Greetings WLM Members,

Version 1.2.3 of the WLM Android App is on Google Play and here. We have made some improvements and in particular, there is an important enhancement related to camera photos.

Yes, camera photos. Please let me explain.

The app is a great way to find monuments, but many participants in WLM use cameras to take the photos they will submit to the contest.

It is great to submit mobile photos to the contest as well, but cameras generally offer better quality and control. So why not upload mobile photos as placeholders, to make camera submissions easier?

The following blog post, which will be published tomorrow, explains how this works.


Using the Wiki Loves Monuments App as a travel log

Posted by  on September 10th, 2012

The Wiki Loves Monuments Android App is a great way to take photos and upload them to Wikimedia Commons during the world’s largest photo contest throughout September. But what if you are shooting with a camera and don’t see yourself taking too many photos with your mobile phone? You can now use the app as a convenient travel log and make it much easier to organize your photos when processing and uploading them at home.

Here’s how you use the app as a travel log. As you walk around finding monuments nearby to shoot with your camera, use the app on your phone to find the monuments and take a picture of them to upload, either on the road or when you get home. Back on your computer, your uploaded mobile photos will be a convenient record of all the monuments you visited, sitting on Commons under “My uploads.”

As an added bonus, every mobile upload you add to Commons will include a link to the Special Upload Wizard that automatically allows you to upload and categorize more photos of that monument based on its campaign and reference number. This is similar to clicking the “upload photo” button on the monument lists in Wikipedia, but it is right there in your travel log.

A screenshot of the new travel log feature associated with WLM app photos uploaded to Commons.

To see your travel log and use this feature, you must login at commons.wikimedia.org and click on “My uploads” at the top. Click on the name of any uploaded photo and the file page of that photo will open. Scroll down and below the description you will see the link, “Upload more photos of this monument.”

The travel log can help you in two ways:

  1. you will see a sequential list of the monuments you visited, which helps in identifying the monuments taken on your camera
  2. you can submit the photos from your camera for each monument directly from the travel log

The latest app, version 1.2.3, has been published in the Google Play store and that version has this new feature. Please update the app if you downloaded it before and do not have auto-updates turned on. If you have good ideas about photo uploads in general, or improvements next year, feel free to post feedback or send email.

You may also download the app here, or on the F-Droid market.

We appreciate your support. Happy uploading!

Phil Chang, Product Manager, Mobile


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Phil Inje Chang
Product Manager, Mobile
Wikimedia Foundation
415-812-0854 m
415-882-7982 x 6810