Hi everyone, I want to suggest to think about whether we want to create/let create a Wikipedia toolbar (as you all know from Ebay, Yahoo, Google, Nature etc.). This would enable even the most active Wikipedians (besides the less active visitors) to instantly search WP and - optionally later - to benefit from other 1-click features (eg "My watchlist" or "In the news" as well as "Recent changes" or "My contributions"). Even if I am not (yet) a programmer being capable of programming this ... I have found a page offering a toolbar kit (www.custom-toolbars.com). Further development issues should be clarified when a general opinion has been made ... pls discuss.
Mark
On Thu, Jan 15, 2004 at 09:23:06PM +0100, mark@kruegerbrothers.com wrote:
Hi everyone, I want to suggest to think about whether we want to create/let create a Wikipedia toolbar (as you all know from Ebay, Yahoo, Google, Nature etc.). This would enable even the most active Wikipedians (besides the less active visitors) to instantly search WP and - optionally later - to benefit from other 1-click features (eg "My watchlist" or "In the news" as well as "Recent changes" or "My contributions"). Even if I am not (yet) a programmer being capable of programming this ... I have found a page offering a toolbar kit (www.custom-toolbars.com). Further development issues should be clarified when a general opinion has been made ... pls discuss.
I think about 100% of the core-developers use Linux or MacOS as operating system. I bet that you will find no one who programms the toolbar for you ;-)
ciao, tom
Thomas R. Koll wrote:
I think about 100% of the core-developers use Linux or MacOS as operating system. I bet that you will find no one who programms the toolbar for you ;-)
Nonetheless, it is a fantastic idea. I have done some research, but some months ago now, and apparently
(a) it is not that hard to create a toolbar for MSIE, using Visual Basic even, and
(b) there seems to be no open source toolbar project out there.
---
For Mozilla (and at least some derivatives), it is possible to create a toolbar using only, what, xml? Some crazy thing about skins, blah blah blah. I seem to recall that this is what took Mozilla so long to develop.
--Jimbo
On Thursday 15 January 2004 04:41 pm, Jimmy Wales wrote:
Thomas R. Koll wrote:
I think about 100% of the core-developers use Linux or MacOS as operating system. I bet that you will find no one who programms the toolbar for you ;-)
Nonetheless, it is a fantastic idea. I have done some research, but some months ago now, and apparently
(a) it is not that hard to create a toolbar for MSIE, using Visual Basic even, and
(b) there seems to be no open source toolbar project out there.
That is because of two reasons: 1. "toolbars" are spyware in most cases. Spyware targets people who don't know much about computers, which happens to be people that use mainly non-free software.
2. most toolbar features are already integrated into the main browsers: firebird (mozilla) and konqueror. In konqueror I can type "gg:wikipedia" in the addressbox and it brings up the google search results for the query "wikipedia". One can create new search aliases like these in the options. But more interrestingly, there already is a wikipedia search integrated into konqueror eg. "wp:bomis". Firebird also already has search plugins for wikipedia (in 13 languages) but you have to install them from http://mycroft.mozdev.org/download.html - which so far has failed when I tried to install them.
Another interresting thing to note is that wordIQ (one of the many number of people that use our content without releasing it as GFDL and claiming copyright) has a toolbar, that allegedly searches their wikipedia clone. Allegedly because it uses IE, and I have no way of finding out.
Best, Sascha Noyes
On Thursday 15 January 2004 05:00 pm, Sascha Noyes wrote:
Firebird also already has search plugins for wikipedia (in 13 languages) but you have to install them from http://mycroft.mozdev.org/download.html - which so far has failed when I tried to install them.
Which was of course because I wasn't browsing the web as "root". 'doh :)
Best, Sascha Noyes
Sascha Noyes wrote:
That is because of two reasons: 1. "toolbars" are spyware in most cases. Spyware targets people who don't know much about computers, which happens to be people that use mainly non-free software.
To me, that should actually generate demand for a GNU-free alternative, right? People can trust that it's not doing anything evil, because the source is publicly available.
--Jimbo
On Jan 15, 2004, at 6:32 PM, Jimmy Wales wrote:
Sascha Noyes wrote:
That is because of two reasons: 1. "toolbars" are spyware in most cases. Spyware targets people who don't know much about computers, which happens to be people that use mainly non-free software.
To me, that should actually generate demand for a GNU-free alternative, right? People can trust that it's not doing anything evil, because the source is publicly available.
Unfortunately, most people in the toolbar market don't care. Most probably don't know what GNU means, or even what free software is. Many probably don't know what source code is.
BTW, this isn't to say open source isn't worth it in this effort. It's mainly just a rant about, well, whatever you call the uninformed masses of the computer world.
Windows users?
*shields self*
Peter
--- Funding for this program comes from Borders without Doctors: The Bookstore Chain That Sounds Like a Charity. --Harry Shearer, Le Show
On Thu, 1970-01-01 at 05:59, Peter Jaros wrote: ^^^^^^^^^^ Birth of Unix :)?
On Jan 15, 2004, at 6:32 PM, Jimmy Wales wrote:
Sascha Noyes wrote:
That is because of two reasons: 1. "toolbars" are spyware in most cases. Spyware targets people who don't know much about computers, which happens to be people that use mainly non-free software.
To me, that should actually generate demand for a GNU-free alternative, right? People can trust that it's not doing anything evil, because the source is publicly available.
Unfortunately, most people in the toolbar market don't care.
People in my domain 'Tamil' should care.
To define free as in freedom (specific to the need to translate for Wikipedia front page and the GFDL I consulted the most central place where many Tamil literary/linguistic interests lie.
I was amazed to find out (while getting some proper definitions by the way) how much people who care about software futures are worried by current practices.
They generally might not know the exact specifics of how source code is compiled etc. but it is abundantly clear that the proprietary players are pushing black boxes and that too along the ugliest global divides like economic wealth to further such division. That includes support for oppressive practices.
Most probably don't know what GNU means,
Well GNU's Not Unix.
If they do not know yet soon they will.
or even what free software is.
This people in non-English and non-German domains generally know. (free and frei (?) have dual meaning here...)
Many probably don't know what source code is.
BTW, this isn't to say open source isn't worth it in this effort. It's mainly just a rant about, well, whatever you call the uninformed masses of the computer world.
Windows users?
I do not fully understand what is said here but I disagree:) MS-Windows user however conned out of the bottoms they might be ... they cannot be written off.
Mozilla toolbar technology (XUL based I think) seems to be well supported. Mozilla works on MS-Windows. If we do anything with a Wikipedia toolbar then probably we have to have a good informative piece of writing under the 'help' -> 'about' section.
There is hope :)
Ramanan
On Jan 19, 2004, at 2:12 PM, Ramanan Selvaratnam wrote:
On Thu, 1970-01-01 at 05:59, Peter Jaros wrote: ^^^^^^^^^^ Birth of Unix :)?
Accident with a contraceptive and a time machine. Long story.
On Jan 15, 2004, at 6:32 PM, Jimmy Wales wrote:
To me, that should actually generate demand for a GNU-free alternative, right? People can trust that it's not doing anything evil, because the source is publicly available.
Unfortunately, most people in the toolbar market don't care.
I was amazed to find out (while getting some proper definitions by the way) how much people who care about software futures are worried by current practices.
They generally might not know the exact specifics of how source code is compiled etc. but it is abundantly clear that the proprietary players are pushing black boxes and that too along the ugliest global divides like economic wealth to further such division. That includes support for oppressive practices.
Well. I'm impressed and duly corrected.
BTW, this isn't to say open source isn't worth it in this effort. It's mainly just a rant about, well, whatever you call the uninformed masses of the computer world.
Windows users?
I do not fully understand what is said here but I disagree:) MS-Windows user however conned out of the bottoms they might be ... they cannot be written off.
Sorry. Don't mind me, it was just an attempt at humor, and a poor one at that.
Broadcasting from the present once again, Peter
--- Funding for this program comes from Borders without Doctors: The Bookstore Chain That Sounds Like a Charity. --Harry Shearer, Le Show
On Thu, 2004-01-15 at 21:41, Jimmy Wales wrote:
(b) there seems to be no open source toolbar project out there.
What will be nice is an applet that docs on the panel... like gdict for Gnome http://wlug.org.nz/gdict%281%29
To be really useful useful this would require something or the other running from the Wikipedia side serving content.
Anyone looked into this? Know difficult or easy it is?
Ramanan
Op do 15-01-2004, om 21:41 schreef Jimmy Wales:
(b) there seems to be no open source toolbar project out there.
For Mozilla (and at least some derivatives), it is possible to create a toolbar using only, what, xml? Some crazy thing about skins, blah blah blah. I seem to recall that this is what took Mozilla so long to develop.
It took so long because Mozilla never was just a browser, but a whole application development framework.
There are a lot of functions that will never be integrated in a main browser because they are too domain specific:
Here are some scientific toolbars:
http://msdbar.mozdev.org/ MSDbar is a Mozilla/Netscape toolbar application for searching the MSD and other macromolecular structure resources.
http://expasybar.mozdev.org/ ExPASyBar project. It is for all people who are interested in biochemistry. With ExPASyBar you can have simple access to the main ExPASy databases.
http://pubmed.mozdev.org/ The PubMed Toolbar increases your ability to search information in NLM Medline database trough PubMed interface.
Other toolbar project at Mozdev:
http://stumbleupon.mozdev.org/ StumbleUpon is a mozilla toolbar which acts as an intelligent browsing tool for discovering and sharing great web sites with other people.
http://companion.mozdev.org/ The idea of this project is to build the popular Yahoo! Companion for Gecko-based browsers such as the Mozilla Suite, Mozilla Firebird or Netscape.
http://gimli.mozdev.org/ The project gimli is born with the purpose of creating for mozilla the greater amount of toolbars like yahoo companion, of googlebar, and another.
Seeing all these makes it rather strange that no one came up with the idea earlier.
Wouter Vanden Hove www.opencursus.org www.open-education.org
mark@kruegerbrothers.com wrote:
Hi everyone, I want to suggest to think about whether we want to create/let create a Wikipedia toolbar (as you all know from Ebay, Yahoo, Google, Nature etc.). This would enable even the most active Wikipedians (besides the less active visitors) to instantly search WP and - optionally later - to benefit from other 1-click features (eg "My watchlist" or "In the news" as well as "Recent changes" or "My contributions"). Even if I am not (yet) a programmer being capable of programming this ... I have found a page offering a toolbar kit (www.custom-toolbars.com). Further development issues should be clarified when a general opinion has been made ... pls discuss.
Mark
This thing used to work for Mozilla (I expect Firebird as well): http://www.squarefree.com/bookmarklets/misc.html#add_sidebar
There seems to have appeared a bug of some sort which prevents it from really working properly (you can find a link to the bug on the page linked above).
A little introduction for the brave ones: drag the *link* "add sidebar" (yes, click and drag on the green text) to your bookmarks, visit the page you want to "sidebar-ize" and click that link from your bookmarks. Presto!
HTH
--Gutza
On Thu, 15 Jan 2004 21:23:06 +0100, mark-9hcUDxK07t8+ibij9IF1FkEOCMrvLtNR wrote:
How about http://www.mozilla.org/docs/end-user/keywords.html? examples: wen mypage- get http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/mypage wm Skins- gets http://meta.wikipedia.org/Skins
----- Original Message ----- From: "Gabriel Wicke" groups@gabrielwicke.de To: wikipedia-l@wikipedia.org Sent: Friday, January 16, 2004 10:55 AM Subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: Wikipedia Toolbar
On Thu, 15 Jan 2004 21:23:06 +0100, mark-9hcUDxK07t8+ibij9IF1FkEOCMrvLtNR wrote:
How about http://www.mozilla.org/docs/end-user/keywords.html? examples: wen mypage- get http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/mypage wm Skins- gets http://meta.wikipedia.org/Skins -- Gabriel Wicke
Excellent !!! I created "en:", "fr:" and "ja:".
Aoineko
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