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Wikipedia Goes Mobile

Posted by kdawson on Mon Oct 16, 2006 12:04 AM
from the what's-that-in-your-pocket? dept.
Handhelds Hardware
eldavojohn writes, "Webaroo has added Wikipedia to their services on mobile devices. There have also been open source efforts to deliver it to the iPod (also check out the wiki) or a PDA. I guess if I were still a bartender, this would be a necessity in solving bar disputes before they escalate to fisticuffs." Wikipedia requires 6 GB of free space, 10 GB recommended. And remember: Don't Panic.
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  • Finally i'll be able to download the intraweb to my harddrive!
      • "Just the entirety of the world's knowledge, idiot" -- Well, that will obviously exclude any of your input :)

        • Re:No, sorry, (Score:4, Funny)

          by 1337Garda (1011059) on Monday October 16 2006, @12:30AM (#16449535)
          What are you saying? A complete breakdown of the world of warcraft episode of south park (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_of_Warcraft_co mes_to_South_Park) or the complete, 8 pages if you print it out, biography of Bender from futurama (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bender_Bending_Rodr% C3%ADguez) are useless?

  • Don't Panic! Don't Panic! Don't Panic! (Score:3, Funny)

    by creimer (824291) on Monday October 16 2006, @12:14AM (#16449453) Homepage
    Wikipedia requires 6 GB of free space, 10 GB recommended.

    Damn, I got to get myself a bigger PDA. Having 32MB isn't what it used to be!
  • I would imagine it would be compressed, and since much of the wiki is text it would shrink a lot.
    I'm thinking at 2 GB would do it, which would easily fit on today's flash memory. And for multimedia content such a pics, they cold convert to smaller and lower quality jpeg's saving at least that much.

    • Re:6 GB? (Score:5, Informative)

      by EPAstor (933084) on Monday October 16 2006, @01:24AM (#16449755)

      Sorry, but I actually know something about this... My job this summer revolved around this issue, and seeing how much of Wikipedia we could cram into about 10 MB. (Hint: OLPC [laptop.org] is using a subset of Wikipedia as its primary out-of-the-box reference material.)

      The images on Wikipedia as of this January are about 76 GB in size. Now, assume we can switch to low-quality JPEGs and cut the size down to 5% of its current - about the size you'd get from switching all the images to black-and-white, in fact. Making that jump is a big assumption, but even that only gets you down to about 4 GB.

      Text-wise, the Wikipedia database containing all current article info (no discussion pages, no history, etc.) is 1.7 GB - compressed. It's significantly larger when uncompressed.

      There - 6 GB total. And that's an achievement...

      • _Very_ interesting. Is the sub-set available somewhere?

        In the past, I've copied ``Wikipedia-CD'' onto my pen slate (got tired of coping w/ Encarta 2003 constantly badgering me to up-date it) and enjoyed using it:

        http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia-C D/Download [wikipedia.org]

        William
      • I think for most PDA apps, you could drop the images entirely. Not necessarily what you want to do for OLPC (I'm presuming y'all are still considering a community server to host it?).

        Are you filtering for only images which the pages you have include, or is that 76G all the images total in wikipedia?
      • Text-wise, the Wikipedia database containing all current article info (no discussion pages, no history, etc.) is 1.7 GB - compressed.
        Aw, nuts. I was hoping for some mobile edit-wars action. It'd be more fun than any Game Boy game, I tellyawhat.

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by indraneil (1011639)
      But then we would need swap space to unzip it on the fly and extract the page we are looking for!
      I shudder to think of how to go about doing that in real time with minimal memory
      All your base are belong to us!

  • The whole database already available on the zaurus (Score:3, Informative)

    by A Wise Guy (1006169) on Monday October 16 2006, @12:22AM (#16449487)
    I own the zaurus S-3200 running application Zbedic. Files are compressed to no more than 400mb total and fits in my 6gb internal hardisk of my pda just fine. the project location for the zaurus http://sourceforge.net/projects/bedic [sourceforge.net] Look under english wikipedia and you can use it on a zaurus. http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group _id=51673 [sourceforge.net]

  • 6 GB? I'm panicking already (Score:3, Informative)

    by arun_s (877518) on Monday October 16 2006, @12:24AM (#16449497) Homepage Journal
    While one of the basic strengths of Wikipedia is its updatability, I would question the point of storing all the articles offline. Admittedly, TFA does say it'll sync up the data the next time you go online, but it'll practically eat up all your disk space eventually.
    I think I'll stick to just checking it online quickly on my humble Motorola A780.
    • "While one of the basic strengths of Wikipedia is its updatability, I would question the point of storing all the articles offline."

      To be fair, there's a plethora of historical data on Wikipedia that probably won't be touched much over the next year or so. Personally, one of the reasons I want a Treo is so I can hit Wikipedia from time to time. But if I could download a version of it today and update it once a year or so, I'm confident it'd be worthwhile even though it's not up to date.
    • The point of storing the articles offline is to be able to access them offline seeing as how you can't access them online when you're offline by definition.

      Rich
    • I would think you could set up a filter of some sort, or require more human intervention while syncing...

      But would it really matter if it was constantly updated? If you have a good starting base of information, I think it would suffice. If anything came into question, you'd be able to check it later when you reach an internet connection.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by jbarr (2233)
      We all don't have online access, so an offline solution is VERY useful. Obviously, it's just a dated snapshot, but it's certainly more useful than having nothing. I have an LG phone by Verizon (provided by work, so I have no choice as to model) and Web browsing is a MAJOR headache--it's simply not worth the hassle. Having an offline Wikipedia resource could be most invaluable. And besides, do we REALLY need to have the absolutely current, most recently updated version? No! It IS possible to live with Wikipe

  • Not really new news (Score:3, Informative)

    by CUatTHEFINISH (970078) on Monday October 16 2006, @12:24AM (#16449499)
    The Wiki addition to iPod Linux (WikiPodLinux I believe it was called) has been around for awhile. At least since I had installed iPod Linux back in March.
    • The Wiki addition to iPod Linux (WikiPodLinux I believe it was called) has been around for awhile.

      Likewise I saw a compressed version for smartphones about 18 months ago. Yesterdays news for nerds apparently.

  • drinks (Score:3, Insightful)

    by mikesd81 (518581) <mikesd1@veri[ ].net ['zon' in gap]> on Monday October 16 2006, @12:44AM (#16449597) Homepage
    I guess if I were still a bartender, this would be a necessity in solving bar disputes before they escalate to fisticuffs."
    It would sure help with some mixed drinks you may not be familiar with. We have one around here called the 3rd Reich and some of the bar tenders don't yet know how to make it.
    • As far as I can tell, neither does Wikipedia:)
    • Verizon offers (or offered maybe) DrinkNation as a 'get it now' app. Perhaps not the best resource humanly possible but I'd like to think it's at least on par with wiki.

  • Unfortunately ... (Score:4, Funny)

    by ggvaidya (747058) on Monday October 16 2006, @12:45AM (#16449605) Homepage Journal
    ... initial excitement died down after a major publishing house announced the release of a competing device. With a cheaper price, and the words "Don't Panic" written in large, friendly letters on the cover, the new version, tentatively called "The Guide Mk 1", is expected to dramatically outsell Wikipedia's own offering.

    • "Don't Panic" written in large, friendly letters on the cover

      Thank you, I really didn't get the "Don't Panic" reference until suddenly now. You geeks and your in-jokes and your fscking jargon...

  • Dump troubles? (Score:5, Informative)

    by quokkapox (847798) <quokkapox@gmail.com> on Monday October 16 2006, @12:56AM (#16449653)

    Wikipedia regularly dumps the entire database, which is available to download [wikimedia.org]. However, It looks like they're having trouble getting them out lately (link is to a September 25 English dump, which hasn't yet successfully completed).

    The compressed dump files are huge, and I wouldn't want to even attempt downloading them without wget or unless a torrent were provided directly by Wikipedia (why is this not being done yet?)

    In 2009 slinging 100 GB data files across the net or between devices should be trivial, but not yet.

    However, I have a truly marvelous demonstration of how to compress Wikipedia, which the margin of this comment is just barely large enough to contain:

    Call somebody with Internet access and ask them. P.S. Wow, this also works for compressing Google... Hey, this margin is not as narrow as I thought.

    • Well, I find the fact that some of those multi-gig files have "xml" in the filename rather nauseating...
    • Call somebody with Internet access and ask them.

      But to do that I'd probably need to have friends first. Hmm, seems easier to download 6GB onto my mobile device.

  • No need for all that space (Score:5, Informative)

    by Zouden (232738) on Monday October 16 2006, @12:58AM (#16449661)
    Just connect to Wapedia [wikipedia.org] with your phone/PDA.
    Seriously, that's the only reason I ever use the internet on my phone.

  • Try Opera Mini... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by dimension6 (558538) on Monday October 16 2006, @01:10AM (#16449701)
    ...I've been accessing Wikipedia often on my phone, using the Opera Mini [opera.com] browser. If it will work on your phone (Java), then you can just view the normal site. It looks great.

  • A disadvantage (Score:3, Insightful)

    by benzzene (755902) on Monday October 16 2006, @01:40AM (#16449815)
    Say goodbye to Pub Trivia.
    • My old local pub quiz in London was always full of teams using mobiles to cheat anyway, I doubt this will make it worse.

  • Wikipedian Pocket-Encyclopedia (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Pi_r_ed (1003627) on Monday October 16 2006, @02:23AM (#16449947)
    Why doesn't Wikipedia make their own mobile? It could be updated when connected to the computer, like an iPod, and I'm sure ads for it would replace any mentionings of donations...
  • for when they put Uncyclopedia [uncyclopedia.org] on mobile devices as well. I need access to the funny stuff as well.

  • I'm still not happy. (Score:3, Funny)

    by bmo (77928) on Monday October 16 2006, @02:58AM (#16450063)
    When I can put Wikipedia on an HP48, then I will be happy.

    --
    BMO

  • History repeats itself, just faster. (Score:3, Interesting)

    by johneee (626549) on Monday October 16 2006, @07:55AM (#16451535)
    "I guess if I were still a bartender, this would be a necessity in solving bar disputes before they escalate to fisticuffs."

    Which is exactly why Guinness, the brewery, started publishing an anual book of world records: To resolve bar disputes about the longest, fastest, first, etc... Perhaps you've heard of it?
  • I guess if I were still a bartender, this would be a necessity in solving bar disputes before they escalate to fisticuffs

    I use my Samsung SCH A950 (Verizon) and Google already. The local bar that I frequent has a daily trivia question. If you're the first to get it right you get a free drink. I'm currently disqualified because I "cheat". I can't recall the last time I haven't found the correct answer in under 10 minutes.
  • Now I think this is a great idea, unfortunately it's not available for the latest model, iPod Video 5G. I'm not trying to be a troll here, but does anyone know why that is?

  • TomeRaider (Score:3, Interesting)

    by bookemdano63 (261600) <bookemdano@gm[ ].com ['ail' in gap]> on Monday October 16 2006, @08:59AM (#16452085)
    I have been carrying around Wikipedia on my PDA for years. TomeRaider has a "complete" version of Wikipedia, with some pictures, for about 1GB.
    And it is very good for settling bar bets.
    • I don't think the iPod would be able to decompress whatever compression they wind up using, unless software is written for the iPod, which would be undesirable. I don't want to reboot my iPod just to read Wikipedia. Then there's battery life to consider. I don't know how much battery life it would use up to decompress parts of Wikipedia, but that might be an annoyance, too.
      • I gave up trying to get a copy of that Universal AI book.. Asked Amazon for it, paid for the best possible shipping, they still wanted me to wait a month.

      • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

        by jpardey (569633)
        That whole post was an explanation. I have a feeling he/she wasn't a troll, but a regular slashdot reader who was fed up with all the modding down. Too few good posts are let out of the trash pile, and too many are modded down to the seventh circle. It was sort of funny that he posted that he was wasting a mod point, because whoever modded him down could not have used it for something better.

        I think the discussion system could use improvement, and so did whoever posted that.

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