Thanks all!

Cunctator - As Juergen notes, the search tool does index some major open access repositories already. We've gone back and forth on including open access repositories into the tool more directly (i.e. listing them in 'My Library') because we weren't sure what criteria to use for listing a publication/website, we could imagine quite easily having an unwieldy list of a huge number of free-to-read websites that's difficult to navigate. For that reason we focused on the paywalled repositories for now. Curious to hear if folks have any ideas about how we could include an open access/free-to-read section which has reasonable boundaries.

Anupam - "My Collections" are the resources which are available for you to access right now; by default you'll have a bunch here which are immediately accessible to all users. "Available Collections" are the additional resources which have a limited number of concurrent users; these you need to apply to access before they'll be added to "My Collections".

Xavier - We're absolutely looking to diversify the languages covered by the library's collections! Once you're logged in please head over to https://wikipedialibrary.wmflabs.org/suggest/ and add any suggestions you have, or 'upvote' other suggestions. We get all the content for the library through partnerships and this list, among others, directly feeds into our prioritisation of which resources to pursue.

Best,
Sam

On Thu, 20 Jan 2022 at 11:06, F. Xavier Dengra i Grau via Wikimedia-l <wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org> wrote:
Congratulations for this step forward and to everyone that has been involved!

The Wikipedia Library is amazing news for those that do not have institutional accesses. I know that it’s a bit early for this question, but maybe someone can already give me some answer :)

Is it expected that in the future we can agree with some paywall repositories/journals that offer publications in other (minor) languages to include the Wikipedia Library as one of their institutional accesses? In case of their approval or interest, to whom do we then address for the formalities?

Kind regards and thank you for this again!

Xavier Dengra


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‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐
El dimecres, 19 de gener 2022 a les 18:09, Sam Walton <swalton@wikimedia.org> va escriure:

Hi all,

We've just published a blog post summarising the new features and functionality available to active Wikipedia editors in The Wikipedia Library: https://diff.wikimedia.org/2022/01/19/the-wikipedia-library-accessing-free-reliable-sources-is-now-easier-than-ever/

The Wikipedia Library is a tool providing active Wikipedia editors with free access to otherwise-paywalled resources, including journals, books, newspapers, magazines, and databases. Over the past 5-10 years the library has built up a large collection of content from a wide range of publishers.

In the past couple of years we've been finalising the centralised Wikipedia Library tool used for accessing all this content: https://wikipedialibrary.wmflabs.org/. I'm really pleased to announce that we've finished work on some long-requested and planned features which make it really simple to use!

The library now has:
  • Proxy-based authentication for direct access of resources without a secondary login
  • A centralised search feature for browsing multiple collections from one place
  • An on-wiki notification to let editors know about the library when they have crossed the eligibility threshold (rolling out in stages throughout January)
As the project I first joined the Wikimedia Foundation to work on years ago I'm personally thrilled that we've finally been able to deploy all these features!

If you're eligible to use the library (500+ edits, 6+ months editing) you can jump in and start using the library straight away. We're now working on expanding and diversifying the content available in the library, so let us know on the suggestions page if there are collections you want us to make available: https://wikipedialibrary.wmflabs.org/suggest/

If the tool isn't currently localised into your language, you can translate it on TranslateWiki: https://translatewiki.net/wiki/Translating:Wikipedia_Library_Card_Platform

We're planning to host some Office Hours, which will be a chance to get a walkthrough of how to use the library, as well as discuss your research needs and requests for new collections with the team. Look out for more on that in the coming weeks.

--
Sam Walton
Product Manager, The Wikipedia Library


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--
Sam Walton
Product Manager, The Wikipedia Library