User:DBrant (WMF)/Nearby blog post

Brief Description

Screenshot of the Nearby feature in the Wikipedia iOS App.

Screenshot of the Nearby feature in the Wikipedia Android App.

The Wikimedia App team has just added the first native "Nearby" functionality to the new Android and iOS Wikipedia apps. Using this feature you'll be able to retrieve a list of Wikipedia articles near your current location and see their relative distance to you. You'll even notice a handy compass arrow gives you a quick indication of what direction you'll have to head for each location.

For a more traditional map view you can long-press an entry, or simply single tap to read the article.

Possible things to come

• Filtering nearby items by category - maybe you're interested in seeing just nearby museums, or historic buildings.
• Searching for other articles that are "nearby" the article you're currently reading.

Or, once we work out some techical details, it might be cool to let you drop a pin on a map and see articles tagged near that location.

A "fullscreen" compass type view might also be useful when you've decided to zero in on a specific article location.

What do you think?

Don't hesitate to send us feedback [EMAIL] about this, or any other, feature. We want to know what you'd like to see in future updates, and to hear your ideas for making the apps even more awesome!