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Squeezing a Wikipedia Snapshot Onto an 8GB iPhone

Posted by timothy on from the but-you'll-miss-the-latest-edit-wars dept.

blackbearnh writes with this excerpt from O'Reilly Radar "Think about Wikipedia, what some consider the most complete general survey of human knowledge we have at the moment. Now imagine squeezing it down to fit comfortably on an 8GB iPhone. Sound daunting? Well, that's just what Patrick Collison's Encyclopedia iPhone application does. App Store purchasers of Collison's open source application can browse and search the full text of Wikipedia when stuck in a plane, or trapped in the middle of nowhere (or, as defined by AT&T coverage...)"

9 of 169 comments (clear)

  1. Nothing new by Hrshgn · · Score: 4, Informative

    This is nothing new. Wikipedia has been available for several years now in MDict format: http://www.octopus-studio.com/product.en.htm

    1. Re:Nothing new by tomthepom · · Score: 2, Informative

      You're not looking hard enough. Wikipedia has also been available in Tomeraider format for a while now.

  2. Better by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    And for those preferring accuracy and editorial responsibility :

    http://www.ipodnn.com/articles/08/02/27/britannica.on.iphone/

  3. Re:Nice! by Starayo · · Score: 3, Informative

    The filesize of the app is about 2GB. Pretty amazing!

    I'd be grabbing it right now if I didn't only have ~350MB of free space left on my iPhone...

    Would be a great app for iPod Touch users.

    --
    Ezekiel 23:20
  4. Wikibooks is for how-to guides by tepples · · Score: 3, Informative

    Hell, I was flipping through an encyclopedia from the 40's, and under "Dynamite", it had detailed instructions on how to MAKE it yourself

    Wikipedia doesn't have how-to guides. If you want that, use Wikibooks.

  5. Re:Profits by twoshortplanks · · Score: 3, Informative

    He is; It's detailed on the info for the app in iTunes. Since you need iTunes to read that, I'll simply post a screenshot: http://img.skitch.com/20090703-e7kkm8i7f4wdq9ir92td898wr3.jpg (skitch may eventually delete that image after a while...)

    --
    -- Sorry, I can't think of anything funny to say here.
  6. Warning: 3 majors problem with this app. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    I bought this application 6 months ago and there are 3 majors problems with it:
    1) The search function is broken because you need to type the exact word (prefix)
    2) This is plain text: no pictures and no tables so most articles with "list" are useless
    3) No update mechanism so the dump used will be outdated soon.

  7. Re:Nice! by SuperKendall · · Score: 2, Informative

    So stick a bigger SD card in it already.

    He can't, can you just loan him your mobile SD capable device that can run the app?

    Oh that's right...

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
  8. Just use the mobile-formatted version by daemonenwind · · Score: 4, Informative

    try this link from your mobile phone:
    http://wapedia.mobi/en/

    That way you get the whole thing, up-to-date, and with no trouble or major memory usage.