In 2019 Wikimedia Israel (WMIL) decided to develop instructional material
for the Wikidata Query Service (WDQS). The background for this decision was
that we see audiences to whom we introduce Wikidata become especially
enthusiastic when we present the Query Service, which offers quite a
unique feature within the landscape of information services available
today. This enthusiasm often dampens when audiences discover that querying
is not done using natural language but rather requires learning SPARQL.
We believe learning SPARQL is not rocket science, even for audiences with
no programming background. We created a step-by-step tutorial website to
give users an introduction and some basic lessons on how to use the query
service. While WDQS has a great Help section, this section might not be so
helpful to users who are new to Wikimedia platforms. We therefore built the
tutorial website on the WordPress platform which has a more familiar design
to most users. We believe this website will make the WDQS more accessible,
and hope this will be a way to expand Wikidata to new audiences. Currently
the site is in English but we are open for collaborations to add the
tutorial in other languages. We are also keen to hear feedback from those
involved in Wikidata Outreach.
Revital Poleg
Executive Director