DokuWiki was created by Andreas Gohr5 in June 2004. In July the first official release was published on Freshmeat (now known as Freecode).6
Originally DokuWiki used a simple list of regular expressions to transform wiki syntax into HTML. A big step forward in the development was the re-design of the parser and the renderer mechanisms based on contributions by Harry Fuecks in January 2005.7 The new design made use of the then-new object-oriented features of PHP4. The new parser and the introduction of a cache mechanism led to significant performance improvements, thus making DokuWiki usable for larger projects.
The new parser also prepared DokuWiki for the introduction of a generic plugin interface which simplified the development and maintenance of syntax-based plugins. Over the years additional plugin mechanisms followed which allowed 3rd-party developers to extend nearly all aspects of the wiki software.8
The introduction of DokuWiki into the Debian9 and Gentoo Linux10 distributions in April and July 2005 respectively significantly increased the visibility of the software.
The DokuWiki logo is the result of a design contest. The winning logo, designed by Esther Brunner, represents editing pages (by pencils of different colors, i.e. different people) and linking them.1112
For many years, DokuWiki's source code was managed through the Darcs distributed version control system. In 2010 a switch to Git was made, making use of GitHub for hosting.13
Today, DokuWiki is one of the most popular wiki engines available and has achieved significant usage with stable interest over time.14151617
Since 2011, releases are named after Discworld characters.
Some independent software projects based on DokuWiki have been created. These projects usually bundle the DokuWiki software, select plugins, a customized design and sometimes pre-built content for specialized use cases.
As required by DokuWiki's license these projects are all licensed under the GPL version 2.
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"DokuWiki: An elegant and lightweight wiki engine". Linux.com. 2008-06-25. Retrieved 2021-08-17. https://www.linux.com/news/dokuwiki-elegant-and-lightweight-wiki-engine/ ↩
DokuWiki was originally designed for documentation. ↩
Fitzpatrick, Jason (25 October 2010). "DokuWiki on a Stick Packs a Portable Wiki in a Tiny Package". Lifehacker. G/O Media Inc. Retrieved 17 August 2021. https://lifehacker.com/dokuwiki-on-a-stick-packs-a-portable-wiki-in-a-tiny-pac-5672325 ↩
"Dokuwiki - C'est mieux quand c'est simple" Ubuntu French - Org. https://doc.ubuntu-fr.org/dokuwiki ↩
freshmeat.net: Project details for DokuWiki http://freshmeat.net/projects/dokuwiki/ ↩
"OOP and Performance - SitePoint". www.sitepoint.com. 11 January 2005. Retrieved 2021-08-17. https://www.sitepoint.com/oop-and-performance/ ↩
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"Contents of dokuwiki changelog". Gentoo-x86. Gentoo.org. Archived from the original on 13 April 2019. Retrieved 25 November 2012. https://web.archive.org/web/20190413010855/https://sources.gentoo.org/cgi-bin/viewvc.cgi/gentoo-x86/www-apps/dokuwiki/ChangeLog?view=markup ↩
"FS#111 DokuWiki Logo". bugs.dokuwiki.org. Retrieved 2021-08-17. https://bugs.dokuwiki.org/111.html ↩
"logo [DokuWiki]". www.dokuwiki.org. Retrieved 2021-08-17. https://www.dokuwiki.org/logo ↩
"[dokuwiki] repository switched to git - dokuwiki - FreeLists". www.freelists.org. Retrieved 2021-08-17. https://www.freelists.org/post/dokuwiki/repository-switched-to-git ↩
"Wiki Usage Distribution on the Entire Internet". trends.builtwith.com. Retrieved 2021-08-17. https://trends.builtwith.com/cms/wiki/traffic/Entire-Internet ↩
"Technologies - What CMS?". whatcms.org. Retrieved 2021-08-17. https://whatcms.org/Technologies/Wiki ↩
Google trend history comparison https://web.archive.org/web/20210624204710/https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?hl=en-GB&tz=-120&q=DokuWiki,Twiki,MediaWiki,PmWiki,MoinMoin&sni=3 ↩
"WikiMatrix View and Comparison Statistics". Archived from the original on 2008-06-26. Retrieved 2008-08-01. https://web.archive.org/web/20080626102013/http://www.wikimatrix.org/stats.php ↩
"Old Changelogs: Release 2004-07-04". DokuWiki. https://www.dokuwiki.org/old_changes#release_2004-07-04 ↩
"Changelog". DokuWiki. https://www.dokuwiki.org/changes ↩
plugins http://www.dokuwiki.org/features ↩
templates http://www.dokuwiki.org/template ↩
"DokuWiki Localization". translate.dokuwiki.org. Retrieved 2021-08-17. https://translate.dokuwiki.org/ ↩
"devel:caching [DokuWiki]". www.dokuwiki.org. Retrieved 2021-08-17. https://www.dokuwiki.org/devel:caching ↩
"Referenzen [Einsatzleiterwiki]". einsatzleiterwiki.de. Retrieved 2021-08-17. https://einsatzleiterwiki.de/doku.php?id=referenzen ↩
Ziehr, Christoph; Skorupa, Frank; Schmitt, Konrad; Kopp, Mike. "Berliner Feuerwehr: Wiki-Systeme für den Einsatz- und rückwärtigen Dienst". BRANDSchutz/Deutsche Feuerwehr-Zeitung. 5/2017. https://www.kohlhammer-feuerwehr.de/de/magazin/view/44 ↩
"DokuWiki als Schulportfolio". lehrerfortbildung-bw.de (in German). 2019-03-19. Retrieved 2021-08-17. https://lehrerfortbildung-bw.de/st_digital/medienwerkstatt/internet/cms/wiki/portfolio/index.html ↩
Voigt, Stefan; Fuchs-Kittowski, Frank; Hüttemann, Detlef; Klafft, Michael; Gohr, Andreas (2011). "ICKEwiki". Proceedings of the 7th International Symposium on Wikis and Open Collaboration. Mountain View, California: ACM Press. pp. 144–153. doi:10.1145/2038558.2038582. ISBN 978-1-4503-0909-7. S2CID 17411638. 978-1-4503-0909-7 ↩