 | This page has been closed down bycommunity consensus, and is retained only forhistorical reference. If you wish to restart discussion on the status of this page, seek community input at a forum such as thevillage pump. It was last substantively updated in May 2021. |
 | The book rendering service wasdeprecated in 2021. Seethe alternative options. For details of how to restore a book after deletion, see:Wikipedia:Books/archive.
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AWikipedia Book (or aWikipedia Reading list) is a book formed wholly or partially from an organized collection ofWikipediaarticles. Their list forms (generally created using the Book Creator tool) are often nowadays hosted in theUser namespace in the form of a list of Wikipedia article tiles, some lists may also include for reading only specific sections of the article (generally included as an anchor link). There are third party services for rendering electronically inPDF format, or ordering as a printed book. The book is compiled afresh each time it is retrieved by the service, so that a new upload will always reflect the latest versions of the articles. There are currently many Wikipedia Books that are available on book sellers such asAmazon.com.
You can stillcreate and edit a book design using thebook creator and upload it to an external rendering service:
For details of how to restore a book after deletion, see:Wikipedia:Books/archive
Each book generally has its own Wikipedia page, which contains a Contents list of the articles included in it together with formatting metadata such as Chapter headings. You can create a book as asub-page in your own user space. TheBook Creator tool can automate much of the book creation work, although experienced editors can also code up the book by hand.
Once completed, a book created by the Book Creator tool can be uploaded to the independent companyPediaPress, whereprint-on-demand copies can be ordered. Such books may also be retrieved by other independent publishing tools such asMediaWiki2LaTeX. It used to be possible to build an e-book on Wikipedia for immediate download, but this service is no longer available.
For information and help on Wikipedia books created by the Book Creator tool, seeHelp:Books (general tips) andWikiProject Wikipedia-Books (questions and assistance).
You can look for books either by browsing the book categories or by searching for a title or topic.
Wikipedia books are automatically categorised by location.
The following code:
{{#tag:inputbox|type=fulltextprefix=Book:width=40break=nosearchbuttonlabel=Search}}creates a search box which will return a list of book titles.
The Bookshelf is a simple tool which combines the above options with a few statistics, enabling you to browse, search and view the Wikipedia Books created to date. You can place a copy anywhere by clicking the Edit tab above and copy-pasting the code from this page.
| Bookshelf |
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| Browse the book categories: |
| Search for books: |
Featured topics andGood topics are collections of some of Wikipedia's best articles.
Some topics may have a dedicated book linked in the upper-left corners of the topic boxes.
The Wikipedia Book Creator Tool was first rolled out in 2009. It comprised two main parts:
But Wikipedia does not print books or handle ordering, as that costs money. An agreement was reached withPediaPress, who built their own renderer and publishing website, where a user could upload a Wikipedia book and either download a PDF softcopy for free or orderPrint on demand copies. PediaPress later withdrew their free softcopy service.
Eventually the OCG service became outdated and unmaintainable. It became unreliable, while bugs and evolving security issues could no longer be fixed. The Wikimedia Foundation turned off the book rendering service on all Wikimedia wikis inOctober 2017. Since then, Wikipedia books have only been available from third-party providers.
A candidate replacement, calledElectron, was based on the open-source Chrome HTML-to-PDF rendering engine but proved unsuitable for books, although it replaced the OCG for the PDF download of single articles. A second attempt, namedProton, also failed at book rendering but succeeded Electron for article rendering in 2019. During this period Dirk Hünniger independently wroteMediaWiki2LaTeX, which also compiles Wikipedia books in PDF format. However theWikimedia Foundation were reluctant to adopt it because they could not support the Haskell programming language in which it is written. It has since been improved and offered by theWikiMedia Foundation (WMF) as an online service.
As of August 2020 the Book Creator design tool, MediaWiki2LaTeX softcopy rendering service and PediaPress print service remain available.
In April 2018PediaPress stepped forward to try and develop a viable replacement PDF book renderer called Collector, based on their previous experience with their own in-house renderer. The new renderer is planned to provide limited initial functionality, with incremental improvements over time. As of April 2019 analpha release of the core Collector service has yet to become usable. It is being developed as a closed source project. The WMF are also unable to support closed-source code owned by third parties.
In December 2019 English Wikipedia suppressed the rendering capability ofTemplate:Wikipedia books(related =Template:Book bar &Template:Books-inline) and removed theBook Creator from the sidebar after a community discussion about effectiveness.
As the Book Creator no longer generates copies of Wikipedia books, its primary working feature directs users to order printed Wikipedia books fromPediaPress, a third-party company which has a longstanding agreement with the WMF. Editors in discussion valued the user experience of Wikipedia readers over the business prospects of PediaPress and felt that the template and sidebar link were no longer justifiable.
The namespace and its transclusions were retained in the hope that the WMF would come up with a solution. As a result of then-anticipated future solutions, template transclusions were not removed from articles. SeeSuppress rendering of Template:Wikipedia books for more information.
As a result of avillage pump proposal, article and template transclusions to Wikipedia books are deprecated.
Due toWikipedia:Templates for discussion/Log/2021 April 7#Template:Wikipedia book,Template:Wikipedia books and related templates were deleted in April 2021 and all of their transclusions were removed.
Aset of proposals to look at the future of the Book namespace were started on May, 15 2021.
On July 13, 2021 the namespace was deleted through Phabricator ticketT285766.
