Hello everyone!
I have been a somewhat active user of wikipedia and other wikimedia
websites, and a while ago, I found out about wikifunctions. (As well as
the Mailing lists!!)
At first, I thought it would be a useful programming tool, a repository
of useful functions; however a lot of the functions there are seemingly
trivial.
Examples of such "trivial" functions are:
substring exists
<imap://noahpoulton2%40gmail%2Ecom@imap.gmail.com:993/fetch%3EUID%3E/%5BGmail%5D/Drafts%3E185?part=1.2&filename=Z10070>
To Uppercase <https://www.wikifunctions.org/view/en/Z10018> (as well as
"To lowercase")
and most of the other functions "advertised" (for lack of a better term)
in the "Functions to try out" section.
Then I go to more functions...
<https://www.wikifunctions.org/wiki/Wikifunctions:Catalogue> and there
are a lot of just string and boolean functions (*).
And then there are a lot of "functions" to do with natural languages.
Which take up a good (70% at a guess) chunk of all of the functions.
Finally at the bottom of this there are some list based functions, which
all seem trivial as well.
So now I want to ask a few questions.
1. In the "What Wikifunctions is not
<https://www.wikifunctions.org/wiki/Wikifunctions:What_Wikifunctions_is_not>"
page it says: "Wikifunctions is not an encyclopædia of algorithms".
Why not? Would it not be better to have a concentrated, standardised
place for useful algorithms (like Dijkstra's or sorting algorithms)?
2. Why are pretty much all of the functions trivial or just use
built-in functions/modules?
I get why the languages used (Python and Javascript) are the ones
that are used (easy to read, high-level, popular languages) however
I feel it would be better to use less built-in functions/modules,
for example there is this
<https://www.wikifunctions.org/view/en/Z10127> function for SHA-256
encryption which literally imports a module, which feels like a bad
thing to do.
3. Why are all the functions named something like `Z10124(Z10124K1)`?
4. Why so many natural language functions? It seems to me to be many
more than all of the actual programming language functions? And, why?
5. In the FAQ, it says: "Wikifunctions is the first step towards
building Abstract Wikipedia." what is meant by this? And, once
again, why?
6. What can I do to help it reach it's full potential? This feels like
it could be used in future to help (newer) programmers, which would
require a lot more (complex) functions.
I want to finish this by saying that I do not think this is bad; just
extremely unfinished! I think it has lots and lots of potential, it just
needs more love from the community, which I hope it gets.
Thanks,
Noah Poulton.
(*) I am aware that in the FAQ
<https://www.wikifunctions.org/wiki/Wikifunctions:FAQ> it says "
* At launch:
* We have the ability to have functions that work with Strings and
Booleans.
"
With no explanation other than it being a new project.
Dear Wikimedians,
On behalf of the Wikimedia Foundation, I am pleased to announce the
publication of our first child rights impact assessment
<https://diff.wikimedia.org/2024/01/17/protecting-youth-online-wikimedia-fou…>
(CRIA). This report forms an important part of the Foundation’s long-term
efforts to meet the commitments articulated in our Human Rights Policy
<https://foundation.wikimedia.org/wiki/Policy:Human_Rights_Policy>. The
assessment builds upon our 2020 organizational Human Rights Impact
Assessment
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Foundation_Human_Rights_Impact_As…>
(HRIA), which identified risks to children’s rights as one of five
categories of significant human rights risks facing the Foundation and
Wikimedia communities. The HRIA recommended that the Foundation undertake a
targeted assessment to better understand this category of risks.
What is in the report?
Publishing this CRIA represents a significant step forward in the
Foundation’s human rights endeavors. The CRIA was prepared by Article One
<https://articleoneadvisors.com/>, a strategy consultancy with expertise in
human rights. In it, Article One identifies and analyzes the impacts,
risks, and opportunities posed to children that access and participate in
Wikimedia projects. It proposes recommendations that the Foundation and
Wikimedia’s volunteer community could implement to mitigate those risks, so
that children can fully benefit from participating in our projects
Of the recommendations, the Foundation is positioned to act upon a number
of them, while others provide an opportunity for collaboration between the
Foundation and the volunteer community to address, and others the volunteer
community is better positioned to lead. We hope these recommendations will
give us all a basis for dialogue and collaboration around making Wikimedia
a safer space for children.
Making sense of the findings
To help you digest this report, we’ve prepared a number of resources for
you, including:
-
A Diff blog pos
<https://diff.wikimedia.org/2024/01/17/protecting-youth-online-wikimedia-fou…>t
summarizing the findings of the CRIA and what it means for the movement;
-
A Meta page
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Foundation_Child_Rights_Impact_As…>
to serve as the “home” for the report and to provide more background
information on the report, including its objectives, the timeline in which
it was completed, the methodology that was employed to develop the report,
and actions the Foundation has taken since first receiving the report;
-
The full report
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:ArticleOne_-_WMF_Child_Rights_Impact_A…>,
which contains a foreword from the Foundation’s General Counsel, an
executive summary, a risk analysis, and recommendations. The report is
available in English, French and Spanish.
Working together to protect child safety on Wikimedia projects
We want to hear from you on this topic: What questions do you have? What
are your thoughts on the risks and recommendations from the report? What is
your community already doing, or what would you like to do, to ensure the
safety of children on Wikimedia projects? How can we collaborate to make
progress? Leave a message on the report’s Talk page
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Wikimedia_Foundation_Chil…>
or register and join us at either of the two community conversation hours
scheduled for the following times:
-
Friday, 23 February at 13:00 UTC
<https://wikimedia.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZIkcOmoqDopEt38H6i8ueP2Gv_8oXQD…>
-
Friday, 23 February at: 18:00 UTC
<https://wikimedia.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZMvde-trTspHtE5a7ZAnHOrtpblIctO…>
If you prefer to ask questions or share information privately, you can also
email us at youthsurvey(a)wikimedia.org. We will take the information we
gather across channels to prepare a map of efforts happening across the
movement and ideas for collaboration and implementation. We look forward to
hearing from you.
Thank you,
*Ricky Gaines*
Senior Human Rights Advocacy Manager
Wikimedia Foundation
Hello,
The Campaigns Products Team at the Foundation is currently developing
the "*Event
Invitation Tool,*" aimed at enhancing event discovery and participation. As
we are in the early stages of this tool's development, we are seeking
organizers of events focused on gender and/or geography from February to
March 31st to participate in our initial testing phase.
This tool aims to help you engage new audiences and foster impactful
contributions by creating a targeted invitation list of editors for your
events.
Early testing is important to refining the tool's functionality and
ensuring it meets the community's needs.
To be part of this early testing group and share your valuable insights,
please join us at the Event Invitations Consultation Hours
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Event_Invitations_Consultation_Hours>.
Register
here
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Event:Event_Invitations_Consultation_Hours/…>
to join the 21 February session.
Your participation in this early stage is important to us. You would also
get the opportunity to learn more about the use of the Event Registration
Tool.
Together, we can make Wikimedia events more accessible and engaging for
everyone.
Warm regards,
--
Benedict Udeh (he/him)
Community Relations Specialist
Movement communications
Wikimedia Foundation
Hi Everyone*,*
*SAVE THE DATE! *😍🗓️
*We are thrilled to announce that the Wikimedia ESEAP Conference 2024 will
be hosted in Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia on the 10th-12th of May, 2024! *
Excitement is building as we gear up for this Wikimedia ESEAP Conference!
🌏✨ Mark your calendar and join over 100 passionate Wikimedians from around
the world in the vibrant Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia, for an unforgettable
experience themed "Collaboration Beyond the Horizon." 🌟
Don't miss this extraordinary opportunity to unite, learn, and liberate
knowledge together! 🤩
Dive into the details at https://w.wiki/7Ky9 and stay tuned for the
adventure of a lifetime! For any enquiries, send your questions at
persidangan(a)wikimedia.org.my.
We are excited to see you 🥳❤️🔥
#ESEAP2024 #Wikimedia #KotaKinabalu #Malaysia
Kind regards,
*Butch Bustria*
*On behalf of the ESEAP Conference 2024 Core Organizing Team*
Bon dia / Hi,
I would like to ask around about the fact that we have very significant imbalances of official statistics when it comes to the traffic in our wiki projects.
Let's look at the reading gross value for the English Wikipedia on January 2024. Without applying any kind of filtering to their searching method, the website Wikimedia Stats shows 12.697.373.117 visits, while the Pageviews tool from the WikimediaCloud in Toolforge yields 8.864.755.474 visits.
This is a huge figure disparity, and both data repositories are hosted "under the same roog" and most likely are the two more widely used tools for this purpose. Am I wrong? For a smaller project, like the Catalan Wikipedia, there is a 19.5M vs 64.5M inconsistency... Which changes a lot our conclusions in a tech situation in which we are socially dealing with Google hiding results in our language from its search engine since a couple of years ago. What am I missing about these value differences? As an experienced editor, I have been regularly digging in our available data tools for several years. But it's difficult not to encounter frequent problems of comparability, false positives, and reliability. Not only for my personal pleasure, but when it comes to easily explain our projects' data to the outside world via referring to a trustworthy portal.
That adds up to the fact that we are not able to see itemised statistics for some small countries in Wikimedia Stats. We can filter how many millions of visits does the Dutch Wikipedia get in Belgium or in the Netherlands, but we cannot see which is the language use of each Wikipedia in Belgium (% of readers that accesses it in French, Dutch, German, Walloon, Picard, English, etc). That feature disappeared in 2018 with the last update of the dismantled WiViVi portal. Altogether, it makes it impossible to tackle biases or plan actions by chapters, user groups or even academic policies regarding awareness or revitalization of minoritized and endangered languages.
I am afraid that, this being my experience as a long-term editor, the ones of newcomers, journalists, or even scientists may still be much more uncertain and confusing. Hopefully someone can help to figure out some of these questions.
Salutacions / Best regards,
Xavier Dengra
Hey All,
Wikimedia ZA has not shared its report to these streets for a long time.
But following in the footsteps of other Usergroups who share with us their
reports here I'm also excited to share with you our Wikimedia ZA 2022-23
Annual report
<https://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=WM_ZA/Annual_Report_2022-23&ac…>
.
We tried to keep the report succinct and to the point highlighting the
results and impact of our activities.
Enjoy and let us know here or at my email:bobby.shabangu@wikimedia.org.za
if you have questions or think we could collaborate on projects in the
future.
Best regards,
Bobby Shabangu