Talk:Wikimedia Apps/Commons

The concept of 'Upload Later'
The concept of 'Upload Later' does not make sense for the Android app, since our primary end point would be from the Gallery / Camera app. So the photo is *always* there, and you can upload them whenever you want. 'Upload Later' only made sense with our WLM app model - html5, without native access to the underlying Android intents system. It does not make sense for our Native Android app Yuvipanda (talk) 18:42, 25 January 2013 (UTC)


 * If the point is that its superfluous as the image will already be saved in the gallery then that makes sense. If its the fact that Gallery / Camera app are the entry point then I disagree. We need to have an image capture pipeline within the app itself Tfinc (talk) 18:46, 25 January 2013 (UTC)
 * It is already saved, and you can choose to share whenever you want, yes. We'll have an image capture pipeline from within the app itself, but I don't think we should aim for that in iteration 1. And even then, it can be a simple 'pause uploads' toggle in the upload queue, which counts as a good small feature, and not as a large chunk by itself. I think we should aim for iteration 1 to be a super solid version that people who already know of / use commons can use to get stuff up, and with the technical base sound, go on from there. Yuvipanda (talk) 18:52, 25 January 2013 (UTC)

Roadmap
I've only just installed the app and must hit the road soon to join a biker gang going to one of my phototarget areas, but I'll spout my uninformed reaction rather than wait for tomorrow and sober reflection. As hinted in Talk:MobileFrontend/Photo upload I am delighted with the idea that my smartphone can find a target, snap it, and send direct from the location, with relevant information already entered. The WLM Monuments app did this well, despite minor irritations. The upload button of the "Alpha Dragon" version of the WP moble site did it more completely, more slowly and with different irritations caused partly by the great ambition of automatic picture insertion. I expected using a special app in my phone would act more like the WLM map, only better integrated and without the rapid battery drain.

Instead the trend seems to be towards lesser integration. The Commons app stands separate from the Wikipedia app, which stands separate from the Mobil Site, which is the one that the superior mapping of Google Maps connects to. That means there's no simple straight path from map to article to upload process. This afternoon after leaving the gang I expect to see the little W signs on Google Maps, see whether there is already a picture or only a bad one, and go snap it. Previous methods would instantly upload the pic with relevant information like name of target (from article name), geocoordinates, a crude attempt at verbal description, and in some cases a somewhat relevant geographical or topical category or two. Instead, it seems none of this will go into Commons except where I key it in on the tiny glass keyboard. The phone knows much about what it's doing; the Commons description should be filled with such information to be checked when I bring my brain home to the big screen, fast connection and clickety keyboard. Jim.henderson (talk) 14:11, 31 January 2013 (UTC)


 * We're literally two weeks into the project, it ain't done yet. :) --brion (talk) 22:35, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

Shelve Notifications for now?
I think we should wait on Echo to be rolled out before doing Notifications. Can't be done 'right' now without eating up an enormous amount of bandwidth (I'll have to literally make multiple requests for every image you contributed *ever* to be able to make this useful). Yuvipanda (talk) 12:00, 21 February 2013 (UTC)

Requested images
Will the app also connect to the database of requested images and show nearby requested images similar to "Wiki loves monuments"? --Tobias1984 (talk) 19:21, 28 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Hello Tobias! Would be a fun exercise, and something I can investigate. Are 'requested images' databases already organized somewhere? Yuvipanda (talk) 19:26, 28 February 2013 (UTC)
 * I think all of the requests are handled here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requested_pictures. --Tobias1984 (talk) 19:29, 28 February 2013 (UTC)


 * There is also this page on Commons: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Picture_requests. Maybe the app could also have a "request image" button where the user can enter the information and it then gets added to the database and added to the Commons or Wikipedia requests. --Tobias1984 (talk) 19:07, 7 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Wonderful! Some form of merging all these together into a sortof machine readable pageable way would be needed before we can use this on the app. Thoughts on how to do that? A bot perhaps? Yuvipanda (talk) 19:15, 7 March 2013 (UTC)


 * In the requested images there are sometimes links to a map with all the requests: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Wikipedia_requested_photographs_in_Belgium (There is a box on the right hand side of the screen where the requested images can be shown on a map). Not sure if they are generated by a bot. The commons requests look like they don't have any kind of structure, so maybe one would have to go through them one by one. Plus, some are probably duplicates from the Wikipedia requests. --Tobias1984 (talk) 21:56, 7 March 2013 (UTC)

Android requirements
Does it really need to be compatible only with Android 2.3 and up? I have tried it on 2.2 in the past and it was crashing and I had the impression that it was some bugs that would be fixed. If it can have a little more backward compatibility it will be better. 2.2 still has a 7,5% market share and I guess the drop in percentage is not because people are throwing away their old phones but because of new devices with Android are getting more share. -Geraki (talk) 15:43, 23 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Hello! The major reason that 2.2 support was dropped was because there is only one person working on it actively (me!) and ensuring compatibility with 2.2+ would be much harder than with 2.3+, since that would mean testing on 4 variants (2.2, 2.3, 4.0 phone, 4.0 tablet) than on 3. Considering the fact that even the lowest end newer devices are sold with 2.3, and cameras on 2.2 devices that aren't upgraded are poor anyway, we've decided to not support 2.2 now. If someone was super-keen on getting 2.2 support, I'd be happy to review patches. But I don't think I'll work on 2.2 support myself. I will, however, ensure proper 2.3 support for a long, long time! :) Yuvipanda (talk) 17:27, 23 March 2013 (UTC)