The on-wiki version of this newsletter can be found here:
https://www.wikifunctions.org/wiki/Wikifunctions:Status_updates/2024-05-03
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Team meeting in San Francisco
<https://www.wikifunctions.org/wiki/File:Maiden_Lane,_San_Francisco_-_View_from_Union_Square_-_2021-04-11.jpg>Maiden
Lane, San Francisco, view from near the office
Last week saw our annual team meeting, and this time we gathered for the
first and last time in the current office space of the Wikimedia Foundation
in San Francisco. Some of us met for the first time, and we used the
meeting to get to know each other, and to sketch out our plans for upcoming
work on Abstract Wikipedia and Wikifunctions.
We improved our shared understanding of the project and how we work
together, and one of the results is our plan for this quarter, which we
present below.
We also had interesting discussions around how Abstract Wikipedia could
look like in the future. We want to capture some of the thoughts from that
session in more detail in an upcoming update, as it opens many questions
for how Abstract Wikipedia can flourish and grow as a project that is
rooted and anchored in the work of our contributors.
It was a bittersweet opportunity for the team to see the current office, as
the Wikimedia Foundation will move to a smaller office space
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Foundation_Annual_Plan/2024-2025/Goals/Effectiveness#Evolve_processes_and_the_way_we_work_to_strengthen_our_effectiveness>
in
the fall as our lease ends.
Quarterly planning
One of the results of the meeting was to establish a plan for the current
quarter. Here is a quick overview of the main tasks we will be working on:
- *Visual prototype for Wikipedia integration
<https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T363392>*: based on our ongoing
research, what could designs for the integration of Wikifunctions into
Wikipedia look like? This will also be used to improve cross-functional
collaboration and to identify next steps towards building Abstract
Wikipedia.
- *Type support for identity / enumeration
<https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T363390>*: supporting types that have
a specific set of values, such as grammatical number in English (plural,
singular), cases in Russian (nominative, dative, etc.), signs for integers
(positive, negative, and neutral), or months in the year (January,
February, etc.). This should allow us to create all types that are
necessary to access lexicographic data in Wikidata, which would come next.
- *Improve production monitoring
<https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T363387>*: so we have an easier time
understanding when something goes wrong, or where the time in orchestration
and evaluation is going. This will also inform future work on caching,
which is critical for integration into Wikipedia.
- *Improve integration with MediaWiki core tests and other test support
<https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T363389>*: changes to core are
currently not automatically tested against the WikiLambda extension. We
will work on changing that.
- *Demos in a box <https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T363394>*: provide
resources that help community members to give presentations about
Wikifunctions and Abstract Wikipedia.
- *Wikifunctions’s UX drives user behavior to increase linguistic
accessibility <https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T363383>*: changes to
the UX that make it easier for users to provide missing translations and a
better experience in other languages than English.
- *DB table for expanded metrics support
<https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T363439>*: allow for collecting more
metrics about Wikifunctions.
- *Help users debugging implementations by providing more metadata
<https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T363384>*: function calls are
currently a bit of a black box. We want to provide some more insight into
what is going on inside a function call, and this might help contributors
fix issues more easily.
An overview of this quarter’s work can be seen in a brand new Phabricator
board <https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/project/board/7067/>. All the
tasks listed above are represented in the column “Epics for this quarter”.
Recent Changes in the software and Function of the Week
Because this newsletter is already so long, and due to the team meeting and
the Hackathon, we are skipping these sections this week.
Volunteers’ corner on May 6
On Monday, May 6, 2024, we are going to have our Volunteers’ corner at
17:30 UTC <https://zonestamp.toolforge.org/1715016600>. Bring questions and
curiosity! We will give an overview of recent changes, ongoing work, have
ample opportunities to answer questions and discuss concerns by the
community, and if there’s time, also work collaboratively on a function.
Abstract Wikipedia team at the Wikimedia Hackathon in Tallinn
This weekend sees the Wikimedia Hackathon 2024
<https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Hackathon_2024> in Tallinn,
Estonia. James Forrester of the Abstract Wikipedia team will be there and
if you want to discuss anything about Wikifunctions or Abstract Wikipedia,
feel free to approach him. (Also, he’s an awesome fellow to chat with even
if you don’t.)