Wikicite/e-scholarship/Mike Peel (Cite Q improvements)

Project name

What is a short name for the activity/project you are proposing?

Collaborative improvements to en:Template:Cite Q

Contact information

your name and/or Wikimedia username: User:Mike Peel

your contact e-mail: "Allow other users to email me" is enabled

your nearest city and country: San Cristobal de La Laguna, Tenerife, Spain

Details of team members (optional)
If this application is for a team project, each additional team member (up to 5 total) should have their name/username, project role, location, and contact details here:

Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing) Birmingham, England; instigator of the 'Cite Q' template)
(RexxS (talk); Programming support and advice; West Midlands, England; Author of WikidataIB module. Not applying for grant)
Adamant.pwn (talk); Berlin, Germany; One of the current maintainers of ru:Module:Sources
Ederporto (talk); São Paulo, Brazil; Translator of module WikidataIB to Wikipedia in Portuguese.

The activity/project

Tell us about your proposed project. What will you get achieved with this time?
Describe why you think this project is important, and how the project is different from your normal volunteer contributions.

en:Template:Cite Q is used on the English Wikipedia to fetch Wikicite references from Wikidata using a single parameter of the QID. It is the fundamental template to use Wikicite content on enwp.

The purpose of these e-scholarships is to have a mini-event that is focused on rewriting en:Template:Cite Q so that it uses en:Template:WikidataIB. This would simultaneously improve the functionality of the template and address outstanding issues with the template. At the same time, test cases and documentation for the template would be improved. Optionally, the template parameters could be translated so that it works on other language Wikipedias.

The template is controversial on enwp, see the deletion discussion. This controversy makes me unwilling to work on this template on my own (I have plenty of other projects to work on with a mixed level of controversy!). Perhaps this eScholarship process provides a way to work on the issue collaboratively via a mini-event.

The scope of this activity is restricted to what can be achieved by templates and Lua code: improvements to the MediaWiki code are out of scope. The foci will be decided during the activity itself, but it may include the following:

Reviewing the problems previously identified with the template, and assessing which can be tackled in this proposal, as well as discussion about other potential issues and improvements
Reviewing which properties are used in the template, and whether new properties should be added and/or if existing properties should be changed (related to ruwiki uses)
Reviewing the template code, and migrating over to Module:WikidataIB as much as possible
Improving the template documentation (high priority)
Assessing and improving the portability of the code, including installing it on the Portuguese Wikipedia
Tests in live articles to evaluate how well the new code works in practice
A Wikidata Lab in Brazil to explain the template and encourage other editors (particularly on ptwp) to make use of it

Your qualifications

Describe how you (and, if applicable, your team) are able to achieve this project. What skills, expertise, and motivation do you have which will enable you to succeed?

User:Mike Peel has extensive experience linking Wikidata with the other Wikimedia projects, particularly through using Wikidata information in infoboxes using WikidataIB.
Andy Mabbett also has extensive experience of linking Wikidata with other Wikimedia projects, and bi-directionally with external databases ([1],[2]). He is a template-editor on en.Wikipedia, and has been active in WikiCite since its inception.
RexxS: 50 years of programming experience. 20+ years of IT project management. 10+ years of Lua experience. Now retired with plenty of spare time. I'm able to extend or modify WikidataIB to meet particular requirements that may emerge in developing Cite Q.
Adamant.pwn: Engineer, Closer and (current) ArbCom member on Russian Wikipedia. One of current maintainers of ru:Module:Sources (see d:Q18007831) which is used in Russian Wikipedia and several other Wikimedia Projects to provide the current functionality of Cite Q. Specifically started writing technical documentation for the ruwiki module. Willing to help as possible and hope that experience sharing in this field may potentially benefit both projects using Sources module and Cite Q.
User:Ederporto also has extensive experience in linking Wikidata to other Wikimedia projects, especially Wikipedia in Portuguese, adapting WikidataIB in the past to better serve the Portuguese language particularities and has been giving support and help in several training sections (called Wikidata Labs) for the community to empower themselves with the technologies involved in the making of automated infoboxes and other topics revolving Wikidata.

Proposed activity dates

When will you undertake this project? (This may be two, three or four days. Not necessarily consecutive). The latest allowable date is 1 May 2021.

The activity will take place on up to 4 days as follows:

2 adjacent days (1 full weekend) to focus on rewriting the code and the documentation - nominally in October or November, probably the weekend of 7-8 November.
1 day connected to a Wikidata lab (ideally a weekend day, but may need to be during the week) - nominally in November or December
1 day for checking in on how the changes have been received and to make further improvements (may be expanded to 2 days if the Wikidata lab doesn't take place) - nominally in November or December

The initial plan is for the first 2 days, the other 2 days will happen if there is demand for them. Splitting the grant into two or three tranches (per the bullet points above) would be useful if possible. The exact days are subject to participant availability. Hopefully the project will be completed before the end of 2020, but it may extend into early 2021 if needed (definitely ending before 1 May 2021).

We also need a reliable way to collaborate during the project. The ideal solution would be access to a professional Zoom account for the days of the project, so that we can reliably connect to each other and share screens etc. If that is not possible, then we can use Skype instead.

Endorsements

Optional: Community members are encouraged to endorse your proposal and leave a rationale here.

Support -- Joalpe (talk) 18:17, 5 September 2020 (UTC). OK, this is something we REALLY need in our projects in Brazil. With Ederporto, we are happy to deploy Cite Q improvements into Wikipedia in Portuguese, as the team progresses in this project. An idea I have already discussed with Mike Peel when I read this proposal is to have a Wikidata Lab on Cite Q as part of the outreach strategy of this project.[reply]
Comment I don't know what the "problems previously identified" are, but it would be nice to know that they are generally agreed by all to be problems. Or have a way of making sure. I'm generally supportive of the proposal, and CiteQ is important, but wouldn't want money flowing into the middle of a controversy unless all were clear on the way forward. Even templates can end up controversial. --99of9 (talk) 12:19, 24 September 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Comment Experienced team - if there is clarity on the way to move forward this could be a useful project Jodi.a.schneider (talk) 20:11, 25 September 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Support Great tool to improve Wikipedias. Thanks for initiative! --Ixocactus (talk) 01:00, 27 September 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Support-- Nirmal Dulal (talk) 06:54, 7 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Status: complete