I'm trying to install MediaWiki (1.29.1 or 1.27.3) locally with a large Wiktionary dump (3GB). After converting the xml dump into an sql file and importing the latter into my DB that I create with this script, I followed the MediaWiki installation instructions in the browser to generate my specific "LocalSettings.php". I get the message
There are MediaWiki tables in this database. To upgrade them to MediaWiki 1.29.1, click Continue."
By clicking the "continue" button, the browser stays in loading state forever.
My understanding is that my DB containing the wiktionary dump has some tables that are not compatible with the version of wikimedia that I'm using. Therefore, an update of the DB is required. I tried to run install.php from the command line to avoid having timeout with the browser. The command didn't return anything (after waiting more than 2 hours).
I tried as well a workaround:
Create my DB with empty Tables
Generate "LocalSettings.php" from the browser (that was fast since the DB is small)
Import the wiki sql dump to my DB
Refresh the index.php page
I got then a blank page with this message
Exception caught inside exception handler.Set $wgShowExceptionDetails = true; and $wgShowDBErrorBacktrace = true; at the bottom of LocalSettings.php to show detailed debugging information.
All the examples and tutorials that I found online about this matter are assuming/using a small or new created DB.
Any idea what's wrong? Did really someone tried to use an existing wikimedia dump and run it locally? Why is there no such an advanced example?
The issue in a first level originates from mwdumper which seems to be outdated. An sql DB I generated using mwdumper is missing some tables which should have been though created by running update.php. It was not possible for me to run any php file neither from shell nor from the browser and I suspect the size of the dump to be the cause.
The workaround which by some magic helped to overcome this issue was:
Et voila! The huge wiktionary mysql dump is queryable now throw the mediawiki interface. Not sure if such a trick could be called a solution but it solved the problem in my case. An explanation for what could have happened in background would be definitely helpful.