User blog comment:MisterWoodhouse/Fandom is upgrading to a modern version of MediaWiki/@comment-3218221-20190624012116

Well, this is a surprise--not a bad one by any means, and I'll be cautiously optimistic about what's to come. (Optimistic in that there is certainly much to be gained if things go smoothly, but cautious in that there is a chance things will not).

My main/immediate Worried Thought when I saw this announcement was that FANDOM might be planning to invest more heavily in Community Builders in tandem with upgrading MediaWiki, so for those who were worrying the same, fear not: as stated in two or three earlier comments, FANDOM is in fact retiring the Community Builder experiment.

(Also stated in earlier comments: Source Editor won't be in danger with any MW upgrades, whew.)

I suppose one question I have is how the upgrade might affect bots hosted on the 'current' MW software, if at all? For instance, the PywikiBot framework I believe still works with older versions of MW (older than the one FANDOM likes to say it forked from), but would those who use PywikiBot experience notable changes? (I've used AWB for my bot purposes instead).

Development that may potentially see editing directly enriched/bettered is always welcome (and necessary), so I look forward to seeing said development over the next year--and I hope it will involve plenty of user feedback and dialogue therein.

Ah, also--I see a few people bringing up Forums, but should users of wikis still using the wiki-style forums expect some changes with the upgrade? The DPL extension the forums are based on is still going strong, but I can't shake the worry I'll wake up one day and find wiki-style forums have been removed entirely.