Grants:IEG/Batch uploader for small GLAM projects/Midpoint

This project is funded by an Individual Engagement Grant

Welcome to this project's midpoint report! This report shares progress and learnings from the Individual Engagement Grantee's first 3 months.

Summary

In a few short sentences or bullet points, give the main highlights of what happened with your project so far.

We've established the basic needs of small to medium GLAM staff based on ongoing projects and discussion with several volunteers: based on this, we decided to include the following file description templates into the application: Information, Artwork, Photograph, Book.
@Yarl: wrote the initial release of Pattypan, which included the Information, Artwork and Photograph template description fields.
We established a need to integrate a preview of an uploaded file description into the application; the preview is now available from within Pattypan.
We integrated the license and partnership templates into the tool.
We conducted initial tests via the Wikimedia test site. [1][2]
We wrote the short version of user manual in Polish and English, more detailed manual is in progress.
We trained the staff of several GLAMs and Wikimedia volunteers including the State Archive in Łódź and the State Ethnographic Museum in Warsaw in using the uploader tool and are waiting for further uploads
Adding the Book and Document template is in progress.

Methods and activities

How have you setup your project, and what work has been completed so far? Describe how you've setup your experiment or pilot, sharing your key focuses so far and including links to any background research or past learning that has guided your decisions. List and describe the activities you've undertaken as part of your project to this point.

Preparations

We had decided to concentrate on the development of the tool and somewhat cautious testing prior to making the releases widely publicly available.
We ran tests – first on the Wikimedia test site, then a few uploads to Wikimedia Commons. After these tests, Yarl published a third release of Pattypan and added the "Uploaded with Pattypan" category into the uploader.

Development and progress

After preparing a basic manual we began to inform selected Wikimedia and GLAM volunteers about the tool, to gain external comments, requests and perspective on its usability.
Initial uploads were made by Wikimedian volunteers working with the European Solidarity Centre, Małopolska Institute of Culture and the National Museum of Ethnography in Warsaw. Files can be viewed in the Pattypan category.
We created a Pattypan uploader page on Wikimedia Commons with the manual and download links only after the above steps were completed, to make sure the users will be able to smoothly work with the new uploader.

What remains to be done

We now would like to:

Expand the documentation and informational materials about the tool (expand Commons page; pdf flyer; other promotional material) and further inform the community about the tool;
Incorporate final corrections / additions into the program (Book template, audiovisual file upload)
Allow the GLAM volunteers and institutions time to perform uploads
Allow the GLAM volunteers and employees time to reuse their new uploads in Wikimedia projects.
Collect data and statistics (3 months after current release, 6 months after current release).

Midpoint outcomes

What are the results of your project or any experiments you’ve worked on so far? Please discuss anything you have created or changed (organized, built, grown, etc) as a result of your project to date.

A working version of the application is available for download
Information and instructions are now available on the Pattypan page on Wikimedia Commons
The preview function works well to prevent mistakes and verify files before uploading
First 220 files have been verified and uploaded into the tool category
Some problems with the tool and things to improve on have been identified by users, ie: some users found it necessary to be given a list of most popular copyright tags and other wikicode fragments, to be inseted into the spreadsheets. We will prepare a list of these in the final, extended version of the manual
One user reported a limit to the total number of characters that can be read by Pattypan from the Excel sheet - problem is currently being addressed.
Further uploads are in progress; 3 training meetings were organised, remote training (online) will take place.
Volunteers or employees from 6 GLAM institutions and 1 private collection uploaded files:

The European Solidarity Centre, Gdańsk
The Ethnographic Museum, Warsaw
Museum Catharijneconvent, Utrecht
The Groam House Museum, Scotland
The Małopolska Institute of Culture, Kraków
The National Museum in Warsaw
The Jacek Dehnel Collection.

Horn of Salt Diggers Brotherhood of Wieliczka, Tatra Museum (Małopolska's Virtual Museums)
Embroidered clergy set, c. 1625, Museum Catharijneconvent
Faras Gallery interior, National Museum Warsaw
Pictish Stone fragment, 8-9th century, Groam House Museum

Finances

Please take some time to update the table in your project finances page. Check that you’ve listed all approved and actual expenditures as instructed. If there are differences between the planned and actual use of funds, please use the column provided there to explain them.

No changes in budget; spent on programming work as planned.

Learning

The best thing about trying something new is that you learn from it. We want to follow in your footsteps and learn along with you, and we want to know that you are taking enough risks to learn something really interesting! Please use the below sections to describe what is working and what you plan to change for the second half of your project.

What are the challenges

What challenges or obstacles have you encountered? What will you do differently going forward? Please list these as short bullet points.

Volunteer time: Volunteers or GLAM collaborators who receive online training directly or use the instruction manual still need time to prepare a batch of images for upload and to provide item descriptions for each uploaded file.
Varying needs: Users prioritise a variety of program functions/options, and uploads differ considerably; this, however, is also an advantage which allows us to incorporate new functions into the program (user feedback has allowed us to work on new program functions at this stage)
Time to prepare high-quality documentation and promote the tool - this is our main priority going forward - user feedback and final improvements will result from this.

What is working well

What have you found works best so far? To help spread successful strategies so that they can be of use to others in the movement, rather than writing lots of text here, we'd like you to share your finding in the form of a link to a learning pattern.

Conducting initial uploads via the Wikimedia test site
Contacting initially a small group of 3-4 volunteers from different GLAM organisations to perform first live uploads and submit initial issues/comments, prior to making the tool accessible to the public - this allowed us to eliminate some issues and provide better instructions in the documentation.

Learning pattern: Learning patterns/Uploading files using Pattypan

Next steps and opportunities

What are the next steps and opportunities you’ll be focusing on for the second half of your project? Please list these as short bullet points. If you're considering applying for a 6-month renewal of this IEG at the end of your project, please also mention this here.

simplify and adjust program interface to user needs based on feedback,
add missing crucial options to the program,
create easy to understand tutorial, ask community for translations,
prepare grant renewal based on list of features community needs.

Grantee reflection

We’d love to hear any thoughts you have on how the experience of being an IEGrantee has been so far. What is one thing that surprised you, or that you particularly enjoyed from the past 3 months?

We are happy to receive some positive feedback from a fellow Wikimedian Sara Thomas on the glam@lists.wikimedia.org list: "Loving the Pattypan uploader - can really see how this tool will, if we target it correctly and used in partnership with the visual editor, have the potential to seriously increase smaller GLAM's engagement".
We are gradually receiving comments and improvement ideas from various community members, which motivates us to improve the uploader further.