blackbearnh writes with this excerpt from O'Reilly Radar
"Think about Wikipedia, what some consider the most complete general survey of human knowledge we have at the moment. Now imagine squeezing it down to fit comfortably on an 8GB iPhone. Sound daunting? Well, that's just what Patrick Collison's Encyclopedia iPhone application does. App Store purchasers of Collison's open source application can browse and search the full text of Wikipedia when stuck in a plane, or trapped in the middle of nowhere (or, as defined by AT&T coverage...)"
Survey of Human Knowledge? (Score:4, Insightful)
There. Fixed that for you.
Re:Survey of Human Knowledge? (Score:5, Funny)
"Wikipedia, what some consider the most complete general summary of human knowledge[citation needed] we have at the moment."
There. Fixed that for you.
There. Fixed that for you.
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Re:Survey of Human Knowledge? (Score:4, Interesting)
In all seriousness, I'm starting to get extremely annoyed by what is IMHO flagrant abuse of the [citation needed] tag on Wikipedia, I don't know how many times I've seen it used in situations where it just wasn't needed. And I don't mean in "But anyone who spends all day working on FOO knows that BAR!" situations but more along the lines of "The earth orbits the sun[citation needed]." or even better "Sir NameOfArticle was in his day frequently regarded as a national hero in $COUNTRY.[citation needed]. <Six paragraphs that detail, with plenty of sources, exactly how famous Sir NameOfArticle was.>".
I've actually begun wondering if maybe there are certain individuals who are deliberately trolling Wikipedia by adding [citation needed] in places where it just doesn't belong and then sit around giggling as they read the discussion pages of various articles they've messed with.
/Mikael
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Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
If they need citations, then they need citations on every sentence/idea/paragraph that isn't general knowledge.
I think that's a good viewpoint. Now, I am all for Wikipedia and have on many occasions found it to be of paramount value, but there is no way anyone in their right mind should trust an "encyclopedia anyone can edit". The way I see it, Wikipedia is a collection of sources, and WP articles function mainly as summaries of those sources. No-one should accept anything that's written in WP without checking where the information came from, and that's why everything that doesn't fall under common knowledge should
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Look, this is how it works: I'm asked to find out what COBIT is. Naturally, I google it and find a hit in Wikipedia. From there, I get a fairly comprehensive idea of what it might be - with external links that I don't bother to click. I then explain to the team what COBIT is and tie it in with our business objectives. The team then might want to investigate further or get certification if it is a requirement for the job.
Now, I'm not sure what you mean by trust. I do trust that the information I gathered on
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
If there is a pattern, it's that the person who put [citation needed] didn't necessarily agree with the preceding statement, but either (a) didn't want it to turn into a conflict or (b) didn't feel like doing the research and (perhaps rightly) decided that the person making the claim should do it.
I think that in the aggregate they turn the tone of WP into something that's very passive-aggressive. But individually they are harmless, just pointing out the obvious ("here is a statement that is unverified").
Whe
Re:Survey of Human Knowledge? (Score:4, Insightful)
[citation needed]
Seriously though, it's a really useful meme to tap in the middle of a debate. It's a reminder that those who seek to convince must bring evidence, and that anyone can post anything they like. When used to tag a claim that a) is very unexpected or counterintuitive, b) should be citable, and c) is central to the opponent's argument, then demand the citation. If it's tangential or a matter of opinion, then yeah, it's bastardish.
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Not a Problem (Score:5, Funny)
This is easily doable.
Once you trim the earth reference down to "Mostly harmless".
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This is easily doable.
Once you trim the earth reference down to "Mostly harmless".
What reason did you have for adding "Mostly"?
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What a total geek.... (Score:5, Insightful)
2. Doesn't have wireless access.
3. Instead of wandering about the country he spends most of his time programming ("Then basically, I spent a significant fraction of my time there in Japan, again, in 2007 writing those applications") an application so he can look up stuff about the country he isn't spending much time actually visiting.
I bow before you sir. Awesome.
Re:What a total geek.... (Score:5, Interesting)
You're right that this guy has flown the geek flag pretty high here; however, at least it's to some useful purpose. There are all kinds of facts about a country that are quite hard to discover just wandering about in it, and Wikipedia would be the ideal candidate to answer them.
Last time I went on holiday (to Australia) I came back with a dozen questions I wanted answering, just because I didn't have internet access while I was out there; Wikipedia access would answer many of these questions. Examples:
I could answer these questions by going into an internet cafe, but this isn't always possible. A portable Wikipedia sounds like a great idea.
Parent
Talk to people, and public libraries (Score:2)
I think you could probably get answers to your questions by visiting public libraries, and talking to people. Maybe the "talking to people" bit might not get you definitive answers (though probably as good as a lot of Wikipedia content) but you might have found out a whole lot more. Also the public libraries probably had a lot of this info if you were looking for solid facts.
I appreciate a portable + off the net wikipedia would be a cool tool as well but nothing beats chatting to the locals.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Oblig (Score:5, Funny)
Yeah, pretty much you're turning your iphone into a hitch hiker's guide to earth, or at least america and europe if you can manage to squeeze wiki-travel onto it.
Nothing new (Score:5, Informative)
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Given the trouble Patrick had squeezing down a full DB dump of Wikipedia to fit into 2GB (for the app store), I find it impossible to believe that the 162 MB files I've found so far for Wikipedia in MDict format are anywhere near the full text (which Patrick's app is).
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
You're not looking hard enough [legaltorrents.com]. Wikipedia has also been available in Tomeraider [tomeraider.com] format for a while now.
Better (Score:2, Informative)
And for those preferring accuracy and editorial responsibility :
http://www.ipodnn.com/articles/08/02/27/britannica.on.iphone/
Wikipedia has an entry on the Kama Sutra ... (Score:5, Funny)
... so clearly this app will never make it through Apple's review process.
Re: (Score:2)
Sometimes I have the idea that the approval process consists of an Apple employee typing swearing words into any text field of an app.
We're in the middle of creating an iPhone app for a client and they provide an API for the app. I've actually advised them to filter out a bunch of bad words, so the approval process won't be impeded for some dumb reason.
Cool (Score:2)
Because it works with 0 bars (Score:2)
I use 2 free apps that let me access wikipedia. Nothing really new or radical about this app
Except it works when you're away from a hotspot, even if you paid only $220 (not $100 + $80/mo * 24 months) for your device.
Profits (Score:2)
It would be nice if he shared/donated some of the profits from this to Wikipedia, seeing as he's getting the database for free. There didn't seem to be a mention of it in the article or his personal site.
Re:Profits (Score:4, Informative)
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Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I hate when companies don't just come out and say it explicitly. It makes me think they might just be paying a penny on the dollar so they can play the "philanthropy" card. I like that Target Corp clearly states that "5% of our profits" go to charity (admittedly, much of this may be in the form of product donations, but still.)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Target_Corporation#Philanthropy [wikipedia.org]
Why do this? (Score:2)
XML Compression (Score:4, Interesting)
So, I'm reading here that they convert the XML into proprietary metadata and compress that.
Why not use EXI (Efficent XML Interchange) http://www.w3.org/XML/EXI/ [w3.org] which has been tested as more efficient that gzip and requires less memory to parse? Especially since the XML processing can remain the same, since the nodeset is the same.
Of Typos and Thinkos (Score:2)
You should study how mistakes are made a bit more. When typing fast, I often mistype one work for another. Even though I know very well the rules for "its" and "it's" (a mistake you made in your post), "their" and "there", "than and then", sometimes my fingers just decide to type one thing even though my brain is thinking another. Sometimes I type "you" instead of "your", too. Or "to" instead of "too". None of this has anything to do with not knowing the rules. It's partially about not proofreading (c
*shrug* Did this a year ago on a psion 5MX (Score:2)
http://www.instructables.com/id/SBK1NAUFF78M26B/ [instructables.com]
I found these instructions in May 2008 and created a reasonably current snapshot of wikipedia that is still rather compact on a Psion 5MX. Not quite the same "curb appeal" as an iPhone, but a lot more functional.
Best,
Wikipedia Midlet (Score:2)
Bah, that's nothing. I made an offline Wikipedia midlet! Unfortunately J2ME is unpleasant to say the least, and my phone only supports 2 GB SD cards so it only has some of the articles and without text.
EXCELLENT app, but limited (Score:3, Interesting)
I've been using this app for quite a while on my 1st gen iPod Touch, and it works and works well. It's amazing just how many articles it has. Other than some cosmetic and minor feature issues, the only real limitation is that Apple limits data file size to 2GB, so there is an obvious limit as to how much can go into the file. But it is amazingly complete. No images, no fancy tables--just text articles at your fingertips.
If you Jailbreak your iPhone/iPod Touch, then an excellent alternative is the Wiki2Touch app. Unfortunately, it seems that it's been pretty much abandoned in development, so it may be hit-or-miss if it works on OS v3.x. This implementation was REALLY slick. It provided a 4GB data file (that was much more complete) and a small Web server. You enabled the Web server, fired up Safari, and pointed it to a local URL. The app presented quick and very readable articles. And if you went to the trouble to download and process, you could also add about 4GB of image files to make things more complete (on a larger-capacity device, of course.)
Here's a review that I posted for both apps just over a year ago on my iPod Touch Tips site:
http://jimstips.com/ipod-touch-tips/ipod-touch-review-wikpedia-on-your-ipod-touch.html [jimstips.com]
In both cases, the main complaint is updating. In order to update the data file, you have to re-download the data, and depending on the app, you are typically at the mercy of the developer to provide an update. Otherwise, you had to download, index, and install the HUGE files yourself.
If you absolutely HAVE to have updated, offline data, check out the Wikipanion app. It's a nice compromise.
8 Gig? (Score:2)
Sounds a bit small.
Advice (Score:2, Funny)
App Store purchasers of Collison's open source application can browse and search the full text of Wikipedia when stuck in a plane
This page [wikipedia.org] is not recommended when you're stuck in a plane...
Warning: 3 majors problem with this app. (Score:5, Informative)
I bought this application 6 months ago and there are 3 majors problems with it:
1) The search function is broken because you need to type the exact word (prefix)
2) This is plain text: no pictures and no tables so most articles with "list" are useless
3) No update mechanism so the dump used will be outdated soon.
Web Version (Score:3, Funny)
Is there a version of this that will run in a web browser? Anyone have a link?
Just use the mobile-formatted version (Score:5, Informative)
try this link from your mobile phone:
http://wapedia.mobi/en/ [wapedia.mobi]
That way you get the whole thing, up-to-date, and with no trouble or major memory usage.
Re:iPhone apps for computers (Score:5, Funny)
That problem has recently been solved. With the recent addition of sms-sharing, you could use any iPhone remotely.
Parent
Re:iPhone apps for computers (Score:4, Interesting)
FTFA:
Already done.
However, I'm not sure that I want precisely what this iPhone app is. It strips out references, and from the sound of things also the discussion pages. I'd say about 1/2 of articles I check the discussion pages to see what's really going on. Also he says he strips a lot of the metadata, and obviously images, none of which are things I"d want to give up (some of the metadata might be superfluous, but if I'm copying Wikipedia onto my computer, I want to copy Wikipedia onto my computer.)
I understand there are licensing issues with images, but even so, the SVG ought to be safe. And that wouldn't add as much of a disk space hit as the gifs, etc.
One of the other issues is the timing of Wikipedia dumps. They only do text-only dumps, and according to the article they only happen once every few months. It would be nice to implement an image review policy, and figure out a way to allow for mirrors (or just some increased bandwidth at Wikipedia HQ) so that we can actually have the entire English Wikipedia, regularly snapshotted and compressed, available for download. And really, for that kind of thing a 3-month or even yearly turnaround would be well worth the wait.
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Re: (Score:2)
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Fragile? I have dropped my iPhone onto concrete three times from 5 feet up. I carry it all day at work and don't use any of the protectors. I treat it as I do any other phone. Fragile isn't a word I would use to describe it.
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On the other hand, one of my colleagues dropped it to a floor from his desk. Now the screen is full of cracks.
Anecdotal evidence goes both ways.
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To be honest, what would probably be easier would be just hacking the emulator that already comes with the development tools to run any app at any time.
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Re:Another step closer (Score:5, Insightful)
No. The Kindle supports online access to Wikipedia, but this requires a network connection. The iPhone supports the same. A while ago someone created a cut-down version of Wikipedia which you could browse completely offline on the iLiad. It sounds like someone has ported this to the iPhone, and because it's now on the iPhone it's news.
Putting Wikipedia snapshots on portable devices is interesting. I don't really see why you'd do it with an iPhone; the iLiad takes CF cards, so you can just keep a 16GB CF card for Wikipedia and not fill up space you'd otherwise use for something else, but the iPhone's storage isn't expandable so it's a strange thing to want to do. The text of Wikipedia is not that big. A complete (uncompressed) copy is 200GB, but that includes all revision history and user pages. The current version of the English Wikipedia is around 4GB of text. This leaves another 4GB for filling up with images.
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Re:Nice! (Score:4, Informative)
I'd be grabbing it right now if I didn't only have ~350MB of free space left on my iPhone...
Would be a great app for iPod Touch users.
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
So stick a bigger SD card in it already.
He can't, can you just loan him your mobile SD capable device that can run the app?
Oh that's right...
Re:Complete human knowledge? (Score:5, Insightful)
[citation needed]
I'm not really kidding. Your anti-Wikipedia rant is entertaining, but it doesn't provide any substance. Speaking for myself, when I go to Wikipedia for a refresher on something I already know about, I'm generally pleased with the quality of the results, which makes me think that the articles on subjects I don't know much about are likely to be pretty good too.
Your line about "political correctness and facts washed out of existence by human insecurities" provides a clue as to what really bothers you about Wikipedia: reality's well-known liberal bias. Unless you can provide specific examples, with citations, it's reasonable to assume that the Wikipedia groupmind knows more about the way things really work than some random dude on /.
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Wikibooks is for how-to guides (Score:4, Informative)
Hell, I was flipping through an encyclopedia from the 40's, and under "Dynamite", it had detailed instructions on how to MAKE it yourself
Wikipedia doesn't have how-to guides. If you want that, use Wikibooks.
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