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Wikibase Community User Group/Reports/2019

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2019 is the second year of existence of the Wikibase Community User Group. You can read the 2018 report.

Activities

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January 2019

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  • Addshore published a blog post on how to update an existing Docker-powered Wikibase instance.

February 2019

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  • Wikimedia Deutschland improved the integration of QuickStatements in Docker-powered Wikibase instances.

April 2019

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  • The University of Erfurt and the German National Library (GND) announced to base the FactGrid project on a Wikibase instance.
  • Wikimedia Foundation removed the ElasticSearch dependancy from Wikibase extension code and put it into a separate extension. This allows to set up a Wikibase instance more easily, without requiring an ElasticSearch instance (announcement).

May 2019

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  • Barbara Fischer, from German National Library (GND), and Jens Ohlig, from Wikimedia Deutschland (WMDE), published a blog post on how the two institutions intend to test Wikibase on several projects.
  • Wikimedia Hackathon (Prague, Czech Republic)

June 2019

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July 2019

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Attendees of Ghent University Wikidata and Wikibase Workshop.
  • Wiki Valley published (in French) a complete guide of the Wikibase installation made for the NOEMI project with the National Library of France (BnF).
  • Ghent University Wikidata and Wikibase Workshop (Ghent, Belgium)

August 2019

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Wikidata and Wikibase Vision.
Strategy for the Wikibase Ecosystem.

September 2019

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October 2019

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November 2019

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December 2019

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Communication

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At the end of 2019, the most active communication channel is by far the Wikibase Telegram group. The community also relies on Twitter and discusses on a daily basis using this channel. The mailing list is still active. IRC channels #wikibase-cugconnect and #wikibaseconnect are more or less dead.

From a single Wikidata to a Wikibase ecosystem

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2019 was a turning point in the life of the Wikibase project.

Main contribution tools are migrated from a dedicated use to Wikidata to a generic use with any Wikibase instance. It started with Quickstatements, WikibaseJS followed in September, and OpenRefine is on its way.

Wikimedia Deutschland, by hiring a Project Manager dedicated to Wikibase, shows that it now considers Wikibase as a whole project, distinct from Wikidata.

In 2019, several organizations started to test Wikibase with their own instances, expanding the Wikibase community. 2020 will be challenging, as it will be necessary to prove that Wikibase is a viable solution for use cases outside of Wikidata, and not only proofs of concept.