#Wikidata weekly summary #94

Every week, without fail, there is the Wikidata weekly summary. In this weeks summary, Cactaceae is the "showcase item". Cacti are really fascinating plants and there is a lot to say about them. When you look at their family taxon through the Reasonator, you will find several small improvements.

• new external resources have been identified
• the taxon name and its qualifiers are now prominently on display

The one thing that is puzzling is that there are no taxons known to Wikidata that have this family as its "parent taxon". The theoretical implication is that there are no species that are part of the Cactaceae family.

Thanks,

     GerardM

#EOL will update its language picker

At #translatewiki.net we support the localisation of many projects. One of them is the Encyclopedia of Life. Currently there are 2641 messages that need localisation and for several languages the localisation is almost complete.

For the EOL software it is a novelty to have one language with two scripts. It will be interesting to learn how they will deal with that in their language picker.

We have been told that they are about to update their software with additional languages. I expect Macedonian like Serbian to feature brightly. It will be cool when more languages are supported. This is a wonderful moment to take up the challenge and provide your language with a user interface in this most prestigious website.
Thanks,
      GerardM

#EOL can now be localised at #translatewiki.net

The Encyclopedia of Life became available at translatewiki.net as its latest project. At this moment, people have started the localisation process and for Dutch, Macedonian and Malay,  the current crop of messages is already done.

We can expect translations in Arabic that we will need to import. The expectation is that existing localisers for EOL will discover the advantages of working at translatewiki.

Megaloprepus caerulatus (Drury, 1782)

It will be interesting to see how a site that effectively mashes information from other websites will evolve when its interface becomes increasingly multi-lingual.
Thanks,
       GerardM

We are waiting for the latest YAML of #EOL

Good news from the Encyclopedia of Life, all the formalities are done. We have spoken with all the right people. At translatewiki.net we are ready for what will be project number twenty-one.

The waiting is now for the latest YAML files that contain all the existing messages and possibly translations. This project will be awesome on several levels;  not only the Library of Alexandria is involved we understand that organisations from China and South America will also be involved.

Solanum lycopersicum L.

One aspect that is of interest to EOL is the review of localisations and translations. For translatewiki this is an area where there is room for improvement. As our developers have not felt an itch, not much has been done.

As EOL is very much into the mashing of data, it is likely that there will be a need to translate information that is currently in a CMS. When you want to harness the power of communities and get the best results, it is a bad idea to split data over multiple platforms.

However, first things first; the YAML files are being prepared and it will a great moment when the first localisations find their way to EOL.
Thanks,
        GerardM

#EOL helps all of us better understand life on our planet

At #translatewiki.net we are preparing for the localisation of the Encyclopedia of Life. The message MediaWiki:Twn-project-eol has been created and has been localised in several languages already. This is the motto of the EOL and it will be translated in many more languages.

There is a page about the localisation effort, there is a template that will be added on user pages when the localisation starts in earnest. It is now just a matter of waiting for the EOL developers to get ready with the big changes they are working on.

Aan: judyannebel@gmail.comTheobroma cacao L.

The EOL has every day a featured species and I think it is fun to feature it on my blog post as well when there is some EOL news.
Thanks,
       GerardM

#eol will be the next project for #translatewiki.net

It is a proud moment when you can announce that the Enclyclopedia of Life is the next project for translatewiki.net. We are ready to make the messages available today but, we are going to wait a bit.

As the software is undergoing massive changes at the moment, we were asked to wait a few weeks. This does impress us because the time and effort our localisers will put into it is considered. It is a valuable resource that will be optimally used.

At the question what the next formalities are, we found no need for them. We are willing and happy to start. We agree with EOL and the Library of Alexandria that it will be motivating to our communities when new localisations become often and regularly available.

Anolis carolinensis Voigt, 1832

There will be challenges ahead, one of them will be the static content that is maintained in a CMS. They are the things that describe what EOL is about, how to donate, how to cooperate ... Technically this will be interesting. As there is not the same structure in such text, making sure that we get the updates in and the translations out will be more of a challenge.

The Wikimedia community will find in the Encyclopedia of Life many references to Wikipedia articles. The fusion of many sources is what makes the EOL so interesting. I wonder if the EOL will eventually also support Wikipedia information in other languages. When it does, it will bring even more sources to the Encyclopedia of Life.
Thanks,
        GerardM

Maybe an #eol and #translatewiki.net collaboration?

The Encyclopedia of Live has long been an English only project. As it became more prominent, the call for multi-lingual support became louder and louder. The Library of Alexandria became involved and its task is to make the EOL available in Arabic.

The trouble with the current software is that it is not only big, the idea of internationalisation has never been considered. Internationalisation is an architecture and consequently there will be a need for a continuous effort to slowly but surely enable more and more of the software for localisation.

Chromis abyssus Pyle, Earle & Greene, 2008

In a big project like this, there will be a steady stream of new messages and changed messages and while the primary interest of the Library of Alexandria is Arabic, the process of internationalisation done right will enable localisation for all languages.

At translatewiki.net we are used to dynamic projects like this and our community is adept at asking for clarification of messages. When developers are eager to get the internationalisation right, they will find in translatewiki an effective partner.

When localisations find their way quickly into production, the Library of Alexandria will find that they bring the Encyclopedia of Life not only to the Arab world.
Thanks,
      GerardM

Looking at Encyclopedia of Life differently

There has been a lot of comments on the Encyclopedia of Life in the Wiki community lately. All of them miss the most important point. The point is made by the Encyclopedia of Life itself; it will provide "aggregation and will use mash-up technology and Wiki style editing and accumulation of content".

Key in all this is that the Encyclopedia of life is not only Wiki style editing, it also provides for aggregation and mash up technology. It is the one thing that Wikipedia and Citizendium alike are incapable of. With the functionality MediaWiki provides, you are restricted to copying data into the article and having done that, it loses the connection with its origin in a practical way. This reduces these projects to sources of information because of the functionality.

When you look at the examples on the Encyclopedia of Life website, you find that they have information from many sources and present them together. In this way they provide a composite view on the subject that is considered. The data can remain fresh because once data is changed in the sources it consists of, this can be reflected because of the methodology.

One of the exiting things they provide in their mash up is the connection to old literature. This literature is extremely relevant to taxonomy as the oldest name that described a taxon is the one to be used to describe it. The consequence is that many names that were valid once are not valid anymore. It is interesting to learn how they will manage the linking of old valid names to the newer names. This has other applications as well, when an old paper mentions aspects of a species, it may mean that there is no mapping. It is then of relevance to consider the mapping to a subspecies or a different species that is referred to in the old literature.

Mapping the historical names of taxons in time is a hell of a job but an important job because it opens up the understanding of the old literature. For plants, the IPNI resource is of immense value. If anything, I hope that IPNI will be or become part of the mash-up.

Thanks,
GerardM