Manual:$wgTmpDirectory

Paths: $wgTmpDirectory
The path of the temporary directory.
Introduced in version:	pre 1.1.0
Removed in version:	still in use
Allowed values:	absolute path
Default value:	system temp dir determined by wfTempDir() "{$wgUploadDirectory}/tmp" prior to 1.20 (Note: The default value of this variable depends on other variables, such as the values set in Setup.php, after LocalSettings.php is executed)

Other settings: Alphabetical | By Function

Details

MediaWiki version:

≥ 1.20

The path to the temporary directory. Used by wfTempDir() to control where temporary files MediaWiki needs are to be written to including:

• Old and new tempfiles for external executable based external diff engines configured by $wgExternalDiffEngine
• TempFSFile, used for chunked uploading, some transformations, and various parts of the file backend code.
• UID Generator node and lock files.
• Upload from URL
• The directory which a CACHE_DBA cache places it's DBA database file. Can be overridden using $wgObjectCaches[CACHE_DBA]['dir'].
• Importing uploads from XML dumps
• ...

MediaWiki version:

≤ 1.19

The path to the temporary directory. When using CACHE_DBA as your $wgMainCacheType, this allows you to select which directory is used.