Grants:IdeaLab/Dynamic and automated data inside articles

Idealab

Dynamic and automated data inside articles

One thing that I always thought that would be great when editing an article, is the ability to use a variable system for some informations.

Everything inside an article, in the body of the text, inside boxes, inside tables, in lists, etc, have to be updated by hand, like the age of a person or the sum of numeric values in a table. My idea is to implement a simple variable system wich its numbers could be called inside the article many times, and could even be called inside other articles (and anyone could edit each variable through any place that its in inserted, no need to go to an especific place/database to do that) and a calculation system (like excel functions "=$var1*$var2+500") so the editors won´t have to update some portions of the article from time to time (like people/place ages, sum of monetary values, sum of itens inside a list, etc).

And, of course, this "simple programming" technology should be open-source too!

idea creator• Ogat

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created on13:44, 14 February 2017 (UTC)

Project idea

What is the problem you're trying to solve?

What problem are you trying to solve by doing this project? This problem should be small enough that you expect it to be completely or mostly resolved by the end of this project. Remember to review the tutorial for tips on how to answer this question.
Some informations and data inside an article needs to be frequently updated by hand, and a lot of those information could be automatically calculated if there was a variable & function system implemented.

What is your solution?

For the problem you identified in the previous section, briefly describe your how you would like to address this problem. We recognize that there are many ways to solve a problem. We’d like to understand why you chose this particular solution, and why you think it is worth pursuing. Remember to review the tutorial for tips on how to answer this question.
One thing that I always thought that would be great when editing an article, is the ability to use a variable system for some informations. Everything inside an article, in the body of the text, inside boxes, inside tables, in lists, etc, have to be updated by hand, like the age of a person or the sum of numeric values in a table. My idea is to implement a simple variable system wich its numbers could be called inside the article many times, and could even be called inside other articles (and anyone could edit each variable through any place that its in inserted, no need to go to an especific place/database to do that) and a calculation system (like excel functions "=$var1*$var2+500") so the editors won´t have to update some portions of the article from time to time (like people/place ages, sum of monetary values, sum of itens inside a list, etc). And, of course, this "simple programming" technology should be open-source too!

Project goals

What are your goals for this project? Your goals should describe the top two or three benefits that will come out of your project. These should be benefits to the Wikimedia projects or Wikimedia communities. They should not be benefits to you individually. Remember to review the tutorial for tips on how to answer this question.
It would be easy to keep constantly updated values and information based on time (date and even hours or seconds) in an automated way. Reapeted information and data would be stored in a "database system" (along with its respective referecens aswell) so any article could use the same numbers, and they would be dinamically changed. It would minimize the chance of wrong calculations in tables or any part of the artcile, since they would be functions with numbers dinamicaly linked and updated.

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About the idea creator

I´m a brazillian indie filmmaker producer, director and writer and professional in post-production (video editing /vfx / motion graphics). I´m an pathological wikipedia addict, it´s my starting point for research about any topic, I like to edit articles correcting wrong pieces of information, cleaning up texts and improving boxes, lists, tables, always trying to make the information presentation more fluid.

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