iwf

Improved Wikidata Format

A TypeScript library that simplifies working with Wikidata through an intuitive object-oriented interface. Wikidata is a free knowledge base that anyone can edit, serving as a central storage for structured data used by Wikipedia and other Wikimedia projects.

Features

Request and parse Wikidata items
Object-oriented interface for working with Wikidata entities
Full TypeScript support with comprehensive type definitions
Upload changes back to Wikidata with automatic diff generation
Handle labels, descriptions, aliases, statements, and sitelinks
Support for both anonymous and authenticated operations

Requirements

Node.js 16 or higher
For browser usage: Modern browsers supporting ES2020+
For authenticated operations: A Wikidata account

Installation

npm i --save iwf

You can easily request an item from Wikidata and list all the labels. For example, Q42 represents Douglas Adams in Wikidata:

import { requestItem } from 'iwf';

// Request the item for Douglas Adams (Q42)
const item = await requestItem('Q42', { userAgent: 'YourApp/1.0' });

// Prints all available labels in different languages
console.log(item.labels);

Create a new item and upload it to Wikidata. This example creates a new astronomical object:

import { Item, BotPasswordAuth, upload, Label, Statement, WikibaseItemSnak } from 'iwf';

const item = Item.fromNothing();

// Add an English label
item.labels.push(Label.fromString('en', 'new planet'));

// Add a statement: instance of (P31) celestial body (Q634)
item.statements.push(Statement.fromSnak(WikibaseItemSnak.fromID('P31', 'Q634')));

// Authenticate with bot password and upload
const auth = new BotPasswordAuth({
    username: 'YourUsername@YourBotName',
    password: 'your-bot-password',
    userAgent: 'YourApp/1.0 (your@email.com)'
});

await upload(item, {
    summary: 'Adding new astronomical object',
    auth
});

Authentication

The library supports Bot Password authentication for editing operations. Bot passwords are app-specific passwords that can be created in your Wikidata account settings.

Example with Bot Password:

import { Item, BotPasswordAuth, Label, Statement, WikibaseItemSnak } from 'iwf';

// Create auth provider
const auth = new BotPasswordAuth({
    username: 'YourUsername@YourBotName',
    password: 'your-bot-password',
    userAgent: 'YourApp/1.0 (your@email.com)'
});

// Create and modify item
const item = Item.fromNothing();
item.labels.push(Label.fromString('en', 'new planet'));
item.statements.push(Statement.fromSnak(WikibaseItemSnak.fromID('P31', 'Q634')));

// Get CSRF token for API calls
const csrfToken = await auth.getCsrfToken('https://www.wikidata.org');

Documentation

To see all the functionality, extra documentation, and examples, visit the documentation.

Where can you help?

You are already helping by using this library, but if you want to do more, there are a few things you can do:

If you find a bug, please report it here on GitHub.
If you have an idea for a new feature, please create an issue here on GitHub.
If you want to help with the development, you can fork this repository and create a pull request.

There is a FUTURE.md file that contains ideas for future development. If you want to help, you can look there for ideas.

License

MIT

iwf