Old Periodicals, a New Datatype and Spiderfied Query Results in Wikidata
Introduction by OpenMethods editor Klaus Thoden: This blog post describes how the National Library of Wales makes use of Wikidata for enriching their collections. It especially showcases new features for visualizing items on a map, including a clustering service, the support of polygons and multipolygons. It also shows how polygons like the shapes of buildings can be imported from OpenStreetMap into Wikidata, which is a great example for re-using already existing information.
Several years ago the National Library of Wales appointed the Worlds first Wikidata Visiting Scholar. The volunteer, Simon Cobb, has worked with the library ever since to share, enrich and explore the library’s data using Wikidata – a massive open access linked data repository which contains tens of millions of pieces of data on just about every subject imaginable. In this guest blog, Simon presents his recent work, using open library data on periodicals, publishers and printers in conjunction with the latest Wikidata visualization tools. Jason Evans, National Wikimedian.
Recent developments in Wikidata have made it possible to display more items from the National Library of Wales’ collections on a map. A cluster feature in the Wikidata Query Service map view has enhanced geolocation data visualisation and the new geoshape datatype provides access points for content discovery.