Friday, May 06, 2011

Get ready for next gen #Wikipedia #Mobile

It is easy to check if your #Wikipedia is ready for the next generation mobile support. What is extremely good information is that the first iteration will be the replacement of the Ruby engine with a PHP engine.

The consequence is that initially, the user interface will not change. This means that you can check here at translatewiki.net if your language has its user interface completely localised.

When all the messages are translated, you need to request for the localisations to be brought into production. This is done by adding a bug to bugzilla. This is needed for the current Ruby interface.

Another step that you can take is the creation of a mobile main page for your language. Without a mobile main page and the localisation it will look like this example for the Pontic language.


With a mobile main page, sections of the main page will be provided by clicking on a button like in this example for the Indonesian language. This is particularly friendly on those people for whom the use of bandwidth comes at a premium.


Apparently bandwidth in the Netherlands is not considered much of an issue; its mobile main page shows more of the main page.


Given that the mobile use of Wikipedia is where most of its growth in traffic is, it is also growth where your language may benefit. When the result is less then successful, it is good to remember to post a bug in bugzilla because once the next generation PHP mobile engine kicks in, it will get attention.
Thanks,
        GerardM

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