User talk:Dschwen/WikiMiniAtlas

Hi Dschwen, This is a very neat Javascript project. I've installed it and am not quire sure what to expect: what determines whether an article appears on the map? Is the program accessing some index of all articles with coordinates? Banff National Park doesn't have coordinates using the top-of-page template (whatever that's called) but has them in an infobox—it does not appear on the map. Just curious, Outriggr 03:19, 17 August 2006 (UTC)
 * Thanks for your interest :-)! I download and parse the Wikipedia KML files for GoogleEarth. A german user (de:Benutzer:Stefan Kühn) updates them on a regular basis. The problem is the plethora of coordinate templates in en.WP (de.WP just has 3 templates more or less). Maybe Banff used an unsupported template. Then again I cannot display all links on the map. A sophisticated (not) weighting system, based on article length determines at which zoomlevel articles start showing up as links on the map. Since I limit the density to 4 articles per 128x128px square some might not make it on the map at all even at the higest zoomlevel. I'll look into the Banff article and keep you posted here.--Dschwen 04:38, 17 August 2006 (UTC)
 * Thanks. I'm not concerned about the Banff article in particular, but used it as an example. Something that strikes me about your weighting system is that it works against what I was hoping to see using this tool--that is, very specific (surprisingly specific) places that have articles in WP. Since they are likely to be stubby, I suppose they are less likely to show up. Maybe you could have an option that inverts the weightings! (Charlie's Diner instead of New York City!) I guess your weighting system is vital for highly populated areas, but me, I was looking at my home province of Alberta, a little less developed in WP. Outriggr 05:26, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

Todo
Just making a note of some fixes I might have a go at making (depending on how hard they are):
 * the "down arrow" button should look like it more obviously means "configure"
 * the "up arrow" button should look like it more obviously means "close"
 * the blue links are barely visible against the satelite data
 * mouse wheel should zoom
 * the Atlas link in the top right of articles clashes with the recent 'donation stuff'

--Huffers 09:40, 28 December 2006 (UTC)


 * After taking a look, I think that User:Dschwen/wikiminiatlas2.js just loads external JavaScript via external html, so I can't easily fix these things --Huffers 09:57, 28 December 2006 (UTC)


 * The external JS is nescessary due to XMLHTTPRequest security policies. But thanks for the suggestions. The link color is already configurable. I'm currently performing some major revisions on the code, maybe I can work your ideas in :-) --Dschwen 16:31, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

WikiMiniAtlas at polish Wikipedia
What should I do that WikiMiniAtlas would fully work? I installed it according to installation instructions. It shows maps but with Not found The requested URL/tileserv_pl/x(...)x was not found on this server... and without markers with WikiLinks to other geocoded articles. When I copied .js and changed my monobook.js file atlas didn't work at all. 62.21.117.78 23:23, 7 December 2006 (UTC)


 * Right now it cannot fully work, because there is no geodata dump for the polish wikipedia (at least not that i know of). As of now only english and german dumps exist. Are you involved with (and is there such a thing as) the polish Geographical-Coordinates Porject on pl.WP? If so it would be nice if some kind of cooperation between the german project and the polish project could be established to communicate about the geocoding and the templates used. That way we could exchange coordinates between projects for the benefit of both. Anyway, to avoid any confusion, could you for now remove your copy before it spreads, please. Otherwise future change I make to the main version may not be visible for users including your copy. --Dschwen 08:19, 8 December 2006 (UTC)


 * What is geodata dump? There is no polish Geographical-Coordinates Project, but it could be. There is only polish Orten coordinates. OK. I'm going to remove my copy, but don't wory - it doesn't work at all and I use in my monobook link to yours .js. 62.21.117.78 16:25, 8 December 2006 (UTC). Here is much more coordinates 62.21.117.78 02:32, 11 December 2006 (UTC)


 * In several wikipedias there is a standardized set of templates to insert coordinates into articles. A german wikipedia user processes the de and en database dumps and extracts all coordinate information. These dumps (each containing a set of about 50000 places) is used by the miniatlas. I wrote a server program to create and serve the labels via xmlhttp requests. So support for each new language has to be implemented serverside. I don't have much time currently, but it is certainly worth considering to expand the atlas to further languages. Do you have a list of coordinate templates used in the polish wikipedia? --Dschwen 16:33, 8 December 2006 (UTC)


 * Main template, internal, minutes, degrees. It would be great, if polish WP were supported, but I can‘t program. 62.21.117.78 18:07, 8 December 2006 (UTC)


 * I have istaled also in Basque Wikipedia, where we're starting to put coordinates in the same way as portuguese wikipedia. I can't see links to other pages that contains coordenates. Can I manually make it? - Theklan - discussion


 * No, you cannot manually make it. It has to be added to my coordinate-server program. It is (along with the polish data) on top of my list. Be sure to ask de:Benutzer:Kolossos (who compiles the multi-language data) to include a Basque dataset. --Dschwen(A) 07:21, 30 January 2007 (UTC)


 * Hi again! I don't really understand what was the problem Kolossos said, could you explain me it in simple words, please? Thanks a lot! - Theklan - discussion


 * As far as I understand, adding further languages takes a considerable amount of work. He wants to wait until the basque WP has a substantial amount of coded articles :-(. Anyway, a few months don't really matter, do they? If I had more time I'd help out with creating the coordinate sets. Maybe in about a month... --Dschwen(A) 16:35, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

Translation help
In the meantime could I ask for your help in translating WikiMiniAtlas to more languages (such as Basque)? Just add xx:'new translation' (with xx being the wikipedia language code from the site URL). --Dschwen(A) 07:38, 30 January 2007 (UTC)
 * User:Dschwen/WikiMiniAtlas/Translation


 * Translated into basque and spanish! -Theklan.eu 13:24, 30 January 2007 (UTC)


 * I suggest you to use http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8b/Icons-mini-arrow_down.gif for icon in Basque version, as we use a world ball for the link (look, for example eu:Madril). -Theklan - Discussion 16:49, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

Proxy error
I installed WikiMiniAtlas2, but when I click on Atlas links, the popup just fills up with tiled error messages "Proxy error: The proxy server received an invalid response from an upstream server" and "Could not connect to remote machine: Connection refused". heqs 01:47, 12 January 2007 (UTC)


 * That happens when the server backend stops working and requires a manual restart. I recently migrated to a new server (with automatic service surveillance), so this shouldn't happen anymore. --Dschwen(A) 07:40, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

Phi Phi Islands not working wit this Outstanding tool
Dschwen, Outstanding javascript addition. I've already enjoyed revisiting a number of pages with this new tool. Also, made it a point to fix up some of the coor tags in a handful of articles to take advantage of this. The spot on the map seemed to coincide with one of them at: coor title dms|7|44|00|N|98|46|00|E|region:TH_type:landmark_scale:100000
 * First, when reviewing Phuket, an island in Thailand, I noticed that the geographic point for the Phi Phi Islands was located in the wrong spot. I looked at the Phi Phi Islands page, and noted two coor tags:
 * 7.73333°N, 98.76667°W (refering to one of the islands), and
 * 8.04167°N, 98.81083°W (refering to nearby Krabi
 * 8.04167°N, 98.81083°W, which was originally the first coor tag in the text of the article. It seemed like the position on the map reflected this coordinate.  So, thinking the server-side s/w might associate a page with the first coor tag in that page, I rearranged these two links, and also made the the coor title entry:
 * (Commented this out of the page code to remove the Coordinates from the top of your talk page)

on the assumption that maybe the server-side would take the title tag if there was one and only if not would it then take the "first tag found". This resulted in the small globe being placed next to all three coor tags. Later, I placing it at the bottom of the page per the MOS and [WikiProject Geo Coordinates]. And, this has caused the globe to disappear. So far, changing the contents of the Phi Phi Islands page has not caused the link on the minimap to change location. Maybe that will "correct" after, say, 24 hours, but so far has not.

Second, on this Phi Phi page, and ONLY this Phi Phi page (out of perhaps 30 I've accessed today) the minimap won't come up. I've used other pages with embedded coor, and pages with numerous coor tags, but for some reason this Phi Phi Islands page won't invoke the minimap. You'll notice, all three of these coor work here on this page. (And, yes, I simply cut-and-paste into this page) Obviously something on that Phi Phi page that the script doesn't like. - Thaimoss 19:50, 10 February 2007 (UTC)


 * What browser are you using Thaimoss? The map works for me on the Phi Phi page. As for the serverside updates, that takes a little longer than 24h. I'm relying on third party coordinate extration from dumps. Currently that happens every 1-2 months. Lately there was some delay due to nonworking dumps and a change of the extraction system. I'm a little swamped currently, but I'll update the coordinate sets in about a week. --Dschwen(A) 20:14, 10 February 2007 (UTC)


 * No sweat on the coordinate sets. That'll clear up eventually.  Just so I know, what methodology is used?  Does it take "title" and "at" coor tags first, and if none exists then it takes some other coor tag on the page?
 * I was afraid you'd say yours was working. Hate when that happens.  I'm using IE 7 (ver: 7.0.5730.11, to be exact) and I've tried it from two of my three computers.   Surely not a huge thing, no need for you to jump on it.  I'm going to continue to place additional coor tags onto the various islands of Thailand articles, and I'll let you know if during that I come across any other obstinate pages. Just thought you'd want to know, and was kind of hoping you'd point out a typo or something.  Weird part is how they work right here on this page.  - Thaimoss 20:25, 10 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the bug report. I'll look into it. There have been quirks with IE before. Standard compliance would make life a lot easier for the programmer... --Dschwen(A) 20:45, 10 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Oh, and I'm not exactly sure which coordinate gets extrated from an article it fit contains multiple. My guess would be a preference for the title coordinate. I'll find out. --Dschwen(A) 20:47, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Russian Wikipedia
Hi! Is it possible to add information from Russian Wikipedia? The list of templates with coordinates is collected in the category ru:Категория:Шаблоны с географическими координатами. Google Earth layer with all coordinates from Russian Wikipedia is here. --Zserghei 12:57, 15 July 2007 (UTC)


 * I'll look into it. Sorry for the late response, I was on holidays. --Dschwen 20:11, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Additional coverages
What do you think of the adding the ability to live render Keyhole_Markup_Language files to coverage layers. We could enable upload of KML files and perhaps start transitioning away from statically rendered maps for some things. Not a trivial feature to impliment, but at least points should be fairly simple.--Gmaxwell 18:40, 3 August 2007 (UTC)


 * I've already been thinking about that. Not for points, but for line and area data. It would be some work, but it is totally doable with my current design. --Dschwen 20:10, 3 August 2007 (UTC)


 * Something like this is the use case for points. Although the functionality of that software should just be directly integrated into WikiMiniAtlas, there are lots of other applications for allowing external point sources. --Gmaxwell 15:24, 4 August 2007 (UTC)


 * An alternative would be locator dots for all the coordinates in the article, not just the red dot for the current coordinate. --Dschwen 16:02, 4 August 2007 (UTC)
 * Hm. Yes. So long as the extra dots are only displayed for the map on the one article. --Gmaxwell 18:03, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

"Full Screen mode"?
Have there been any thoughts given to offering a full scree mode? The popup is nice for bringing up a little map while navigating Wikipedia normally, but I expect that a version that uses all available space would be nicer for navigating Wikipedia via the map. The extra space would also make room to do hover popup article excerpt display like Lupin's popups script. --Gmaxwell 18:03, 4 August 2007 (UTC)


 * Apart from the popups this should be easy to implement using a server-side script on the toolserver. I'll check it out next week! --Dschwen 21:06, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

Scale behaviour
Can the WikiMiniAtlas modifies its behaviour using the scale factor specify in the Coord? Or also other parameters, as type. For example, on Colosseum, if I click on the icon, I see all the world, but I want only view the area near the Colosseum. --WISo 14:07, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

Point subsetting for WikiMiniAtlas
I've been working on some database based high speed category intersection stuff for Wikipedia. Check out my cattersect tool.

I'd added a quick hack to it to enable limiting search results by a lat,long bounding box. I don't have a user interface for it, yet, but if you wanted to look up "mound builders" around Palm Beach Florida you might use this URL.

My tool is fast: A worse case category intersection takes 70ms. Getting all the points in an spatial bounding box seems to take no more than 3ms (with or without a category limit). I have no clue how the user interface should work, but I think it would be really cool to be able to filter WikiMiniAtlas points by category. --Gmaxwell 18:39, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

Zoom accuracy.
Can you do something like "if the position of interest is within a small threshold of the center of the map, zoom exactly on that, otherwise zoom on the map center?" This will allow the zoom button to go straight to an article you have the dot on, without losing the abilit to move and zoom around. --Gmaxwell 17:23, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

Globe icon in page
Is it possible to turn off the globe while in the body of an article? I think it's great at the top of the page and in the infobox but in the middle of the page, such as Hay River, Northwest Territories, is not a great idea. It reminds me of the line "Flag icons should not be used in general prose in an article, including in the lead section." at Don't overuse flags. Other than that I think it's a great thing to have. Just wish the NASA servers weren't overloaded so much. CambridgeBayWeather (Talk) 09:27, 19 August 2007 (UTC)


 * Good suggestion, I just added a configuration item for it. Put this anywhere in your monobook.js file:

var wma_settings = { onlytitle : true }
 * Best, Dschwen 19:04, 19 August 2007 (UTC)


 * Thanks. CambridgeBayWeather (Talk) 20:36, 19 August 2007 (UTC)