Wikidata:REST API feedback round
We regularly get feedback that Wikidata (and Wikibase in general) needs an API that’s easier to understand and use in order to get more people to build tools that use data from Wikidata and other Wikibase instances. The existing action API has several problems. The biggest ones are that it’s not a widely used standard, not versioned and that it is not very well suited for Wikibase’ structured data (as opposed to MediaWiki’s usual wikitext). Here we are collecting feedback on the spec and implementation of the new REST API for Wikibase.
What we want to achieve with it[edit]
- Provide a more industry-standard and versioned way to access and manipulate data in Wikibase. This will make it easier for programmers to get started building tools with and around Wikidata and other Wikibase instances.
- Provide an API that is more tailored to the Wikibase data model to, for example, make it possible to get exactly the part of an Entity you need instead of the whole entity.
- Solve a number of issues in the current API that are easier to solve with REST.
Timeline and updates[edit]
- January 25th 2023 - First release on Wikidata
- January 18th 2023 - REST API is now available for testing on Test.Wikidata
- August 2022 - Feedback on current development state on Beta Wikidata.
- October 2021 - Early feedback on the proposed implementation plan; design of the REST API, its scope and specifications.
Further updates will be on the general REST API page.
Feedback[edit]
At any point, feel free to give feedback on this talk page. Updates will be announced on the usual communication channels (Project Chat, weekly newsletter).