There's basically two bits:

1. The way DNS is set up, only known language codes are actually defined. We could add all known codes to the list and have them go to the generic 'no wiki' page to cover anything that will actually work on Incubator, without requiring serious changes (such as wildcards).

2. A resulting redirect could probably be generated by whatever little script runs that generic page, forwarding you on to a matching Incubator page based on the current hostname. I don't think that logic would be super hard, and it should be able to stay as-is from there out.

Manual Apache config with the redirects is also possible but would likely be more work to maintain.

afaik all supported language codes are already serviced by Apache on subdomains of any WMF wikiproject domain.

Eg. af.wikinews.org shows a Wiki does not exist (yet) page. (unlike xyz.wiktionary.org). I think that behavior makes sense and could stay as is.

The script is the remaining part and would be easy to do from the "Wiki does not exist"-page. The wait is the Incubator to show a meaningful page for subpages that don't exist yet (ie. potential incubator wikis) that is not just a "Page doesn't exist yet" (like http://incubator.wikimedia.org/wiki/Ws/af currently is).

(In reply to comment #2)

afaik all supported language codes are already serviced by Apache on subdomains
of any WMF wikiproject domain.

Eg. af.wikinews.org shows a Wiki does not exist (yet) page. (unlike
xyz.wiktionary.org). I think that behavior makes sense and could stay as is.

The script is the remaining part and would be easy to do from the "Wiki does
not exist"-page. The wait is the Incubator to show a meaningful page for
subpages that don't exist yet (ie. potential incubator wikis) that is not just
a "Page doesn't exist yet" (like http://incubator.wikimedia.org/wiki/Ws/af
currently is).

Yeah, that's what I've been coding lately :-) Roan has reviewed it and he will likely deploy it one of the following days, so the content of the referenced URL will magically change! :-)

However, the current "wiki does not exist (yet)" page is much more user-unfriendly than that (e.g. it doesn't mention the language name; it's not translatable, ...) so I do want to have those non-existing wikis refer to Incubator. That's my plan at least, and I will do everything to make that plan work :-)

ebe123_wiki wrote:

(In reply to comment #0)

The plan is to make xyz.wikiproject.org redirect to
incubator.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wx/xyz if the wiki does not exist. Preferably
*all* language codes, but if that is not possible then only languages known to
Wikimedia.

(So for example af.wikinews.org -> incubator.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wn/af)

The new welcome template will soon be deployed to incubator (hopefully).

After talking with Danny_B, Ryan Lane and Rob Halsell about this, it is
difficult but not impossible. Apparently we should wait until virtual hosts are
set up for Wikimedia.

It would be very useful if we could define the redirects ourselves, which will
apparently be possible in the future.

Why not incubator.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wx/xyz&uselang=xyz? Well, I admit that it will only work for the page viewed first, but it's better than nothing. Also, xyz.wikiproject.org/wiki/Example would redirect to incubator.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wx/xyz/Example&uselang=xyz.

(In reply to comment #4)

Why not incubator.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wx/xyz&uselang=xyz? Well, I
admit that it will only work for the page viewed first, but it's better than
nothing. Also, xyz.wikiproject.org/wiki/Example would redirect to
incubator.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wx/xyz/Example&uselang=xyz.

I had been thinking about that as well. But first we need to have the technical ability to implement the redirects (= this bug) and then we can see what is possible and what is desirable. One step at a time ;-)

FYI: the welcome pages are now deployed so the Wx/xyz pages are nicer and user-friendly.

Btw, I was thinking..
Maybe it is possible to (temporarily) redirect the missing wiki page (http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_missing_site_template) through PHP's header() or an HTML meta refresh. (This would require some PHP to make xyz.wikiproject.org go to incubator:Wx/xyz but that's easier than Apache config.)
Just an idea..

missing.php changes have been deployed.