(Apologies for not getting to this sooner)
On 8/10/07, Brianna Laugher brianna.laugher@gmail.com wrote:
- Improved search.
Dumping Mayflower in there would be a great start: http://tools.wikimedia.de/~tangotango/mayflower/ I suggest replacing the current search box with a Mayflower search box, and moving the current text search box below the toolbox.
I will try to write a JavaScript-based search as a stop-gap measure once the API actually returns search results:-) I have some ideas for improving search results, and for mixed text/image search results.
- Rating system
I would like a simple youtube-style 5star rating thing for image pages, for logged-in users. More importantly it should be possible to sort search results (and maybe categories?) according to rating. This is important because, if you think about Wikipedia, any search query likely has only half a dozen highly relevant results at most. Most I would wager only have one. But on Commons, querying over individual images, a reasonable search query can and often does have dozens or even hundreds of results. The best way to sift through them would be by ratings. There is only so much manual rating we can do (and we are doing it). As Commons grows this is only going to get worse. This may not seem like a priority simply because we don't have the functionality now, but I have a strong feeling this is the right direction.
I could invest some time in this.
- Improved category handling
If the search was improved enough, it might make categories (and galleries) more or less irrelevant. I can only pray. However for the moment categories are often used for navigation. The bug of not putting all subcats on the first page is a frequent problem. The problem of not seeing the total number of items in the category is a problem. The lack of ability to sort a category by, e.g. date item was added to it, or date item was uploaded, is a problem. The lack of ability to 'auto-flatten' a category is a problem.
If by "auto-flatten" you mean display images in subcategories in the parent category, this might be doable with JavaScript. If you mean moving iamges to a parent category, there's my semi-automatic [[MediaWiki:Cat-a-lot.js]].
- Global native MW Checkusage, CommonsTicker functionality.
Checkusage is an utterly vital tool for us.
There is my JavaScript-based Check-usage: http://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Image:Valeriana_officinalis_2... which works through query.php (yay multi-site query capability!), but it can be quite slow.
- User upload gallery function
I think I wrote this some time ago (last year?). It was deactivated or reverted because there was (is?) no index on the upload user.
- Bulk upload function
This and image moving from another MediaWiki site could be eased by external tools quite easily, except that there are heavy restrictions on the file upload field. I once wrote an "upload from http site" function, but it is, of course, deactivated...
- Auto-resize galleries according to window size.
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/MediaWiki_talk:ResizeGalleries.js
This will have to stay JavaScript, I guess; even if you can see the window size of the user when requesting the page, returning a different page for each request would mess up caching. Also, to resize the gallery when the window is resized after loading the page requires JavaScript anyway. I could try to have it execute sooner that it currently does, so you won't see the "jump" when resizing.
- Category and gallery 'previews'
Example: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:SWB9470_Puetzstrasse.jpg?withJS=Medi... http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/MediaWiki_talk:Gallerypreview.js This has improved usability so much even for me, an experienced user. It just makes you so much more likely to explore. And that is fantastic for how people should ideally use our site.
I rewrote my JavaScript as an extension some month ago, as "MiniPreview". As there is, as usual, no interest to get it working on the live site by the people who *could* make it live, I have not wasted^W spent as much time on it that on the JavaScript one.
- "Fotonotes".
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/MediaWiki:ImageBoxes.js (a start, but I think not totally user friendly yet) Ability to put user annotations directly on an image. Another one of those things that once we start using I'm sure we won't be able to do without.
I have updated this a few days ago to actually show the box you draw while drawing. I can add "auto-edit" to this. However, parts of this will always stay JavaScript, and unless we get some new tagging mode, using edits/templates/categories for this seems as good a way as any.
Cheers, Magnus