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Wikimedia Mobile engineering/Features

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All features below are general, although some may be more relevant to an app, and some more to the mobile site. The intention is to bring all forms of mobile access up to an optimal level of functionality and usability.

Apps

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Android

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V1.3 (drafting)

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UI:

Languages:

  • Language prefs in inter-wiki links
    • Tiering languages so most likely languages are at the top of the list, or save most recent languages visited
    • Could be based on country detection
    • bugzilla:32254
  • a new option in Settings: switch also search language when switching the main language

Nearby:

Other:

V2.0

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First release with contributory features

  • Committed Features:
    • Login
    • Photo upload
    • Switch to GPS API

iOS

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Potential features

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  • Article scrolling freezes intermittently
  • Spotlight integration (swipe left on home screen)
    • Equivalent to Google search on home screen
    • Let's confirm we remain integrated

Needed ASAP:

  • Share via email

Other

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UI features:

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  • Wikipedia navigation UI
    • Turn icon into Home link
    • Intermediate step to Athena UI
    • Slides on and off the screen on smartphones
    • Include Random and inter-language links
    • Some menu items are general Wikipedia features, some are specific to the article
    • Account features such as login, footer functions (Desktop view, Contact us)
    • bugzilla:31399

Language features

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Nearby features

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Other features

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Tracking bugs

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Mobile Web

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Contributory features

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Performance/scalability enhancements

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  • Implement Varnish edge side includes (ESI) for enhanced cahacability

Potential features by category

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Here is a link to the SF Hackathon page.

Pune Hackathon ideas:

  • OpenStreetMaps
  • Share with identi.ca
  • India landing page
  • GPS API - use it or improve it
  • Photo uploads
  • New WAP view

Most mobile features fall into the following categories:

  • UI and usability - Otherwise known as user experience, there is great room for improvement in both the mobile site and smartphone apps.
  • Participatory features and apps - There are many ways to make mobile Wikipedia editing-friendly and more engaging, in ways that really make sense on mobile devices. These features are among the most groundbreaking in the MediaWiki world - help our mission of retaining and growing the editor user base!
  • Carrier solutions - Wikimedia staff are actively engaging carriers around the world in groundbreaking projects such as WIkipedia Zero, which gives mobile users in developing countries free access to Wikipedia.
  • Languages on mobile - The issues around language are in several areas: rendering fonts to read content, the UI of devices and apps, input languages and keyboards, and Wikipedia content across languages and in search.

UI and usability

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User feedback

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  • Top font size too small on high-res screens
  • Opening screen: search box and the list of saved pages
  • Set any page as home page
  • List of categories for search
  • Top searches that day
  • Top searches of all time
  • Engaging audio or visual content
  • Most recent articles created
  • Top edited articles that day
  • Top edited articles of all time
  • Print directly from the app, if printing is enabled on the device
  • Dark theme (white text on dark background) - helps with reading at night, offered in Wapedia and other apps
  • Copy URL of current article - more flexible than share to Facebook
  • TOC button, left pane on tablets like Wikipanion
  • Auto save all viewed pages
  • Save image from the app

Internal backlog

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  • Slideshow of photos in article
    • Could also be used with Featured Pictures, Related Pictures, see below
  • Wikipedia navigation UI
    • Turn icon into Home link
    • Intermediate step to Athena UI
    • Slides on and off the screen on smartphones
    • Include Random and inter-language links
    • Some menu items are general Wikipedia features, some are specific to the article
    • Account features such as login, footer functions (Desktop view, Contact us)
    • bugzilla:31399
  • Featured Pictures
    • Could be part of Wikipedia menu, among general Wikipedia items
    • bugzilla:32269
  • Related pictures
    • "Wikimedia Commons has media related to..." in many articles
    • Could be part of Wikipedia menu, among items related to article
  • Language prefs in inter-wiki links
    • Tiering languages so most likely languages are at the top of the list, or save most recent languages visited
    • Could be based on country detection
    • bugzilla:32254
  • Show English search result if none in other language
    • Falls back to English Wikipedia only
    • High priority for many languages
    • bugzilla:32541
  • "Did you mean" corrections for search
    • Just surface from form - now implemented in Android app
    • Possibly use full-text search as well when word matching ends - already implemented but not integrated
    • bugzilla:29560
  • Articles trending on landing page
    • Could be combined with country-specific landing page, below
    • Also related to "Top 20 articles by country RSS feed," below
    • Nimish has manual process for doing this by country
  • Access map link in articles
    • Little-known attribute of many place-related articles
    • Use Open Street Maps in mobile-friendly way
    • Could be part of Wikipedia Menu, among items related to article
  • Saving content for offline reading
    • Android and iPhone apps have or will have this
    • Can we use printable version and PDF?
    • HTML 5 options
    • Kiwix app is a proof of concept
    • bugzilla:32270
  • Contact us page needs better formatting
  • Augmented Reality with articles near me
    • like Wikitude app
  • Donation mechanisms
    • One idea is to provide versions of the iOS and Android apps that "cost" money
    • In-app purchase for donations
    • Could be part of Wikipedia Menu
  • Font sizes preference for mobile site and iPhone app
  • Horizontal scrolling - mostly done
    • Enabled when content exceeds screen width, typically photos or tables
    • bugzilla:32123 now closed, related to bugs 31931, 22187, 30887, 31892
    • bugzilla:33688 remaining for RTL languages in some Android browsers
  • Improved photo handling 1 - mostly done
    • Scale photos to screen width or nearest standard size in the main article view
    • When a photo is clicked and the photo is larger than the screen width, allow horizontal scrolling
      • mostly done except RTL languages in some Android browsers
    • bugzilla:31931
  • Improved photo handling 2 - mostly done
    • Filter info page to show a subset of information
    • Allow click to open to show original image at screen width but user can use zoom and scroll as supported natively
    • bugzilla:31933

Participatory features and apps

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Most of these features rely on mobile login, which has been deployed.

  • History view of articles: Add a "history" button to each Wikipedia article displayed, which shows a mobile version of the "history" tab. It needs to, at minimum, provide usernames and a link to the user page, but all the info shown on the web version of a MediaWiki site would be useful. If implementing diff views and views of specific revisions is difficult for technical reasons, these capabilities could be left until later; but the history screen is important for license compliance.
    • Legal requirement to provide attribution of authors (Android app): bugzilla:34673
    • Legal requirement to provide attribution of authors (Mobile site): bugzilla:35616
    • Discussion in context of some other related features: bugzilla:34692
  • Photo upload
    • Depends on improved photo handling, see UI
    • Improve current Upload Wizard for mobile screens (will not work on iOS)
    • Possible tie-in with articles near me or a known article (some way of identifying photos for certain articles)
    • Here is the page for recent feedback on the Upload Wizard from Wiki Loves Monuments: Upload Wizard Feedback
    • Weekend of Code submissions
      • "Share with Commons" app:
        • On Android Market: [1]
        • On github: [2]
        • The application adds a "Share with Wikimedia Commons" option to the "Share with" menu that's available in the Android Gallery app. It doesn't prompt for categories and the license selection is basically just a template field, but it gets the job done. Images uploaded using the app are added to this category: [3]
    • bugzilla:33428 - Smooth upload workflow starting with article
    • bugzilla:31979 - Android app
    • bugzilla:32286 - Mobile Web
    • bugzilla:31978 - HTML5 Support
    • bugzilla:24387 - Login
    • bugzilla:32292 - Notifications system - jeblad prototype and notes
    • Possible staging area for uploads with curation method, or just part of normal workflow on Commons initially
    • Photo upload solution for iPad, such as making the main uploader functional or a link from normal site to iPad app
    • Prompt users to add a photo when browsing photos with empty place and text, "Add your own"
  • Add GPS coordinates within a location-related category
  • View and act on redlinks (Redlinks currently stripped from article in MobileFrontEnd, iOS, and Android)
    • Clicking redlink provides mobile-friendly dialog to do one or all of the following possible actions:
      • Share or email to friends (or yourself)
      • Bookmark the article (to create later)
      • Request creation (either Wikipedia:Requested articles or a special Mobile sub-queue)
  • Diffs view of article history (perhaps related to history page, described above?)
    • Display the changes between two revisions of an article. Simply having the functionality, without a direct interface, would be useful to editors, as diffs are often sent in email (specifically in MediaWiki email notifications of user talk page activity). Creating an interface to these within the "history" tab would be a useful addition, but is less essential than merely being able to view the page.
  • Individual old revisions of articles (perhaps related to history page, described above?)
    • Display a specific old revision of a page. Simply having the functionality, without a direct interface, would be useful to editors, as diffs are often sent in email (specifically in MediaWiki email notifications of user talk page activity). Creating an interface to these within the "history" tab would be a useful addition, but is less essential than merely being able to view the page.
  • Create article stubs offline
    • Like Evernote app
    • Could leverage New Article Creation tool
    • Redlinks (see above) could be used to funnel people to this
  • Share or "e-mail to friends"
    • For mobile site (already in Android app and shortly in iPhone app)
    • Prefill email, or SMS
    • Integrate with Identi.ca
    • bugzilla:24359
    • Ankit
  • Moodbar for quick ratings
    • A version of user input for helping with rating the beta features of the mobile site
  • Add GPS coordinates within a location-related category
    • Link up with desktop to refine
    • Needs some API support on main platform
    • bugzilla:32271
  • Custom map apps
    • Having custom maps that can be developed using GPS data as well as generated and shared via mobile devices could open up contributions to content-specific maps on Wikimedia sites. These custom maps could be incredibly useful to view with articles on places, treks on topics such as hiking in the Himalayas or Alps, tracing historic battlegrounds, or trekking though wildlife sanctuaries. Android recently released an open source app named CustomMaps to help build such apps. Check out Google custom maps.
    • bugzilla:32274

Carrier solutions

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  • Voice SMS and IVR
    • Send search request by SMS, users gets a phone call and the article is read aloud
    • Prototype on Twilio and OpneVBX at SF Hackathon
    • See project page
  • Top 20 articles by country RSS feed
    • Requires trending articles analysis by country
    • Also regional if languages differ within a country by region

Languages on mobile

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  • Universal language selector and keyboard
  • Dynamic fonts support or WebFonts
  • Transliteration input extension
    • Currently appears on Hindi Wikipedia
    • Works on iPhone
    • Manish / Mayur mayurdce at gmail dot com
    • Localization team made progress on this with Narayam
  • QRpedia - currently exists as external project
    • Primarily used by museums
    • Detects phone language and directs to the appropriate language Wikipedia

More ideas

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And even more ideas.

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