Wikidata:Events/University of Texas Austin/Wikidata Workshop January 2023

About the workshop

This Wikidata workshop is hosted by the UT Linked Data Learning Group and it is divided in two 2 hours sessions: January 12 (Thursday) and January 13 (Friday).

Wikidata is a collaboratively edited knowledge base built on the principles of linked data. In this workshop, we will be editing Wikidata entries related to people in the Handbook of Texas (HoT), specifically its projects related to diversifying the representation of individuals from Texas history.

The goals of the workshop include:

• Developing Wikidata skills and familiarity among colleagues as foundation for potential Linked Data initiatives/collaborations
• Increasing number and completeness of Wikidata entries for people in HoT
• Amplifying awareness of HoT projects to diversify representation in resource, and expanding impact of these HoT projects by developing related Wikidata

Facilitators:

• Melanie Cofield ~ More.to.life (talk • contribs • logs)
• Brenna Edwards
• Paloma Graciani Picardo ~ GracianiPicardo (talk • contribs • logs)
• Katie Pierce Meyer ~ Katiepiercemeyer (talk • contribs • logs)
• Michael Shensky
• Yogita Sharma ~ Pallasian (talk • contribs • logs)
• Elliot Williams

Audience

This workshop is hoping to attract current library and archival staff at the University of Texas at Austin, as well as members of the wider UT community at large interested in linked data implementation, including current and former faculty, staff, and students.

While linked data knowledge is not a requirement, the workshop contents assume some familiarity with structured data and library/archival description.

Learning outcomes

• Understanding and adding Data
  • Understanding basic structure of items, properties and statements on Wikidata
  • Understanding how items on Wikidata are interlinked
  • Hands-on experience editing Wikidata items and adding references
• Using data
  • Understanding of how to write a Wikidata query
  • Understanding of how to interpret and visualize a query results
  • Hands-on experience using queries

Program

SESSION 1 - Thursday, January 12 @ 2pm-4pm

• Intro & warm-up
• Wikimedia & role of Wikidata
• Wikidata data model
• Properties of Wikidata items
• Intro to dataset, dashboard, and exercise
• Hands-on exercise
• Discussion
• Homework and wrap-up

SESSION 2 - Friday, January 13, 2023 @ 2pm-4pm

• Intro & Session 1 recap
• Query Service overview
• Intro to SPARQL and examples
• Intro to exercise
• Hands-on exercise
• Discussion
• Wrap-up & next steps

Dashboard

This workshop is using the Programs & Events Dashboard to keep track of Wikidata edits produced by the participants during the event.

Join the UT Wikidata Workshop January 2023 dashboard by clicking this link: Join now!.

Participants are expected to log in the event dashboard before starting with the editing component of the workshop. After this, they might want to check the dashboard to monitor their own progress or the progress of the whole group.

Workshop materials

Workshop slides

• Session 1 slides
• Session 2 slides

Dataset

A dataset has been curated for the hands-on exercise of this workshop. Access the dataset on this link: UT Wikidata workshop dataset.

The dataset consists of the names of African American, Mexican and Spanish, and Mexican American women, with links to their entry in the Handbook of Texas. Some of these women have entries in Wikidata, some of them do not, which is identified in the dataset. The dataset also notes whether there is a Handbook of Texas ID (or TID) and a Library of Congress (NACO) ID for each person. The goal is to use data from the Handbook of Texas entry to populate Wikidata with information about these significant women.

Description recommendations

Menschen

Property	Value	Data type	Usage note
label	Most common name that the person is known by	String	Enter name in direct order without any qualifying information such as dates. Might or might not be the same as the full name. Must be associated with a language and may repeat for multiple languages.
description	Brief description about the person	String	The description is designed to disambiguate items with the same or similar labels. Think of it as the continuation of "This person is/was...". Should start with lower case unless is a proper noun.
aliases	Alternative forms of the name for the person	String	Use it to record variant forms of the name, such as differences in spelling, punctuation, abbreviations (e.g. initials), older forms of the name (e.g. maiden names).
instance of (P31)	human (Q5)	Item	n/a
family name (P734)	Part of full name of person	Monolingual text	When this property is used with items of living people it may violate privacy; statements should generally not be supplied unless they can be considered widespread public knowledge or openly supplied by the individual themselves. Must be associated with a language and may repeat for multiple languages.
given name (P735)	First name or another given name of this person	Monolingual text	When this property is used with items of living people it may violate privacy; statements should generally not be supplied unless they can be considered widespread public knowledge or openly supplied by the individual themselves. Must be associated with a language and may repeat for multiple languages.
sex or gender (P21)	Sex or gender identity of the person	Item	When this property is used it may violate privacy; statements should generally not be supplied unless they can be considered widespread public knowledge or openly supplied by the individual themselves. Find appropriate wikidata item for the gender identity (e.g. Female).
country of citizenship (P27)	Geographic location where the person is or has been resident	Item	Do not use if the statement is likely to harm the person being described. If different countries of citizenship are stated in different sources, record both places with references.
date of birth (P569)	The most specific date known for the person's birth	Zeit	When this property is used with items of living people it's likely to be challenged; as a result those statements have to be supported by a reliable public source as suggested in Wikidata:Living people. If different dates are stated in different sources, record both dates with references. Values may include uncertain dates such as the 1980s or 19th century. See Help:Dates for more information about formatting dates.
place of birth (P19)	Geographic location where the person was born	Item	Do not use if the statement is likely to harm the person being described. Record the most specific place known, whether country, province, city, or even specific location. If different places of birth are stated in different sources, record both places with references.
date of death (P570)	The most specific date known for the person's death	Zeit	When this property is used with items of living people it may violate privacy; statements should generally not be supplied unless they can be considered widespread public knowledge or openly supplied by the individual themselves. If different dates are stated in different sources, record both dates with references. Values may include uncertain dates such as the 1980s or 19th century. See Help:Dates for more information about formatting dates.
place of death (P20)	Geographic location where the person died	Item	Do not use if the statement is likely to harm the person being described. Record the most specific place known, whether country, province, city, or even specific location. If different places of death are stated in different sources, record both places with references.
occupation (P106)	Occupation of the person	Item	Use to designate a specific profession or occupation (e.g. writer).
educated at (P69)	Academic institution attended by the person	Item	Find appropriate wikidata item for the institution (e.g. University of Texas at Austin (Q49213)).
archives at (P485)	Cultural heritage institution holding the person's archive	Item	Find appropriate wikidata item for the institution (e.g. Dolph Briscoe Center for American History (Q5289588)).
personal library at (P9419)	Cultural heritage institution holding the person's personal library	Item	Find appropriate wikidata item for the institution (e.g. Harry Ransom Center (Q5671855)).
has works in the collection (P6379)	Cultural heritage institution holding the person's works	Item	Find appropriate wikidata item for the institution (e.g. Blanton Museum of Art (Q2906140)).
Library of Congress authority ID (P244)	Library of Congress identifier for persons, organizations, events, places, titles, and subject headings	External identifier	Enter only the ID No., not the whole URI (e.g.: n79022935)
VIAF ID (P214)	Identifier for the Virtual International Authority File database	External identifier	Enter only the ID No., not the whole URI (e.g.: 120062731)
Handbook of Texas ID (P6015)	Identifier for items in the Handbook of Texas History	External identifier	Enter only the ID No., not the whole URI (e.g.: fad19)

References

Always include a reference to the Handbook of Texas History when using it as a source for wikidata edits. More information about working with sources and references in Wikidata can be found on Help:Sources.

Property	Value	Data type	Usage note
reference URL (P854)	https://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/entries/[URL id]	URL	URL for the Handbook of Texas History entry for this person
retrieved (P813)	DD Month YYYY	Zeit	Date or point in time that the Handbook of Texas History URL was consulted to retrieve the information

Discussion questions

Session 1

• How was your experience with editing and/or creating new Wikidata items?
• Did you find anything particularly interesting, confusing, or useful?
• Do you see potential for linking these Wikidata entries to others, maybe other institutions or collections?
• How do you see creating or using Wikidata as applying to your work?
• Do you have ideas/vision for using Wikidata in library/archive work?
• What will you do next/how will you move forward with using the information and skills you learned here?

• Breakout Room 1 notes
• Breakout Room 2 notes
• Breakout Room 3 notes
• Breakout Room 4 notes
• Breakout Room 5 notes

Session 2

• How was your experience with creating SPARQL queries? What query/queries did you create?
• Did you find anything particularly interesting, confusing, or useful?
• What kinds of Wikidata queries might be interesting or useful to the communities your institution serves?
• Can you imagine ways that creating or using Wikidata queries might be useful in your work?
• Does knowing more about how to query Wikidata inspire you to create/add more Wikidata?
• What will you do next/how will you move forward with using the information and skills you learned here?

• Breakout Room 1 notes
• Breakout Room 2 notes
• Breakout Room 3 notes
• Breakout Room 4 notes
• Breakout Room 5 notes

Wikidata Tools

Recoin

Recoin ("Relative Completeness Indicator") is a script that extends Wikidata entity pages with information about the relative completeness of the information. Relative completeness refers to the extent of information found on an item in comparison with other similar items.

• Recoin wikipage

Listeria

Listeria is a Wikidata tool that allows the use of SPARQL queries to define lists, and provides a bot that will update wiki pages containing these lists whenever the results of their defining SPARQL queries change. The updates take place about once a day in a fully automated fashion but can be triggered manually if needed.

• Listeria wikipage
• Go to Listeria

Histropedia

Histropedia is a project to create data visualizations using Wikidata as an information source. When a user queries Histropedia for a topic, Histropedia searches for events in that topic's history. It arranges those events on a timeline, creates icons with images from Wikimedia Commons, and presents an interface where the user can examine the timeline or choose to access more information on any topic in Wikipedia or Wikidata.

• Histropedia wikipage
• Go to Histropedia

Reasonator

Reasonator is a Tool Labs tool by Magnus Manske which can display a prettified and extended version of Wikidata items. The tool works for all items, but has special functionality for items about people, locations, species. It also has a search function.

The tool can also show related data (from other items) through simple reasoning (e.g., for people, relatives, books authored, music composed).

• Reasonator wikipage
• Go to Reasonator

Other resources

Handbook of Texas

The Handbook of Texas is a digital state encyclopedia developed by the Texas State Historical Association (TSHA) that is free and accessible on the Internet for students, teachers, scholars, and the general public. The Handbook currently includes 27,607 encyclopedic entries, many of which describe people. For more information about the Handbook, see the About page.

A number of special projects have been started with the Handbook, including the The Handbook of Texas Women project, which strives to expand on the Handbook of Texas by promoting a more inclusive and comprehensive history of Texas.

We are using portions of the entries identified and created through this project in the hands-on exercises we will do today, allowing us all to build upon and contribute to their goal of reshaping how Texas women’s history will be understood, preserved, and disseminated in the twenty-first century.