Wikimedia Apps/Wikipedia/Feedback

Feedback Page for Wikipedia Android app

Removed items that have bug reports or have been fixed. See Archive1.

= V1.1 =

= V1.0 =

Issues
--Bnewstead 02:02, 14 December 2011 (UTC)
 * When I start the app the home page is blank except for the search box.
 * Anybody seeing this currently? --Phil Chang, Mobile Product Manager 19:06, 20 December 2011 (UTC)


 * When I click my back button on the phone it leaves the app rather than taking me to the prior Wikipedia page. I couldn't actually figure out how to go back to a prior page.
 * I think this is true from the first page that opens, but after going to other pages it should work as expected. --Phil Chang, Mobile Product Manager 19:12, 20 December 2011 (UTC)
 * I clicked on a few links from the featured article and most rendered properly. For some reason Amundsen's South Pole Expedition and South Pole did not adjust the width properly in Portrait view, but is good in Landscape. Only had this happen with that article
 * Is this a gremlin in Android on your device? Can it be reproduced? Please let us know if it happens again. --Phil Chang, Mobile Product Manager 19:13, 20 December 2011 (UTC)
 * In my menu there is a "Forward" button that doesn't seem to work.
 * I see this problem intermittently, will try on latest build and then post a bug. --Phil Chang, Mobile Product Manager 19:04, 20 December 2011 (UTC)


 * Some feedback from me, in addition to the problems noted above by Steven and Barry -- Motorola Droid 3, running Android 2.3.4. I'm super excited to have the app -- thanks for all your hard work on it! Ldavis (WMF) 19:39, 15 December 2011 (UTC)
 * There's no menu on the nearby functionality; the only way to get back to articles is to hit the back button a few times. Maybe keep the search bar, or add a menu back in.
 * Trying to add a menu, this is one component - thinking of this as a "close map" idea. --Philinje 00:12, 24 December 2011 (UTC)
 * If I search for something, then click on a few wikilinks within that article, I can't seem to get the search box to register that I want to type into it. It will clear my original search if I hit the X button, but it won't let me click on it to start entering text in it. The phone will give me the virtual keyboard, but anything I type into it doesn't show up in the box. Sometimes it will even highlight the box in orange and have a blinking cursor, but anything I type doesn't appear there (it even gives me typo fixing suggestions, so I know the keyboard is registering that I am typing something, it just doesn't show up on the box). I have to hit the back button on my phone a few times to get it to work again.
 * Is this possibly due to the app crashing or freezing? Let's see if it happens with a more stable version. --Phil Chang, Mobile Product Manager 19:16, 20 December 2011 (UTC)


 * When it loads an article I click on from a wikilink, it starts loading the page from where the link was in the orignal article. So, for example, if I click a wikilink in the middle of an article, while the new article loads, it will show me the middle of that article and not the top of the page. Once it's loaded, it will scroll up to the top.
 * not seeing this in RC2 --Phil Chang, Mobile Product Manager 19:00, 20 December 2011 (UTC)


 * From Akapoor (WMF) 20:31, 20 December 2011 (UTC)
 * When I switch languages, but then click on the W, I am always taken back to the english home page, rather than whatever language wiki I was on - bug added (this comment will move to archive soon) --Philinje 01:24, 21 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Sorry, current thinking is to leave this as is - home page is based on language setting of app, not language of current article.
 * Seems like I can search in every language at once, regardless of what wiki I am on. For example, if I am in Turkish wikipedia, and search for "metallica", I am taken to english article of metallica. - bug added (this comment will move to archive soon) --Philinje 01:24, 21 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Also here, the search language is based on the language setting of the app. If anyone disagrees, let us know. --Philinje 22:51, 22 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Also, +1 to the need for a cursor when you first select the search bar


 * The app always starts up in English, although my phone is set to German. Changing the language in the preferences has no effect at all. The only way to get to German is by looking up an English article and then selecting "read this article in..." and choose German from the list. The phone is a HTC Desire Z. --Johannes Rohr 21:19, 11 January 2012 (UTC)


 * When I use the "near me" function, GPS is turned on automatically (as it should). But when I leave the app, GPS stays turned on and I have to shut it down manually.--Pavel Richter (WMDE) 09:46, 20 January 2012 (UTC)
 * When I start the app and immediately hit the menu button, I do see the menu icons but the text underneath reads "null" for all icons. After a second or two, the correct text appears.--Pavel Richter (WMDE) 09:46, 20 January 2012 (UTC)
 * The "choose language dialog" seems to use characters not supported by my Android (HTC Desire Z with HTC Sense 2.1 and Android 2.3.3). For example, between "Frysk" and "Hrvatski" is a language that uses these characters, so my phone shows me only °°°°°--Pavel Richter (WMDE) 09:46, 20 January 2012 (UTC)


 * After using the nearby-function the gps-location service stays alive after leaving the map-view and even after changing to homescreen or to another app. This drains battery unless I shut down the app manuall by task manager. I use Android 4.0.3 on Nexus S. --217.92.179.126 10:41, 20 January 2012 (UTC)

Home Page
First time I loaded the homepage, it matched what today's en.wikipedia.org looked like (same Featured Article and "In the News"), but after switching languages, switching back to English, loading another page, and now going back to the homepage, it is taken me to what appears to be the FA and News from 12/13 - 7 days ago! Not sure why?? Jwild 16:40, 20 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Anyone know if this is a bug on the main site? I see a home page that is a day old, obviously coming from cache. Bug has been filed--Phil Chang, Mobile Product Manager 19:17, 20 December 2011 (UTC)

General Feedback
(WMF)]] &bull; talk   00:23, 13 December 2011 (UTC)
 * More comments, but non-critical stuff. Steven Walling (WMF) &bull; talk   19:39, 12 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Share worked, but if I shared via the built in Message app, it apparently converted to an MMS, rather than an SMS with the link text? Not sure, needs investigating.
 * What phone are you using? I tried it and it sent as a txt as it should Tfinc 00:03, 13 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Droid Incredible with Android 2.3.4. [[User:Steven (WMF)|Steven Walling
 * Is this device-specific? Worth trying again on that device. --Phil Chang, Mobile Product Manager 19:27, 20 December 2011 (UTC)
 * In Nearby, it would be nice if "Redo search in this area" only appeared after I moved the map.
 * Good enhancement, let's see if we can squeeze it in. --Philinje 23:41, 23 December 2011 (UTC)
 * I completely forgot about the menu items for a while. I'd suggest we include a screenshot of these/explanation in the Android Market and in any other materials, since these features are great. The whole hidden menu items thing is a general Android UX problem, but with some user education we can show off the cool parts of the app I think.
 * I don't have a phone myself, so i'm passing some feedback from my friends. It's a bit hard to report it like this, but each of the following issues was reported by more than one person, so it is probably significant. All of the reporters are Hebrew speakers, but none of the issues is related to RTL text. ;) Hope it helps:
 * Many people are complaining that it's very confusing that the interface is in Hebrew, but the content in English and the search box searches the English Wikipedia.
 * a) does this happen by default? If you get the Hebrew interface, it *should* also be defaulting to Hebrew wiki... if not that's a bug I gotta track down! (Looks like this is indeed happening with all languages; locale is picked up for localization but not for the wiki language selection. Reopened bug 32005) b) Out of curiosity how do they react to other apps like the web browser? Do they also show in Hebrew UI? My browser is English no matter what language I'm browsing, just as my mail app is English regardless of the language I'm reading and writing in. --brion 21:16, 23 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Again, i didn't try it myself, but several people complained that it's impossible to type in Hebrew in the search box, even though it's possible to type it in other apps on the same phone. Somebody said that it's possible to switch to Hebrew after typing something in English.
 * This should be fixed with the bug above, and anyway should follow the language setting of the app. --Philinje 23:44, 23 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Surprisingly, several people asked for a big fat QR code for the direct app download link. They apparently don't like clicking text links even if they don't have to type them manually - "my fingers are too fat for text links". --Amir E. Aharoni 12:54, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

QRpedia
Please add a QR code reader, and use it to allow access to QRpedia. Andy Mabbett ( Pigsonthewing ); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 22:50, 19 December 2011 (UTC)


 * I would tend to recommend against this; many QR-code reader applications already exist and should be quite capable of loading URLs. This'll be a rare feature with limited applicability and I don't see much reason to support it directly. --brion 00:48, 20 December 2011 (UTC)
 * The reason this is important is related to GLAM and museums. However, the functionality does exist in other forms and the question is whether a majority of users would find it useful to be bundled in the app. Anyone? --Phil Chang, Mobile Product Manager 19:30, 20 December 2011 (UTC)
 * QRpedia is a Wikimedia project, we shouldn't expect people to leave our app to make use of our project to view our web pages. They should appear seamless. Andy Mabbett ( Pigsonthewing ); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 23:20, 22 December 2011 (UTC)
 * It is? This is news to me. :) Would be curious to hear what sort of usage these get, and whether a Wikipedia app makes more sense than a museum app. --brion 21:14, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

When I use a QR-Reader the article is opened by webbrowser, not by the wiki-app. A Reader within the app could change that. --217.92.179.126 10:47, 20 January 2012 (UTC)

OpenStreetMap
Low priority, I appreciate, but it would be good to have the option to see nearby articles mapped on OpenStreetMap instead of Google Maps. Andy Mabbett ( Pigsonthewing ); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 23:26, 22 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Bug already open https://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=33208