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== Overview ==
The MediaWiki namespace allows administrators and interface editors to [[m:Help:System message|customise or translate the MediaWiki web interface]].
{{Caution|text= Some messages ''must'' have HTML links, and others ''must'' have wikilinks. To find out which is which, you must know where the message is used in the interface.}}
Because the changes to these pages have a global effect, they are [[WP:PROT|protected]] from editing, and '''only administrators and interface editors have the ability to edit them'''.<ref>By default, all messages are protected. This is necessary for a number of reasons:
* Many messages are in plain HTML, so users could insert malicious scripts
* Vandalism of some messages would be extremely disruptive; for example, changes to the text of the links in the sidebar would immediately be visible to all users
* A few messages can in theory cause the software to stop working if they are changed. In practice the software ignores the database contents for the changed page, taking the regular expression straight out of the message files, for performance and stability reasons.
If an administrator wishes to allow non-administrators to edit a MediaWiki page, a method is to place the message on a template, and then transclude the template back onto the MediaWiki page. Another method is to redirect the page to one in a non-MediaWiki namespace.</ref> Non-admins who would like to request a minor change can do so by using the {{tlx|editprotected}} template on the talk page of the MediaWiki page. More substantive changes should be discussed at an appropriate section of the [[Wikipedia:Village pump]]; an edit request should then be made if there is [[WP:Consensus|consensus]] for the change.
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