Hi everyone,
*tl;dr: We'll be stripping all content contained inside brackets from the
first sentence of articles in the Wikipedia app.*
The Mobile Apps Team is focussed on making the app a beautiful and engaging
reader experience, and trying to support use cases like wanting to look
something up quickly to find what it is. Unfortunately, there are several
aspects of Wikipedia at present that are actively detrimental to that goal.
One example of this are the lead sentences.
As mentioned in the other thread on this matter
<https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/mobile-l/2015-March/008715.html>,
lead sentences are poorly formatted and contain information that is
detrimental to quickly looking up a topic. The team did a quick audit
<https://docs.google.com/a/wikimedia.org/spreadsheets/d/1BJ7uDgzO8IJT0M3UM2q…>
of
the information available inside brackets in the first sentences, and
typically it is pronunciation information which is probably better placed
in the infobox rather than breaking up the first sentence. The other
problem is that this information was typically inserted and previewed on a
platform where space is not at a premium, and that calculation is different
on mobile devices.
In order to better serve the quick lookup use case, the team has reached
the decision to strip anything inside brackets in the first sentence of
articles in the Wikipedia app.
Stripping content is not a decision to be made lightly. People took the
time to write it, and that should be respected. We realise this is
controversial. That said, it's the opinion of the team that the problem is
pretty clear: this content is not optimised for users quickly looking
things up on mobile devices at all, and will take a long time to solve
through alternative means. A quicker solution is required.
The screenshots below are mockups of the before and after of the change.
These are not final, I just put them together quickly to illustrate what
I'm talking about.
- Before: http://i.imgur.com/VwKerbv.jpg
- After: http://i.imgur.com/2A5PLmy.jpg
If you have any questions, let me know.
Thanks,
Dan
--
Dan Garry
Associate Product Manager, Mobile Apps
Wikimedia Foundation
Hi
WikiMed, the 50.000 articles big medical Encylcopaedia from Wikipedia is
now available on the Microsoft Windows app store:
https://www.microsoft.com/store/apps/9PHJSNP1CZ8J
Based on the Kiwix offline technologies, Wikimed for Windows completes
the famous WikiMed apps for Android and iOS. But, to the contrary to the
other ports, this version is motorized by a pure Javascript engine,
similar to the one of Kiwix for Firefox and Chrome.
We hope that Windows mobile users will appreciate it... like all other
Windows users... They all can easily install it... even on an Xbox!
Regards
Emmanuel
--
Kiwix - Wikipedia Offline & more
* Web: http://www.kiwix.org
* Twitter: https://twitter.com/KiwixOffline
* more: http://www.kiwix.org/wiki/Communication
Hi everyone,
We've released an updated version of the Wikipedia Android app
<https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.wikipedia&hl=en>, now
available on the Google Play store! (For devices without Google Play
services, you may download
<https://releases.wikimedia.org/mobile/android/wikipedia/stable/wikipedia-2.…>
the app directly)
This is a relatively minor update that focuses on performance improvements
in the Reading Lists feature, especially with very large numbers of
articles in reading lists.
We're also introducing the idea of a "default" reading list, created
automatically, allowing you to save articles with fewer taps, while
retaining the option to create and organize other lists as before.
Cheers,
--
Dmitry Brant
Senior Software Engineer (Android)
Wikimedia Foundation
https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Wikimedia_mobile_engineering
Hello mobile wikimedians,
Now available on the App Store: the latest update of the Wikipedia app
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/wikipedia/id324715238?ls=1&mt=8
This is a small update to improve stability when using the Table of
Contents on iPad, and to address an minor issue with deleting search
history items.
Thanks,
Josh Minor
Product Manager, Wikipedia for iOS
