User:Husky/Depictor
Depictor is a Toolforge-hosted web application that allows you to add structured data statements to Wikimedia Commons using a game-like interface. Depictor is designed to be used without a manual, but for some of the more advanced functions this page might be of use.
Tutorial[edit]
Watch the eight minute tutorial video here.
Philosophy[edit]
Structured data is fantastic, but we're still a long way for having proper statements on all media files on Commons. Some statements can be added automatically, but crucially the most important statement (depicts, P180) needs manual checking. However, we do have a lot of data that in theory can be used to add depicts statements. A large source of information are media files that don't have a depicts statement, but are located in a category that is linked to a Wikidata item.
A naive approach would be to simply add a depicts statement to all the media files in that category, referencing the Wikidata item linked to a category. Unfortunately there are many exceptions to this role.
Take for instance the category for Ruud Gullit, a famous Dutch football player. This category has around 120 files, many of them portraits of the man in question. But some files don't depict Ruud Gullit but something associated with him, like his FC Chelsea jersey (pictured). The only way to be sure that a picture is actually depicting Ruud Gullit is by manually going through all the files.
Fortunately that can be done pretty quickly with a batch of files. It's so simple that you only need one question (Does this image depict Ruud Gullit?) and three buttons: yes, no and 'skip' if you're not sure. This simple way of interaction also opens up the possibility to present a mobile-friendly interface, so people can do it while waiting for the bus or during a coffee break. Hence, Depictor the app was born.
Technical implementation[edit]
Depictor is a web-based app written in Javascript using the Vue.js framework and PHP on the backend. At the heart of the system is the process used to serving up candidate images and candidate items. An item is a Wikidata item that has an attached image (P18). A candidate image is a media file from Wikimedia Commons that doesn't have a depicts statement for that specific item.
When you're pressing 'start' you're always running a query. By default, this is all people born in a random year. But it's also possible to create more advanced queries. Access these advanced options by clicking on the 'Show advanced options' link. There you'll find three options:
- Birth year. This is the same as the default setting, but allows you to provide a specific year.
- Commons category. By default this will take all media files from a single given category. To search in subcategories enable the checkbox and provide a level of depth. These queries can get slow pretty fast, so start out with 0 or 1 and see if that is enough for your usecase. The 'search subcategories' option will use PetScan underwater for getting the media files.
- SPARQL query. Here you can provide a complex SPARQL query, which will use the Wikidata query service to get a list of candidate items. See the provided example. Note that the variable names given in the example (
?item ?instance ?image ?cat) are required and can't be changed.
All queries will result in an URL that you can bookmark or share. An option not available in the interface but accessible from the URL is making a query by QID.
Challenges[edit]
Challenges are used to work together on a specific subject. Think of them as little campaigns for specific subjects, e.g. 'depict all cheeses' or 'depict all female politicians from India'. They have their own leaderboard (challenge edits are still counted on the global leaderboard as well).
To create your own challenge you first need to run a regular advanced query using either a category or SPARQL query. This query needs to result in at least 100 candidate images (for a single category) or 10 items. If you're getting that you'll see a 'Create challenge' button on the bottom of the screen. Otherwise you'll see a notice that a query can't be created.
When pressing the 'Create challenge' button you need to add a title of at least 5 characters and a description of at least 25 characters. Optionally you can add a longer description. After hitting the 'Create challenge' button your challenge is ready to be used.
Your challenge will appear on the front page as well in the list of currently running challenges. Challenges on the front page are sorted by last edit. If you don't want your challenge to appear there any longer you can edit your challenge again and set the checkbox to 'archived'. Your challenge is still accessible from the direct URL, but no longer from the front page. Note that only the original creator of the challenge can edit existing challenges (based on username).
Links and contact[edit]
If you have any issues, improvements or comments on Depictor feel free to:
- Use Depictor here.
- Use the talk page for asking questions.
- For bugs and code improvements please open an issue at Github. Direct link to the project source can be found here.
- Reach out directly to the author via his userpage, Wikimail or Twitter.
- Translate Depictor in your own language.