Hello all,
Every year, the month of October is dedicated to celebrating Wikidata’s
birthday, as our favorite Wikimedia project went live on October 29th,
2012. Since then, we’ve been celebrating together the achievements of the
community, bringing together active editors and newcomers, and taking this
opportunity to do outreach and bring more people onboard.
This year, for Wikidata’s 12th birthday, we would love to see many
decentralized community events taking place all around the world in October
and November.
Whether you are involved in a local chapter or user group, or in touch with
another organization that could organize an event, or simply interested in
connecting with other Wikidata editors, we invite you to start thinking
about organizing a Wikidata birthday event in the upcoming months!
On the Twelfth Birthday page
<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:Twelfth_Birthday>, you will find
more information about the birthday and how to organize an event.
Wikidata birthday decentralized events are organized by local groups within
the Wikidata community, onsite as well as online. They can take many forms
and can be adapted to the wishes, languages, favorite topics and interests
of the local group. It can be for example:
-
A meetup / get together with your local/regional community to share a
piece of birthday cake ;
-
An online editing campaign to improve Wikidata together on a specific
topic ;
-
A moment dedicated to celebrating Wikidata’s birthday during a Wikimedia
conference ;
-
A “translathon” to improve the labels of Wikidata in your language ;
-
A workshop in a library or university to get more people aware of
Wikidata ;
-
A livestream presentation to showcase interesting tools ;
-
…and many other things!
On the How to run an event page
<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:Twelfth_Birthday/Run_an_event>, you
will find many other examples of events, and you can take inspiration from
the past years and what other people have been organizing.
You will also find a communication kit with visuals that you can use to
communicate about your event, and instructions on how to add your event to
the global schedule.
If you are planning an event for Wikidata’s birthday, you may need some
financial support in order to run the event smoothly. On the Funding page
<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:Twelfth_Birthday/Run_an_event/Funding>,
you will find some useful information about how to get funding, to help
your participants join or to provide equipment or refreshments.
What is new this year: Wikimedia Deutschland will run an experiment on
providing microgrants to fund projects related to the Wikidata birthday.
These grants, of a maximum amount of 1,000€, will be provided to the
selected projects after an application process that is running until
September 1st. You also have the option to ask for WMF’s Rapid Fund if the
amount or eligibility criteria work better for you. You will find all the
information about how to apply and what to prepare on the Funding page
<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:Twelfth_Birthday/Run_an_event/Funding>
.
If you are interested in organizing an event, we strongly encourage you to do
it together with other people. We suggest that you reach out to your local
affiliate to get logistical and communication support, or to other Wikidata
editors who share similar interests, for example your favorite WikiProject.
You are also very welcome to join the Wikidata Events Telegram group
<https://t.me/joinchat/HGjGexK8LA2wJZEk1x1p_A>, in which you will find
other community organizers who have been running events in the past and can
answer your questions or provide inspiration. On top of that, we are
running organizers office hours
<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:Twelfth_Birthday/Run_an_event#Connec…>
from July to October: you can join these online meetings to connect with
other organizers and ask questions to the coordination team.
I’m looking forward to hearing about your Wikidata birthday events, and I’m
available at lea.lacroix_ext(a)wikimedia.de if you have any questions.
Best,
--
Léa Lacroix
Community Engagement & Events Consultant
Contractor for Wikimedia Deutschland e.V.
Hello,
Last week, we announced that a limited release of the “default values for
all languages” feature—introducing the language code "mul" for labels and
aliases—will soon be coming to Wikidata. We are currently working on
improvements for “mul” in the Termbox on Item pages. We’ve already received
feedback from some of you on the discussion pages, but we’d also love to
hear from those who prefer to *provide* *anonymous feedback*.
Please share your thoughts on this 5-10 minute anonymous survey until
August 4: https://wikimedia.sslsurvey.de/Wikidata-default-values-feedback
If you have any questions or concerns feel free to let us know in this
Phabricator ticket (phab:T356169 <https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T356169>
)
Many thanks for your time.
-Mohammed
On Mon, Jul 22, 2024 at 10:03 AM Mohammed Sadat Abdulai <
mohammed.abdulai(a)wikimedia.de> wrote:
> *(This [SIGNIFICANT Change Announcement] is relevant for all Wikidata
> users working with Labels and Aliases.)*
>
> Hello,
>
> You may recall our previous announcement
> <https://lists.wikimedia.org/hyperkitty/list/wikidata@lists.wikimedia.org/me…>
> inviting you to test out the “default values for all languages” feature,
> introducing the language code "mul" for labels and aliases, on
> https://test.wikidata.org. I'm pleased to announce that we are now
> proceeding with a limited release on Wikidata. This feature will be
> available for testing starting July 29.
>
> Note of Caution and Tips for Testing
>
>
> -
>
> To try out the new feature during this limited release, you need to
> add the language code “mul” to your Babel boxes
> <https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:Userboxes#Babel>. A full
> release will follow on the week of August 12, displaying default values to
> everyone by default.
> -
>
> Please refrain from starting any Bot-runs for mul during the limited
> release. We will use this limited release to test the performance and
> verify that everything works as planned. Bot-runs for mul should only
> commence after the full feature is released.
> -
>
> Please also test the help page
> <https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Help:Default_values_for_labels_and_aliases>
> explaining how to use the feature. It will be important to get this help
> page right, as the full release will initially contain an onboarding
> element that guides people to this help page.
>
>
> I would like to thank everyone who has participated in the previous
> testing phases or provided feedback thus far. We are eager to hear more
> from you during this limited release. Please do not hesitate to reach out
> with questions or concerns on the talk page of the Help page
> <https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Help_talk:Default_values_for_labels_and_alias…>,
> or for technical details, in this Phabricator ticket (phab:T356169
> <https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T356169>)
>
> There has also been some discussion on the help page
> <https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Help_talk:Default_values_for_labels_and_alias…>
> regarding the copy used for the language. We would like to reach a
> consensus before the full release. Join the discussion to add your thoughts
> and input on the thread. This week, a survey will be included in the Weekly
> Summary for those who prefer to provide anonymous feedback.
>
> Cheers!
>
>
> -Mohammed
>
> On Mon, Feb 12, 2024 at 9:00 AM Mohammed Sadat Abdulai <
> mohammed.abdulai(a)wikimedia.de> wrote:
>
>> (This announcement is relevant for all Wikidata users working with Labels
>> and Aliases.)
>>
>>
>> Hello,
>>
>> We're excited to invite you to participate in the community testing of
>> the “default values for labels and aliases” feature. Based on a
>> long-standing community request around language fallback (T285156
>> <https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T285156>), and based on your feedback
>> from our previous announcement
>> <https://lists.wikimedia.org/hyperkitty/list/wikidata@lists.wikimedia.org/me…>,
>> we are currently testing this feature on https://test.wikidata.org
>> <https://test.wikidata.org/wiki/Q42> with the release planned for Q1
>> 2024.
>>
>> What is coming?
>>
>> 1.
>>
>> Default values for labels and aliases (mul): Items that repeat the
>> same label and aliases over and over are hard to maintain and can strain
>> our infrastructure, especially the Wikidata Query Service. As a solution,
>> we are introducing the option for default values in the termbox. The
>> default values are considered in the language fallback chain (language code
>> “mul”).
>>
>>
>>
>> 2.
>>
>> Visualisation of the language fallback chain: Previously, Wikidata’s
>> fallback chain was not visible in the user interface, making it challenging
>> to determine if additional information was needed. As a first step toward
>> improvement, we will now clearly show what content is already available via
>> language fallback in the placeholders for labels (including default values).
>>
>>
>> We need your feedback
>>
>> Please leave your feedback on Help talk:Default values for labels and
>> aliases
>> <https://www.wikidata.org/w/index.php?title=Help_talk:Default_values_for_lab…>.
>> Your feedback will play a crucial role in verifying if the current version
>> is ready for Wikidata. Additionally, you can find some test Items, known
>> limitations and open questions there for you to review. We will analyze
>> your feedback one week after today's announcement.
>>
>> The next steps
>>
>> After you have left your feedback, please make sure that the guidelines
>> on Help:Default values for labels and aliases
>> <https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Help:Default_values_for_labels_and_aliases>
>> are ready for the launch. You can also already plan bot-runs for mul,
>> but please be sure to start with uncontroversial cases. If there are no
>> blockers, we will then prepare a limited release on Wikidata in the
>> coming weeks. The limited release will only be visible if you put mul in
>> your Babel boxes. We will use this limited release to test the performance
>> and verify that everything works as planned. Please don’t start any
>> bot-runs for mul during the limited release. A full release will follow
>> a few weeks later, displaying default values for everyone by default, and
>> featuring an onboarding element that will guide people to the help page.
>> Bot-runs for mul can commence at this stage.
>>
>> Do not hesitate to reach out with questions or concerns in the talk page
>> of the help page
>> <https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Help_talk:Default_values_for_labels_and_alias…>
>> and for technical details in this Phabricator ticket (T356169
>> <https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T356169>).
>>
>>
>> Thank you for your support!
>>
>> Cheers,
>> --
>> Mohammed Sadat Abdulai
>> *Community Communications Manager, Wikidata*
>>
>> Wikimedia Deutschland e. V. | Tempelhofer Ufer 23-24 | 10963 Berlin
>> Phone: +49 (0) 30 577 116 2466
>> https://wikimedia.de
>>
>> Grab a spot in my calendar for a chat: calendly.com/masssly.
>>
>> A lot is happening around Wikidata - Keep up to date!
>> <https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:Status_updates> Current news and
>> exciting stories about Wikimedia, Wikipedia and Free Knowledge in our
>> newsletter (in German): Subscribe now
>> <https://www.wikimedia.de/newsletter/>.
>>
>> Imagine a world in which every single human being can freely share in the
>> sum of all knowledge. Help us to achieve our vision!
>> https://spenden.wikimedia.de
>>
>> Wikimedia Deutschland — Gesellschaft zur Förderung Freien Wissens e. V.
>> Eingetragen im Vereinsregister des Amtsgerichts Charlottenburg, VR 23855 B.
>> Als gemeinnützig anerkannt durch das Finanzamt für Körperschaften I Berlin,
>> Steuernummer 27/029/42207. Geschäftsführende Vorstände: Franziska Heine,
>> Dr. Christian Humborg
>>
>
Hello,
It's my honor to announce the release of Forage, a new simplified editor
for Wikidata - which can also be used for other Wikibase installations,
with some configuration changes. Like other tools, such as Cradle, Forage
offers a more structured approach to editing than the standard
Wikidata/Wikibase interface, though Forage does seem to have some
advantages over previous tools in terms of ease-of-use. It is structured as
a JavaScript user script, so all you have to do to install it is to add the
following line to the /common.js subpage of your user page on Wikidata:
importScript('User:Techwizzie/forage.js');
Once you do that, you will see a new tab, "Add property values", on the
page of any item on Wikidata; clicking on it will show a form for adding
values, based on the "classes" (i.e., "instance of" values) of that item.
Note that Forage only lets you add data, not modify or remove existing
data; this was a design decision we made to allow it to be a "safer" and
more worry-free editing experience, especially for beginning editors.
Forage was created by Sanjay Thiyagarajan, Naresh Kumar Babu and myself,
and started off as a project at the Wikimedia Hackathon in Estonia.
You can see more about Forage, including a lot of screenshots, at its
GitHub page:
https://github.com/sanjay-thiyagarajan/forage
(You can also add translations there, for non-English languages - we look
forward to those.)
We hope you try it out, and we welcome any feedback!
-Yaron
--
WikiWorks · MediaWiki Consulting · http://wikiworks.com
Hello,
I've curated a list of Wikimania sessions focused around Wikidata, or have
*some* connection to Wikidata:
https://wikimania.wikimedia.org/wiki/2024:Program/Wikidata
Feel free to add to the list if I missed something, including any Wikidata
meetups you may be hosting.
Happy Wikimania!
--
Mohammed S. Abdulai
*Community Communications Manager, Wikidata*
Wikimedia Deutschland e. V. | Tempelhofer Ufer 23-24 | 10963 Berlin
Phone: +49 (0) 30 577 116 2466
https://wikimedia.de
Grab a spot in my calendar for a chat: cal.com/masssly.
A lot is happening around Wikidata - Keep up to date!
<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:Status_updates> Current news and
exciting stories about Wikimedia, Wikipedia and Free Knowledge in our
newsletter (in German): Subscribe now <https://www.wikimedia.de/newsletter/>
.
Imagine a world in which every single human being can freely share in the
sum of all knowledge. Help us to achieve our vision!
https://spenden.wikimedia.de
Wikimedia Deutschland — Gesellschaft zur Förderung Freien Wissens e. V.
Eingetragen im Vereinsregister des Amtsgerichts Charlottenburg, VR 23855 B.
Als gemeinnützig anerkannt durch das Finanzamt für Körperschaften I Berlin,
Steuernummer 27/029/42207. Geschäftsführende Vorstände: Franziska Heine,
Dr. Christian Humborg
Hello,
You may recall that the Wikidata development team at Wikimedia
Deutschland requested
a CentralNotice banner
<https://lists.wikimedia.org/hyperkitty/list/wikidata@lists.wikimedia.org/me…>
to deploy the Wikidata community survey. I'm pleased to inform you that the
request
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/CentralNotice/Request#Wikidata_Community_Su…>
was approved. The banner will be displayed for 13 days starting from July
16 and will be closed on July 28.
Your responses to this survey will help us understand the diverse ways
people contribute to Wikidata and identify patterns in user contributions.
This information will support our efforts to foster a healthy, inclusive
community and inform future efforts of improving the project for everyone.
The survey is brief and will only require 10 minutes of your time to
complete.
Link to Survey (open until July 28):
https://wikimedia.sslsurvey.de/Wikidata_Community_Survey_2024
More information about the survey, the use of the data, and the questions
asked: Wikidata:Usability and usefulness/2024-Community-Survey
<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:Usability_and_usefulness/2024-Commun…>
Many thanks for your participation. If you have any questions please do not
hesitate to write on the discussion page linked here
<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata_talk:Usability_and_usefulness/2024-C…>
.
Cheers,
--
Mohammed S. Abdulai
*Community Communications Manager, Wikidata*
Wikimedia Deutschland e. V. | Tempelhofer Ufer 23-24 | 10963 Berlin
Phone: +49 (0) 30 577 116 2466
https://wikimedia.de
Grab a spot in my calendar for a chat: cal.com/masssly.
A lot is happening around Wikidata - Keep up to date!
<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:Status_updates> Current news and
exciting stories about Wikimedia, Wikipedia and Free Knowledge in our
newsletter (in German): Subscribe now <https://www.wikimedia.de/newsletter/>
.
Imagine a world in which every single human being can freely share in the
sum of all knowledge. Help us to achieve our vision!
https://spenden.wikimedia.de
Wikimedia Deutschland — Gesellschaft zur Förderung Freien Wissens e. V.
Eingetragen im Vereinsregister des Amtsgerichts Charlottenburg, VR 23855 B.
Als gemeinnützig anerkannt durch das Finanzamt für Körperschaften I Berlin,
Steuernummer 27/029/42207. Geschäftsführende Vorstände: Franziska Heine,
Dr. Christian Humborg
(This announcement is relevant for all Wikidata users working with Labels
and Aliases.)
Hello,
We're excited to invite you to participate in the community testing of the
“default values for labels and aliases” feature. Based on a long-standing
community request around language fallback (T285156
<https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T285156>), and based on your feedback
from our previous announcement
<https://lists.wikimedia.org/hyperkitty/list/wikidata@lists.wikimedia.org/me…>,
we are currently testing this feature on https://test.wikidata.org
<https://test.wikidata.org/wiki/Q42> with the release planned for Q1 2024.
What is coming?
1.
Default values for labels and aliases (mul): Items that repeat the same
label and aliases over and over are hard to maintain and can strain our
infrastructure, especially the Wikidata Query Service. As a solution, we
are introducing the option for default values in the termbox. The
default values are considered in the language fallback chain (language code
“mul”).
1.
Visualisation of the language fallback chain: Previously, Wikidata’s
fallback chain was not visible in the user interface, making it challenging
to determine if additional information was needed. As a first step toward
improvement, we will now clearly show what content is already available via
language fallback in the placeholders for labels (including default values).
We need your feedback
Please leave your feedback on Help talk:Default values for labels and
aliases
<https://www.wikidata.org/w/index.php?title=Help_talk:Default_values_for_lab…>.
Your feedback will play a crucial role in verifying if the current version
is ready for Wikidata. Additionally, you can find some test Items, known
limitations and open questions there for you to review. We will analyze
your feedback one week after today's announcement.
The next steps
After you have left your feedback, please make sure that the
guidelines on Help:Default
values for labels and aliases
<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Help:Default_values_for_labels_and_aliases>
are ready for the launch. You can also already plan bot-runs for mul, but
please be sure to start with uncontroversial cases. If there are no
blockers, we will then prepare a limited release on Wikidata in the coming
weeks. The limited release will only be visible if you put mul in your
Babel boxes. We will use this limited release to test the performance and
verify that everything works as planned. Please don’t start any bot-runs
for mul during the limited release. A full release will follow a few weeks
later, displaying default values for everyone by default, and featuring an
onboarding element that will guide people to the help page. Bot-runs for mul
can commence at this stage.
Do not hesitate to reach out with questions or concerns in the talk page of
the help page
<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Help_talk:Default_values_for_labels_and_alias…>
and for technical details in this Phabricator ticket (T356169
<https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T356169>).
Thank you for your support!
Cheers,
--
Mohammed Sadat Abdulai
*Community Communications Manager, Wikidata*
Wikimedia Deutschland e. V. | Tempelhofer Ufer 23-24 | 10963 Berlin
Phone: +49 (0) 30 577 116 2466
https://wikimedia.de
Grab a spot in my calendar for a chat: calendly.com/masssly.
A lot is happening around Wikidata - Keep up to date!
<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:Status_updates> Current news and
exciting stories about Wikimedia, Wikipedia and Free Knowledge in our
newsletter (in German): Subscribe now <https://www.wikimedia.de/newsletter/>
.
Imagine a world in which every single human being can freely share in the
sum of all knowledge. Help us to achieve our vision!
https://spenden.wikimedia.de
Wikimedia Deutschland — Gesellschaft zur Förderung Freien Wissens e. V.
Eingetragen im Vereinsregister des Amtsgerichts Charlottenburg, VR 23855 B.
Als gemeinnützig anerkannt durch das Finanzamt für Körperschaften I Berlin,
Steuernummer 27/029/42207. Geschäftsführende Vorstände: Franziska Heine,
Dr. Christian Humborg
Hi everyone,
Our next Wikidata+Wikibase office hour
<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:Events#Office_hours> is scheduled
for Wednesday 10th July at 16:00 UTC (18:00 Berlin). As usual, the office
hour will happen in the Wikidata Telegram group
<https://t.me/joinchat/IeCRo0j5Uag1qR4Tk8Ftsg>.
*What's the Wikidata+Wikibase office hour?*
*The Wikidata and Wikibase office hours are online events where the
development team at WMDE presents what we have been working on over the
past quarter, and the community is welcome to ask questions and discuss
important issues related to the development of Wikidata and Wikibase.*
Make sure to note the date in your calendars.
Cheers,
--
Mohammed S. Abdulai
*Community Communications Manager, Wikidata*
Wikimedia Deutschland e. V. | Tempelhofer Ufer 23-24 | 10963 Berlin
Phone: +49 (0) 30 577 116 2466
https://wikimedia.de
Grab a spot in my calendar for a chat: cal.com/masssly.
A lot is happening around Wikidata - Keep up to date!
<https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:Status_updates> Current news and
exciting stories about Wikimedia, Wikipedia and Free Knowledge in our
newsletter (in German): Subscribe now <https://www.wikimedia.de/newsletter/>
.
Imagine a world in which every single human being can freely share in the
sum of all knowledge. Help us to achieve our vision!
https://spenden.wikimedia.de
Wikimedia Deutschland — Gesellschaft zur Förderung Freien Wissens e. V.
Eingetragen im Vereinsregister des Amtsgerichts Charlottenburg, VR 23855 B.
Als gemeinnützig anerkannt durch das Finanzamt für Körperschaften I Berlin,
Steuernummer 27/029/42207. Geschäftsführende Vorstände: Franziska Heine,
Dr. Christian Humborg