wikipedia manual

Overview

The wikipedia.el package provides a comprehensive Emacs interface for Wikipedia. It builds on top of mediawiki.el, which handles the low-level protocol details, and adds higher-level workflows for editing, reviewing, and managing Wikipedia content.

The package requires Emacs 29.1 or later and mediawiki.el for the underlying API communication. Optionally, gptel provides AI-powered features (citation generation, edit summary generation, and watchlist review scoring), and pangram.el provides AI-generated text detection. When available, corresponding groups appear in the transient menu (Transient menu). Before using any commands, you must configure at least one wiki site via mediawiki-site-alist and establish a session with wikipedia-login (Session management).

The package is organized around several core workflows:

• Page editing: open pages for editing in mediawiki-mode buffers, preview rendered HTML, and publish changes back to the wiki (Page editing).

• Draft management: save work-in-progress edits as local files that persist across sessions (Draft management).

• Watchlist: browse your watchlist with a grouped, expandable interface that shows recent changes organized by page, with unread tracking and background prefetching of diffs (Watchlist).

• Revision history: inspect the full revision history of any page, view diffs between arbitrary revisions, and navigate between historical snapshots (Revision history).

• User inspection: view user contributions, visit user pages, send thanks, and look up detailed editing statistics via XTools (User inspection, XTools statistics).

• Local mirror: synchronize watched pages to a local SQLite database for offline browsing and faster access (Synchronization and local mirror).

• Diff follow mode: automatically display diffs as you navigate entries in the watchlist, history, or contributions buffers (Diff follow mode).

• AI-powered editing (requires gptel): generate Wikipedia citation templates, produce edit summaries from diffs, and score watchlist changes by review priority (AI commands).

• Wiki link completion: get title suggestions from the MediaWiki API as you type inside [[...]] links (Wiki link completion).

All commands are accessible through a unified transient menu (Transient menu).

The development repository is on GitHub.

User options

Diff display

The user option wikipedia-diff-function controls how diffs are displayed throughout the package. It accepts two values:

• unified (the default): show diffs in a single buffer using Emacs’s built-in diff-mode. This is compact and integrates well with the diff follow mode (Diff follow mode).

• ediff: use ediff-buffers for side-by-side comparison. This gives a richer interactive experience but opens multiple windows and is incompatible with diff follow mode.

Change this option if you prefer side-by-side comparison and do not use diff follow mode.

Draft storage

The user option wikipedia-draft-directory specifies the directory where local drafts are stored. Each draft is saved as a .wiki file named after the page title, using a byte-level encoding scheme for filesystem safety. The default value is wikipedia-drafts/ inside user-emacs-directory.

Change this if you want drafts stored in a different location, for example a directory that is synchronized across machines.

XTools integration

The user option wikipedia-xtools-base-url specifies the base URL for the XTools API. The default value is https://xtools.wmcloud.org/api. You would only change this if the XTools service moves to a different URL.

The user option wikipedia-xtools-project specifies the default project for XTools queries. The default value is en.wikipedia.org. Change this if you primarily edit a different Wikipedia language edition or another MediaWiki project (e.g., de.wikipedia.org or commons.wikimedia.org).

Local database

The user option wikipedia-db-file specifies the path to the SQLite database file used for local page storage. The default value is wikipedia.db inside user-emacs-directory. Change this if you want the database stored elsewhere, for example to keep it separate from your Emacs configuration.

Synchronization

The user option wikipedia-sync-revision-limit controls the maximum number of revisions to synchronize per page. The default value is 20. Increase this if you want deeper local history; decrease it if synchronization is too slow.

The user option wikipedia-sync-fetch-content controls whether full revision content (wikitext) is fetched during synchronization. When non-nil (the default), the content of the most recent revision is downloaded and stored locally, enabling offline viewing and local diffs. Set this to nil if you only want revision metadata without the actual page content.

AI configuration

All AI-powered commands require the gptel package. When gptel is not installed, the AI groups in the transient menu are hidden and the commands signal an error if called directly.

The user option wikipedia-ai-backend specifies the gptel backend name for AI commands (e.g., "Gemini" or "Claude"). When nil, the backend is inferred from the model or falls back to gptel-backend.

The user option wikipedia-ai-model specifies the gptel model for AI commands. When nil, it defaults to gptel-model.

Both options accept three forms:

• nil: use the gptel default.
• A single value (symbol for model, string for backend): use it for all AI commands.
• An alist mapping command keys to values, with t as the fallback:

(setq wikipedia-ai-model
      '((cite . gemini-2.0-flash)
        (review . claude-sonnet-4-5-20250514)
        (t . gemini-2.0-flash-lite)))

Valid command keys are cite (Citation generation), summarize (Edit summary generation), and review (Watchlist review). Commands not listed in the alist fall back to the t entry, then to gptel-model.

The user options wikipedia-ai-review-backend and wikipedia-ai-review-model provide per-command overrides specifically for watchlist review. When set, they take precedence over the alist in wikipedia-ai-model / wikipedia-ai-backend.

The user options wikipedia-ai-citation-system-prompt, wikipedia-ai-summarize-system-prompt, wikipedia-ai-review-system-prompt, and wikipedia-ai-review-prompt control the LLM prompts for their respective commands. Customize these to change the AI’s behavior. Before scoring, the review system normalizes the wikitext by stripping citation markup and splitting sentences, so the AI receives a standard unified diff at sentence granularity. This makes citation-only changes invisible (scored 0.0) and section moves clearly recognizable.

The user option wikipedia-ai-summarize-auto controls whether wikipedia-publish automatically generates an AI edit summary before prompting. When non-nil, the minibuffer is pre-filled with the AI’s suggestion, which you can edit before confirming. Defaults to nil.

The user option wikipedia-ai-review-auto controls whether the watchlist is automatically scored after each refresh. When non-nil, wikipedia-ai-review-watchlist runs automatically, so entries are always scored without pressing R.

The user option wikipedia-ai-review-verbose controls whether per-entry progress messages are shown during scoring.

Wiki link completion

The user option wikipedia-completion-limit controls the maximum number of title candidates fetched from the MediaWiki API for each completion request. The default value is 15. Increase this if you find that the desired page frequently does not appear among the suggestions; decrease it if API latency is a concern on slow connections.

Commands

Session management

The command wikipedia-login establishes a session with a wiki site. When called interactively, it prompts for a site name from those configured in mediawiki-site-alist. You must call this command (or let it be called implicitly) before using any other wikipedia.el commands. Most commands call wp--ensure-logged-in internally, which will prompt you to select a site if no session is active.

Page editing

The command wikipedia-open opens a Wikipedia page for editing in a mediawiki-mode buffer. When called interactively, it prompts for the page title, defaulting to the title at point if available (for example, when invoked from a watchlist or history buffer).

The command wikipedia-publish saves the current buffer’s content back to the wiki. It prompts for an edit summary in the minibuffer. When wikipedia-ai-summarize-auto is non-nil (AI configuration), the summary prompt is pre-filled with an AI-generated suggestion. The alias wikipedia-save is provided for discoverability.

The command wikipedia-browse opens the page in an external web browser via browse-url. Like wikipedia-open, it defaults to the title at point.

The command wikipedia-eww-open opens the Wikipedia article displayed in the current EWW buffer for editing. It extracts the article title from the EWW URL and calls wikipedia-open, positioning point at the corresponding location in the wikitext source. This is useful when browsing Wikipedia in EWW and wanting to quickly fix something in the source. The command is also available from the transient menu (Transient menu) under e.

The minor mode wikipedia-edit-mode provides additional keybindings and completion when editing a wiki page. It displays WP in the mode line lighter, registers wikipedia-completion-at-point for wiki link completion (Wiki link completion), and adds the following bindings:

Preview

The command wikipedia-preview sends the current buffer’s wikitext to the MediaWiki parse API and displays the rendered HTML in a dedicated preview buffer. The preview uses shr-render-region to display the HTML as formatted text within Emacs.

The preview buffer uses wikipedia-preview-mode, which provides the following keybindings:

The preview buffer supports revert-buffer (bound to g in special-mode), which re-fetches the preview from the source buffer.

Draft management

Drafts allow you to save work-in-progress edits locally before publishing them to the wiki. Each draft is a .wiki file stored in wikipedia-draft-directory (Draft storage).

The command wikipedia-draft-save saves the current buffer’s content as a local draft. It requires the buffer to have a page title set (as is the case when editing a page opened via wikipedia-open). Saving a draft for the same page overwrites the previous draft.

The command wikipedia-draft-open prompts you to select a draft from the list of saved drafts, then opens it in a mediawiki-mode buffer with wikipedia-edit-mode enabled. From there, you can continue editing and eventually publish with wikipedia-publish.

The command wikipedia-draft-delete prompts for a draft to delete, with a confirmation prompt before removing the file.

Page titles are encoded into safe filenames using a byte-level escape scheme: characters outside [a-zA-Z0-9 .-] are replaced with _XX sequences (where XX is the hexadecimal byte value of each UTF-8 byte). This ensures filenames are portable across operating systems while remaining mostly human-readable for ASCII titles.

Watchlist

The command wikipedia-watchlist opens a buffer displaying your Wikipedia watchlist. Entries are grouped by page title: each page appears as a collapsible group header showing the most recent change summary, the contributing users, and the total size change. Pages with multiple recent changes display a count (e.g., “Article name (3 changes)”).

The watchlist fetches unseen changes from the last 30 days, excluding bot edits and minor edits. After loading, it asynchronously prefetches revision content in the background so that diffs can be displayed instantly when you navigate to an entry.

Navigation

Group headers with more than one change can be expanded and collapsed. The command wikipedia-watchlist-toggle-expand, bound to TAB and SPC, toggles the group at point. Expanded groups show individual entries indented below the header, with per-edit timestamps, users, size changes, and summaries. The indicators ▶ (collapsed) and ▼ (expanded) show the current state.

The commands wikipedia-watchlist-expand-all (e) and wikipedia-watchlist-collapse-all (c) expand or collapse every group at once.

Actions

The command wikipedia-watchlist-open-page (RET, o) opens the page at point for editing, marking it as read. The command wikipedia-watchlist-show-diff (d, v) displays the diff for the change at point, using the method specified by wikipedia-diff-function (Diff display). The command wikipedia-watchlist-show-history (h) opens the full revision history for the page. The command wikipedia-watchlist-browse (b) opens the page in an external browser.

Unread tracking

Unread entries are displayed in bold (using the wikipedia-watchlist-unread face). Opening a page or viewing its diff marks it as read, both locally and on the server. The command wikipedia-watchlist-mark-all-read (m or !) marks every entry as read.

Managing watched pages

The command wikipedia-watchlist-watch (w) adds a page to your watchlist. The command wikipedia-watchlist-unwatch (x) removes a page, after confirmation. Both commands default to the title at point and send the request asynchronously.

Full keybinding reference

Revision history

The command wikipedia-history opens a buffer displaying the revision history of a page. When called interactively, it prompts for the page title. The history buffer shows each revision’s ID, date, author, size, and edit summary in a tabulated list, sorted by date (newest first).

Viewing and comparing revisions

The command wikipedia-history-view-revision (RET, v) fetches and displays the full wikitext of the revision at point in a read-only buffer.

The command wikipedia-history-diff-to-previous (d) shows the diff between the revision at point and its parent revision. This corresponds to Wikipedia’s “prev” link. The command wikipedia-history-diff-to-current (c) shows the diff between the revision at point and the most recent revision, corresponding to Wikipedia’s “cur” link.

The command wikipedia-history-diff-revisions (D) prompts for two revision IDs and displays the diff between them. This is useful for comparing non-adjacent revisions.

The command wikipedia-history-browse-revision (b) opens the revision at point in an external browser.

Full keybinding reference

User inspection

The command wikipedia-user-contributions opens a buffer displaying a user’s recent contributions. When called interactively, it prompts for the username, defaulting to the user at point when available (e.g., when invoked from a watchlist or history buffer). The contributions buffer shows each edit’s timestamp, page title, size change, and edit summary.

Contribution actions

The command wikipedia-user-contributions-view-diff (RET, d) shows the diff between the contribution at point and its parent revision. The command wikipedia-user-contributions-view-revision (v) displays the full wikitext. The command wikipedia-user-contributions-open-page (o) opens the page for editing.

The command wikipedia-user-contributions-browse (b) opens the revision in an external browser. The command wikipedia-user-contributions-show-history (h) opens the full page history. The command wikipedia-user-contributions-thank (t) sends a thank notification for the edit.

User page and profile commands

The command wikipedia-user-page opens the user page (User:USERNAME) for editing. The command wikipedia-user-talk opens the user’s talk page. The command wikipedia-user-browse opens the user page in an external browser.

The command wikipedia-user-at-point inspects the user at point in any of the list buffers (watchlist, history, contributions), opening their contributions.

The command wikipedia-user-stats is a convenience wrapper that calls wikipedia-xtools-user-stats (XTools statistics).

Sending thanks

The command wikipedia-thank sends a thank notification to the author of the revision at point. It prompts for confirmation before sending. This command works from any buffer where a revision ID is available (history, watchlist, or contributions).

Full keybinding reference

XTools statistics

The XTools commands fetch and display editing statistics from the XTools API, a service that provides detailed analysis of editing activity on MediaWiki projects. These commands supplement the information available through the MediaWiki API with data such as top edited pages and detailed edit breakdowns.

User statistics

The command wikipedia-xtools-user-stats displays comprehensive statistics for a user. The output includes:

• Basic information: user ID, registration date, project.
• Admin status (highlighted if the user is a sysop or bureaucrat).
• Edit counts: live edits, deleted edits, total, and pages created.
• Activity period: first edit and most recent edit timestamps.
• User group memberships (local and global).
• Top 10 most-edited pages in the article namespace.

The command combines data from both the XTools API (edit counts) and the MediaWiki API (registration, groups, contribution timestamps) to present a unified view.

Page statistics

The command wikipedia-xtools-page-stats displays statistics for a page, including revision count, number of editors, minor edit count, average edit size, page size, creation date, and top editors.

The command wikipedia-xtools-top-editors displays a detailed list of the top editors for a page, showing each editor’s edit count, minor edit count, and the date range of their activity.

Synchronization and local mirror

The synchronization and mirror system stores Wikipedia pages and their revision history in a local SQLite database, enabling offline browsing and faster access to frequently visited pages.

Synchronizing pages

The command wikipedia-sync-page synchronizes a single page to the local database. It downloads revision metadata (up to wikipedia-sync-revision-limit revisions) and, if wikipedia-sync-fetch-content is non-nil, the full wikitext of the most recent revision.

The command wikipedia-sync-watchlist performs a bulk synchronization of all pages from your watchlist. It first fetches the watchlist, marks each page as watched in the database, and then synchronizes each page individually with a brief delay between requests to avoid overloading the server. Pages that fail to synchronize are reported in a summary message without aborting the remaining pages.

The command wikipedia-sync-update re-synchronizes all pages already marked as watched in the local database. Use this for routine updates after the initial wikipedia-sync-watchlist import.

Browsing the local mirror

The command wikipedia-mirror opens a buffer listing all pages stored in the local database, showing each page’s title, revision count, last sync time, and watched status.

From the mirror browser, you can open a page for online editing (RET, o), view its local revision history (h), synchronize a single page (s), or synchronize all watched pages (S).

Local revision history

The local history buffer shows revisions stored in the database for a given page. The command wikipedia-mirror-history-view (RET, v) displays the stored wikitext of the revision at point. The command wikipedia-mirror-history-diff (d) shows the diff between the revision and its parent, using locally stored content.

Both commands require that the revision content was downloaded during synchronization. If content is not available, an error is reported.

Database management

The command wikipedia-db-close closes the database connection. The connection is opened lazily on first use and remains open for the duration of the Emacs session.

The command wikipedia-db-stats displays a summary of the database contents: the number of pages, watched pages, revisions, and revisions with stored content.

Diff follow mode

The minor mode wikipedia-diff-follow-mode automatically displays the diff for the entry at point whenever you move to a different line in a list buffer. It works in the watchlist, history, and contributions buffers and is toggled with f in any of these modes.

When enabled, navigating to a new entry triggers an automatic diff display in an adjacent window. If both revisions are already in the cache (populated by the watchlist’s background prefetching), the diff appears instantly. Otherwise, the revisions are fetched asynchronously and the diff is displayed when both arrive, with a “Loading diff…” placeholder in the meantime.

Diff follow mode requires wikipedia-diff-function to be set to unified (Diff display). Attempting to enable it when ediff is selected produces a warning and the mode remains disabled.

In watchlist mode, viewing a diff via follow mode also marks the entry as read (Unread tracking).

AI commands

All AI commands require the gptel package. See AI configuration for backend and model settings.

Citation generation

The command wikipedia-ai-cite generates a properly formatted Wikipedia citation template from a URL or free-text source description. The generated citation uses the appropriate template ({{cite web}}, {{cite book}}, {{cite journal}}, etc.) and is inserted at point.

When called interactively, it prompts for the input. Examples:

• A URL: https://example.com/article
• A description: "The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith, 1776"

Edit summary generation

The command wikipedia-ai-summarize generates an AI-powered edit summary for the current buffer’s changes. It compares the buffer against the live version on Wikipedia, sends the unified diff to the LLM, and produces a concise summary following Wikipedia’s edit summary conventions: standard abbreviations, specific descriptions, and a 500-character limit.

The generated summary is stored in a buffer-local variable. When you next call wikipedia-publish, the summary pre-fills the minibuffer prompt so you can review and edit it before confirming.

When wikipedia-ai-summarize-auto is non-nil, wikipedia-publish calls this command automatically before prompting, removing the need to invoke it separately.

Watchlist review

The command wikipedia-ai-review-watchlist scores watchlist changes using AI to prioritize review. Each watchlist group is assigned a score between 0.0 (trivial, no review needed) and 1.0 (highly significant, should be reviewed).

The command fetches the unified diff for each unscored group asynchronously, sends it to the LLM, and parses the JSON response containing a score and a brief reason. Scores are persisted in the local SQLite database and restored when the watchlist is reopened.

In the watchlist buffer:

High scores (>=0.7) are highlighted with a warning face; low scores (<=0.3) are dimmed.

Wiki link completion

When wikipedia-edit-mode is active (Page editing), typing inside a [[...]] wiki link triggers completion via wikipedia-completion-at-point. The function queries the MediaWiki prefixsearch API for page titles matching what you have typed so far, and presents the results through the standard Emacs completion UI (completion-at-point, typically triggered with C-M-i or TAB depending on your configuration).

Completion activates only when point is in the link target portion of a wiki link — that is, after [[ and before any | pipe character. If you are typing the display text after the pipe (e.g., [[Foo|some text), completion does not trigger, since the display text is free-form.

Results are cached for five minutes per prefix to avoid redundant API calls. The number of candidates per request is controlled by wikipedia-completion-limit (Wiki link completion options).

Transient menu

The command wikipedia-transient opens a transient menu providing quick access to all wikipedia.el commands. The menu is arranged in vertically aligned columns, each containing one or two thematic groups:

• Page / Draft: page operations (open, publish, preview, diff, edit from EWW, browse, login) and draft management (save, open, delete).
• User / XTools: user commands (contributions, user page, talk, browse, thank) and XTools statistics (user stats, page stats, top editors).
• Watchlist / History (h prefix): watchlist operations (open, watch/unwatch, browse, mark all read) and history commands (open, undo, restore).
• Sync & Mirror (s prefix): sync commands (sync page, sync watchlist, sync update, mirror).
• AI (a prefix): AI commands (detect AI, clear overlays, generate citation, generate edit summary, review watchlist). This column is shown only when pangram.el or gptel is installed; individual items are further filtered by their specific library dependency.

Bind wikipedia-transient to a convenient key for quick access to any command in the package.