Wikimedia Apps/Team/Android/2021Roadmap

Roadmap overview
In March 2021, the Android team held a virtual offsite to evaluate past projects and features. We also evaluated the needs of different app user groups and where the Android team would focus building out for the next 3–5 years.

Roadmap Goals
Our goals through the completion of this roadmap are to:


 * 1) Equitably fill knowledge gaps (help editors find and add missing information)
 * 2) Increase quality contributions to Wikipedia
 * 3) Retain and “graduate” app users (give them tools to become editors in varied ways)
 * 4) Grow engagement in underrepresented countries



Roadmap phases
The roadmap is a multi-year effort broken into six phases to improve, expand and create functionality within the app, as well as parity with other platforms – have more of the same functionality in the app as on the mobile web or on desktop. Throughout the implementation of the roadmap, the team will work with existing and new community members and app users to ensure we prioritize the most pressing needs of editors and readers using the app, as well as those impacted by edits made in the app.

The phases of the roadmap include:


 * Phase 0: Architectural assessment
 * Phase 1: Communication improvements
 * Phase 2: Quality contributions
 * Phase 3: Quantity contributions
 * Phase 4: Customized consumption
 * Phase 5: Giving pathways

Phase 0 Architectural assessment
Phase 0 of our roadmap will take place May 2021 through the end of June 2021. During that time we will conduct a gap analysis of the app's current architecture to evaluate critical parts that need improvement and what features need to be removed or arranged to so that we can improve notifications and new feature elements such as modes, curation, graduated onboarding, and customized tooling for patrollers, microcontributors, invited users and organizers. At the end of our assessment we will share a gap analysis and draft workflow for our primary target audiences within the Wikimedia Foundation Product department, existing community members and aspirational (future) Android app users. We will also establish baseline metrics for measuring progress towards equity and report any gaps in accessibility.

Phase 1 Communication improvements
To significantly increase contributions and suggested edit task types on Android, we must prioritize basic functionality for communication between users within the app and editors who encounter their edits. The first steps towards this communication functionality began in 2018 with notifications in the Android app and was improved in early 2021 by implementing native talk pages (talk pages in the app itself) and watchlist. That work can be found at Wikimedia Apps/Team/Android/Communication. We will do further work to make sure notifications work well for everyone, so they know when they are being contacted, and continue working on the talk page.

Starting July 2021 we will begin working on Phase 1 of our roadmap building on previous work of communications functionality with the goal to retain our primary audience in the Wikipedia Android app. We will do this by making sure users can have a functioning two-way communication with other contributors without leaving the Android app. We want to make communication work as well as possible for mobile users. We will know we were successful if we achieve the following:


 * Newer contributors can successfully request and receive meaningful and timely guidance, encouragement or feedback within 30 days of their first 10 edits and view said feedback without leaving the app
 * Organizers report an increase in engaging with invited users directly in the app instead of using third party options
 * Decrease in reports from users of leaving the Android app to communicate with other users

Phase 2 Quality contributions
In 2019, the Android team explored a new task type called Wikimedia Apps/Suggested edits. The task was popular amongst users in countries that are underrepresented on the wikis and new editors. Suggested Edits inspired the creation of Structured Tasks on Mobile Web by the Growth team. The suggested edits have been successful in finding ways to fill content gaps, but the communities have pointed out that patrolling the edits made through the suggested edits tool has been challenging on Commons and Wikidata. As a first step to investigate this, the team is letting a Commons community ambassador grade edits made through the feature, so that we can collaborate with Commons community in developing interventions to improve the quality of edits. This work is being tracked on Phabricator in task T271727 and began in April 2021.

With the challenges of patrolling edits made through the app, requests for patrolling tools and our desire to ensure quality edits are made through the app, as well as our knowledge that a decent number of experienced editors use the Android app, our team made the decision to prioritize creating patrolling tools and other mechanisms for quality control within our roadmap.

By prioritizing quality control, we hope to build trust with experienced contributors so that edit quality can be maintained while we expand microcontribution types in the next phase of our roadmap. We will know we were successful if we achieve the following:


 * Adoption of patroller tools that results in reports of increased efficiency and moderate-high satisfaction for guarding against vandalism
 * Decrease experienced community dissatisfaction surrounding edits made from suggested edits tool
 * Increase edit retention rate by 10% within the first 30 days of new and junior contributor onboarding

Phase 3 Quantity contributions
With quality control mechanisms in place, the Android team will set out to build on the groundwork set by Suggested Edits and Structured Tasks by building more microcontribution task types and curation tools. This phase of our work is rooted in data that reveals Suggested Edits and Structured Tasks are successful in increasing engagement amongst new editors as well as contributors in underrepresented countries, where we have fewer editors.

Our goal is to ensure microcontributors are able to meaningfully edit and fill knowledge gaps based on interest and community identified needs. We will know we are successful when we observe:


 * A decrease in disparity of edits for content about underrepresented groups
 * Tasks curated by 5 community organizers or affiliate groups completed by at least 100 editors
 * Increase in retention for newly logged in Suggested Edits editors by 3% on day 14
 * Increase in edits from underrepresented communities by 5%
 * Increase in new editors ease and knowledge of editing all parts of an article

During this phase of our work, we will also focus on making sure editors are able to navigate editing all parts of an article, with the exception of creating a new article. We will also ensure there are pathways to graduate app users from a reader, to a novice editor, to an expert contributor.

Phase 4 Customized consumption
The reading interface has been an area of focus for the Android app since the start. As early as 2017, the iOS and Android apps created features such as reading lists to enable users to control elements of their reading experience. To continue supporting our lifelong learners, and those that desire to share information, the Android team will build features that expand customization capabilities for reading. We will know our features are successful when there is a:


 * 10% Increase in pageviews from underrepresented countries
 * 20% Increase in app downloads from underrepresented countries
 * 10% of users that use new consumption experience, convert into engaged editors at faster rates than those that do not utilize new consumption experiences



Phase 5 Giving pathways
The Android app has a high rate of logged-in users, who commonly request an ability to donate within the app. Once the team has increased downloads and engagement through phases 0–4 of our roadmap, the team will focus on ensuring those that would like to donate natively in the Android app are able to do so. We will monitor what impact enabling this functionality has on donation rates and if it allows an increase in pathways for donations by mobile devices.

Work with us
In order to do all of this and ensure we are going in the right direction we must partner with community members that use the Android app, and editors who are not app users but are impacted by the edits that come out of the Android app. Below are a few ways to collaborate with us


 * Follow the updates on this page to stay informed
 * Comment on our talk page
 * Email us at android-support@wikimedia.org
 * File tickets on Phabricator and tag #wikipedia-android-app-backlog

Understanding different users
Prior to the creation of our roadmap, we conducted user research to understand behavior patterns and gaps as an input to the development of our roadmap. Below are our quantitative findings.