  • Shortcut VBAR -- |
  • Set VBAR = |

• Vertical caret symbol:
  • Shortcut CARET -- ^
  • Set CARET = ^

• Line break and bullet with different levels of indentation:
  • Shortcut BB -- line break and bullet
  • Set BB =
    •
  • Shortcut BB2 -- line break and bullet
  • Set BB2 =
      •
  • Shortcut BB3 -- line break and bullet
  • Set BB3 =
        •
  • Shortcut BB4 -- line break and bullet
  • Set BB4 =
          •

• Hint: Above shortcuts are useful in tables where you cannot use newlines

• Macros for graphics used in documentation - view all images in Document Graphics:
  • Set H =
  • Set I =
  • Set M =
  • Set N =
  • Set P =
  • Set Q =
  • Set S =
  • Set T =
  • Set U =
  • Set X =
  • Set Y =

• Colored text: (see more Standard Colors)

  You type:	%RED% red text %ENDCOLOR% and %GREEN% green text %ENDCOLOR%
  You get:	red text and green text

  • Note: %<color>% text must end with %ENDCOLOR%. If you want to switch from one color to another one you first need to end the active color with %ENDCOLOR%, e.g. write %RED% some text %ENDCOLOR% %GREEN% more text %ENDCOLOR%.
  • Set YELLOW = looks like this
  • Set ORANGE = looks like this
  • Set RED = looks like this
  • Set PINK = looks like this
  • Set PURPLE = looks like this
  • Set TEAL = looks like this
  • Set NAVY = looks like this
  • Set BLUE = looks like this
  • Set AQUA = looks like this
  • Set LIME = looks like this
  • Set GREEN = looks like this
  • Set OLIVE = looks like this
  • Set MAROON = looks like this
  • Set BROWN = looks like this
  • Set BLACK = looks like this
  • Set GRAY = looks like this
  • Set SILVER = looks like this
  • Set WHITE = looks like this (with gray background)
  • The following color settings are enclosed in verbatim tags to avoid incorrect nesting of XHTML tags, and in sticky to prevent wrapping of the closing verbatim.

      * Set YELLOW = <span class='foswikiYellowFG'>
      * Set ORANGE = <span class='foswikiOrangeFG'>
      * Set RED = <span class='foswikiRedFG'>
      * Set PINK = <span class='foswikiPinkFG'>
      * Set PURPLE = <span class='foswikiPurpleFG'>
      * Set TEAL = <span class='foswikiTealFG'>
      * Set NAVY = <span class='foswikiNavyFG'>
      * Set BLUE = <span class='foswikiBlueFG'>
      * Set AQUA = <span class='foswikiAquaFG'>
      * Set LIME = <span class='foswikiLimeFG'>
      * Set GREEN = <span class='foswikiGreenFG'>
      * Set OLIVE = <span class='foswikiOliveFG'>
      * Set MAROON = <span class='foswikiMaroonFG'>
      * Set BROWN = <span class='foswikiBrownFG'>
      * Set BLACK = <span class='foswikiBlackFG'>
      * Set GRAY = <span class='foswikiGrayFG'>
      * Set SILVER = <span class='foswikiSilverFG'>
      * Set WHITE = <span class='foswikiWhiteFG'>
      * Set ENDCOLOR = </span>

Miscellaneous Settings

• Format of a New Wiki Word link:
• Note that $text is the topic link text, $topic is the name of the new topic, and $web is the name of the web for the new topic. Values for the 3 are taken from the link syntax [[$web.$topic][$text]]. For normal plain WikiWord links $text and $topic are the same. The value of $web is the current web unless the link is in the format $web.$topic.
  • Default setting:
    • Set NEWLINKFORMAT = $text

• Preview Background image:
  • Set PREVIEWBGIMAGE = /pub/System/PreviewBackground/preview2bg.gif

• User-friendly synonyms for system webs
  • Set DOCWEB = System

• Show extra help for ApacheLogin users for Admin User login
  • Set ADMINLOGIN = internal admin login (use the password set in configure).

• Formatting of revision comparison: sequential, sidebyside or debug
  • Set DIFFRENDERSTYLE = sequential

• Debug settings for use by Javascript and CSS authors
  • Set FWSRC =
  • Set FWCOMPRESSED = .compressed
  • Set FWUNCOMPRESSED =

• Redefine these as follows for debugging:
  • #Set FWSRC = _src
  • #Set FWCOMPRESSED = .uncompressed
  • #Set FWUNCOMPRESSED = .uncompressed

Access Control Settings

• No-one (except admins) should change this topic
  • Set ALLOWTOPICCHANGE = Admin Group
  • Set ALLOWTOPICRENAME = Admin Group

Accessible configuration items

Note that any configuration variable accessed via QUERY must be included in the definition of {AccessibleCFG} in configure (expert setting)

• Set NAMEFILTER = [\\\s*?~^$@%`"'&|<:;>\[\]#\x00-\x1f]

Creating New Preference Settings

You can introduce new preference settings and use them in your topics and templates. There is no need to change the Foswiki engine (Perl scripts).

• A preference is defined in a bullet item: [3 spaces] * [space] Set NAME = value
  Example (as a nested bullet item, indented 6 spaces):
  • Set WEBBGCOLOR = #FFFFC0
• Preferences are used as Macros by enclosing the name in percent signs: %. Example:
  • When you write %WEBBGCOLOR%, it gets expanded to #FFD8AA .

Protected System Settings

The following macros are declared final to protect them as read only. These are system macros that should never be attempted set or altered in any preference topic or topic settings.

• Set FINALPREFERENCES = WEB, TOPIC, BASEWEB, BASETOPIC, ENCODE, ENV, IF, QUERYPARAMS, QUERYSTRING, URLENCODE, URLPARAM, SCRIPTURL, SCRIPTURLPATH, SCRIPTSUFFIX, ATTACHURL, ATTACHURLPATH, PUBURL, PUBURLPATH, USERSWEB, SYSTEMWEB, SANDBOXWEB, MAKETEXT, GMTIME

Related Topics

• Web Preferences has preferences of the System web.
• User topics in Users can have optional user preferences.
• Macros has a list of common %MACROS%.
• Access Control explains how to restrict access by users or groups.
• Foswiki:Extensions.PreferencesPlugin makes editing preferences a snap.

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