Grants:Project/John Cummings/Wikimedian in Residence at UNESCO 2017-2018/Timeline

This project is funded by a Project Grant

Timeline for John Cummings and Navino Evans

Timeline	Date
Milestone 1	Day Month Year
Milestone 2	Day Month Year
Milestone 3	Day Month Year

Monthly updates

Please prepare a brief project update each month, in a format of your choice, to share progress and learnings with the community along the way. Submit the link below as you complete each update.

October 2017

Practical training session with Stuart Prior, Richard Nevell and John Cummings. During the session I taught WMUK staff how to use of main tools for data import (QuickStatements, Wikipedia & Wikidata Tools for Google sheets and mix'n'match).
identified areas where existing documentation is insufficient and starting writing draft documentation pages to fill gaps.
Imported data relating to 1150 castles in Wales during the practical training, including coordinate locations which allow them to be plotted on a map (e.g. Castles in the UK using Monumental tool)

November 2017

Prepared and delivered presentation + discussion workshop at WikidataCon. This was aimed at sharing the current stage we've reached with the data import hub and getting feedback/ideas about future development needed. This generated some extremely useful feedback, covering wide range of different use cases for Wikidata imports (from the perspective of Wikimedians as well as those from external organisations like Europeana).

Session notes: WikidataCon talk - Data import: An overview of the current system, and idea exchange for the future direction

Wrote follow up blog post outlining key findings from the WikidataCon session and suggesting action to be taken next to put the ideas into practice. The plan John and I came up with was to use Phabricator tasks for managing the improvements needed to the data import process and documentation pages. This would allow us to coordinate efforts, draft the help of experts as required and generally encourage a high level of community engagement for key decisions.

Online training session with Ewan McAndrew (Wikimedian in residence at Edinburgh University) covering the data import process and tools needed to complete a Wikidata based coursework project for a group of 'Data Science for Design' MSc students. This allowed me to identify improvements to the data import process and documentation that will aid the use of Wikidata import projects in academia, as well as gauge the general difficulty in learning how to import data using the existing resources.

December 2017

RFC started on Wikidata to get feedback about our plan for improving the data import process and mapping existing resources. In the RFC we propose using Phabricator to manage the improvements to the data import process, as well as outline a list of specific areas we've identified that need improvement (all intended to be migrated as actionable tasks to Phabricator after initial discussion and feedback).
Promoted RFC on multiple channels to get as wide a range of feedback as possible. This included sharing on Twitter, posting to multiple other wiki discussion pages, writing to wikidata@lists.wikimedia.org mailing list and posting on Wikidata Project Chat.
Refined plan for task list based on discussion points raised from the RFC.
Online meeting with Sandra Fauconnier to identify areas of the Wikidata import process which will overlap with requirements for Structured Commons (meeting notes). We now have a clear picture of which parts of the process we should collaborate over to insure we're not wasting effort doing the same sort of work.
Imported data on 'number of out of school children' from UNESCO Institute of Statistics. Data added for countries, continents and geographic regions, including historical values dating back to 1999 (2033 statements in total). See this tweet for selection of queries and visualisations showcasing the data

January 2018

Identified and fixed incorrect matches for the 'number of out of school children' data previously imported. Also added aggregated region data (e.g. number of out of school children chart - developed countries vs developing countries)
Proposed new Wikidata property Total Fertility Rate, needed for future import from UNESCO Institute of Statistics
I had very limited time this month so did not not clock in any further project hours. However, I did spend some volunteer time exploring the various options for importing data into Wikidata via the API (the Wikidata Edit Node.js library being my preferred method at the moment). This was prompted by discovering limitations with the QuickStatements import tool that would make it impossible to add large amounts of the planned data from UNESCO Institute of Statistics. Now that the initial exploration is done I can easily run imports via the API when QuickStatements is unable to import the data, or the task requires more custom processing.

February 2018

Met with John Cummings in London to finalise the goals and action plan for the Wikidata Import process. The final layout (shown on the RFC page) was settled on after processing the feedback generated from the RFC.
Two online meetings with Chris "Jethro" Schilling to get help with setting up the FormWizard gadget (needed for generating tracking entries on the Dataset Imports page).
Online meeting with Sandra Fauconnier, getting advice on best practice for migrating our task list to Phabricator.
Imported Total Fertility Rate data from UNESCO Institute for Statistics, covering most countries in the world from 1999 - 2014 (3200 statements in total). For showcase queries see this tweet or the import summary sheet - e.g. Fertility rate vs percentage of children out of school (animated graph from 1999 to 2014)

March 2018

Online meeting with Lane Rasberry to discuss areas of shared interest given his role as Wikimedian in Residence at the Data Science Institute at the University of Virginia (meeting notes)
Automatically matched 3400 items from Directory of Open Access Journals dataset. John processed the remaining with some community help in Mix'n'Match.
Imported ISSN and/or EISSN id statements for all 11000 journals listed in the DOAJ data. Data only added where missing, or where references where missing (around 15,000 edits in total). See the dataset summary page for queries showing the data.
John: New Dataset Imports space, Wikipedia training for Swedish Government Delegation at UNESCO, UNESCO staff training, Wiki4Women event.

Is your final report due but you need more time?

Extension request

New end date

Extension of MIDPOINT REPORT only

New midpoint report date: 16th June 2018 (2 month extension)

Rationale

I have been doing reduced hours up to now while John Cummings has been dealing with admin issues that were preventing his official start. He has now officially begun on 1st March, and I have a significant amount of extra time available during May to catch up to half of my grant period completed (by number of hours spent on the project).

This new midpoint date would represent a more meaningful half way point for the overall project. We do not expect to need an extension on the final report date as we are hoping to have caught up on the outstanding work by then, but we will obviously request this if if looks like we'll need it when closer to the time.

NavinoEvans (talk) 23:00, 15 April 2018 (UTC)

Request approved

Approving a new midpoint report date of 16 June 2018. Glad to have a more meaningful report, at a time that makes sense. :-) --Marti (WMF) (talk) 04:10, 7 June 2018 (UTC)

Extension request

New end date

January 31st 2019

Rationale

I would like to request a new end date because the project start was delayed due to contracting issues which have been discussed with the WMF grants team. @Mjohnson (WMF):

Thanks

John Cummings (talk) 08:08, 10 October 2018 (UTC)

January 31st 2019 end date approved

New end date of January 31st 2019 is approved. Final report is due 30 days later, on March 2, 2019. --Marti (WMF) (talk) 20:41, 7 December 2018 (UTC)

Extension request

New end date

March 31st 2019

Rationale

I've been unable to work on this project due to illness since the start of November so I'm two months behind schedule. John Cummings (talk) 19:11, 7 January 2019 (UTC)

@John Cummings: Thanks for this request John, and I'm sorry you've been unwell for the past few months. Your new end date is March 31st 2019, with a final report due April 30th, 2019. I JethroBT (WMF) (talk) 21:47, 20 February 2019 (UTC)