How to read "Wikipedia" in case of its possible blocking

March 1 Roskomnadzor notified Russian-language "Wikipedia" about a possible blocking due to the article "Russian invasion of Ukraine (2022)". If access to the resource is really limited, then it is worth preparing for this in advance.

One of the easiest ways to bypass blocking is to use a VPN. There are many convenient free services and paid analogues with favorable rates, but you can configure and your VPN server.

If you do not want to depend on the stability of the Internet connection, then you can download Wikipedia for offline access. This will require app Kiwix. It is available for free on all major platforms including Windows, macOS and mobile OS.

When downloading the Windows version of the program, you will receive an archive that you need to unpack, and then run the kiwix-desktop.exe file in it - installation is not required.

In essence, Kiwix is ​​an offline browser, so next you need to download the archives of the necessary web resources - for this, there is a special website on the Kiwix website.

library section, which also has Wikipedia. It is available in three versions: 4.43 GB, 14.97 GB and 30.42 GB. To access full articles, not abstracts, you need to download at least the second one - click Download and then Direct.

The archive will be downloaded to the PC in ZIM format. To open it, in Kiwix, click on the folder icon in the upper right corner and select the downloaded file.

The main article will open with all the sections. In the search bar at the top, you can type queries - words, concepts and events that you want to find on offline Wikipedia.

We also note that Wikipedia itself also has a page with instructions for bypassing the block. And if the resource is blocked, then you can open a copy of this page on other sites:

• at the Internet Archive;
• at Archive.is;
• Wikipedia.org. (with a dot after the domain name).