WikiReader was a project to deliver an

offline In computer technology and telecommunications, online indicates a state of connectivity and offline indicates a disconnected state. In modern terminology, this usually refers to an Internet connection, but (especially when expressed "on line" or ...

, text-only version of

Wikipedia Wikipedia is a multilingual free online encyclopedia written and maintained by a community of volunteers, known as Wikipedians, through open collaboration and using a wiki-based editing system. Wikipedia is the largest and most-read refer ...

on a

mobile device A mobile device (or handheld computer) is a computer small enough to hold and operate in the hand. Mobile devices typically have a flat LCD or OLED screen, a touchscreen interface, and digital or physical buttons. They may also have a physical ...

. The project was sponsored by

Openmoko Openmoko is a discontinued project to create a family of open source mobile phones, including the hardware specification, the operating system (Openmoko Linux), and actual smartphone development implementation like the Neo 1973 and Neo FreeRun ...

and made by Pandigital, and its source code has been released. The project debuted an offline portable reader for Wikipedia in October 2009. Updates in multiple languages were available online and a twice-yearly offline update service delivered via

Micro SD Secure Digital, officially abbreviated as SD, is a proprietary non-volatile flash memory card format developed by the SD Association (SDA) for use in portable devices. The standard was introduced in August 1999 by joint efforts between SanDis ...

card was also available at a cost of $29 per year. WikiReader versions of the

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national ide ...

Wikiquote Wikiquote is part of a family of wiki-based projects run by the Wikimedia Foundation using MediaWiki software. Based on an idea by Daniel Alston and implemented by Brion Vibber, the project's objective is to produce collaboratively a vast refer ...

Wiktionary Wiktionary ( , , rhyming with "dictionary") is a multilingual, web-based project to create a free content dictionary of terms (including words, phrases, proverbs, linguistic reconstructions, etc.) in all natural languages and in a number ...

and

Project Gutenberg Project Gutenberg (PG) is a Virtual volunteering, volunteer effort to digitize and archive cultural works, as well as to "encourage the creation and distribution of eBooks." It was founded in 1971 by American writer Michael S. Hart and is the ...

can be installed together on a user-supplied 16 GB Micro SDHC

Memory Card A memory card is an electronic data storage device used for storing digital information, typically using flash memory. These are commonly used in digital portable electronic devices. They allow adding memory to such devices using a card in a so ...

. Unlike Wikipedia itself, the device features

parental controls Parental controls are features which may be included in digital television services, computers and video games, mobile devices and software that allow parents to restrict the access of content to their children. These controls were created to ...

. The device can also run programs written in

Forth Forth or FORTH may refer to: Arts and entertainment * ''forth'' magazine, an Internet magazine * ''Forth'' (album), by The Verve, 2008 * ''Forth'', a 2011 album by Proto-Kaw * Radio Forth, a group of independent local radio stations in Scotla ...

; a simple

calculator An electronic calculator is typically a portable electronic device used to perform calculations, ranging from basic arithmetic to complex mathematics. The first solid-state electronic calculator was created in the early 1960s. Pocket-sized ...

program is included. In late 2014, the WikiReader

website A website (also written as a web site) is a collection of web pages and related content that is identified by a common domain name and published on at least one web server. Examples of notable websites are Google Search, Google, Facebook, Amaz ...

and project itself were shut down and abandoned for unknown reasons. Existing WikiReaders no longer receive updates to their database. Devices, professionally produced updates, and homegrown updates continue to be available from the secondary markets (e.g.

eBay eBay Inc. ( ) is an American multinational e-commerce company based in San Jose, California, that facilitates consumer-to-consumer and business-to-consumer sales through its website. eBay was founded by Pierre Omidyar in 1995 and became a ...

and

Amazon Amazon most often refers to: * Amazons, a tribe of female warriors in Greek mythology * Amazon rainforest, a rainforest covering most of the Amazon basin * Amazon River, in South America * Amazon (company), an American multinational technology c ...

), as well as from community efforts centered around the WikiReader subreddit.

Specifications

* Display: Monochrome

Liquid Crystal Display A liquid-crystal display (LCD) is a flat panel display, flat-panel display or other Electro-optic modulator, electronically modulated optical device that uses the light-modulating properties of liquid crystals combined with polarizers. Liqui ...

(LCD), 240 × 208 pixels. * Interface: Capacitive

touchscreen A touchscreen or touch screen is the assembly of both an input ('touch panel') and output ('display') device. The touch panel is normally layered on the top of an electronic visual display of an information processing system. The display is often ...

with on-screen keyboard. Four hardware keys. * CPU:

Epson Seiko Epson Corporation, or simply known as Epson, is a Japanese multinational electronics company and one of the world's largest manufacturers of computer printers and information- and imaging-related equipment. Headquartered in Suwa, Nagano, ...

S1C33 E07

microcontroller A microcontroller (MCU for ''microcontroller unit'', often also MC, UC, or μC) is a small computer on a single VLSI integrated circuit (IC) chip. A microcontroller contains one or more CPUs (processor cores) along with memory and programmable i ...

with 8KB+2KB internal memory * Firmware: 64 KB

Flash memory Flash memory is an electronic non-volatile computer memory storage medium that can be electrically erased and reprogrammed. The two main types of flash memory, NOR flash and NAND flash, are named for the NOR and NAND logic gates. Both us ...

* Memory: 32MB SDRAM * Storage: Removable

microSD Secure Digital, officially abbreviated as SD, is a proprietary non-volatile flash memory card format developed by the SD Association (SDA) for use in portable devices. The standard was introduced in August 1999 by joint efforts between SanDis ...

card (SD and SDHC supported, 512MB, 2GB, 4GB, 8GB, 16GB supported) * File formats supported: native format; a converter from

MediaWiki MediaWiki is a free and open-source wiki software. It is used on Wikipedia and almost all other Wikimedia websites, including Wiktionary, Wikimedia Commons and Wikidata; these sites define a large part of the requirement set for MediaWiki ...

's XML export format is available. * Dimensions: 100 × 100 × 20 mm (3.9 × 3.9 × 0.8 inches) * Weight: * Languages: English * Warranty: 90 days * Power: Two

AAA batteries The AAA battery (or triple-A battery) is a standard size of dry cell battery. One or more AAA batteries are commonly used in low-drain portable electronic devices. A zinc–carbon battery in this size is designated by IEC as R03, by ANSI C18.1 ...

* Battery life: 90 hours; equivalent to 1 year of normal use according to manufacturer

Limitations

* Text-only display: The WikiReader is strictly a "text only" display device. The device therefore does not store or display any Wikipedia images. * Tables: The WikiReader does not display article text which appears inside a table on the Wikipedia Website (see Wikipedia:Tables). * HTML "special characters": Certain Wikipedia article text encoded using

HTML special characters In SGML, HTML and XML documents, the logical constructs known as ''character data'' and ''attribute values'' consist of sequences of characters, in which each character can manifest directly (representing itself), or can be represented by a series ...

is stripped from the WikiReader's output. * Mathematical formulas: Original versions of the WikiReader do not display Wikipedia article information encoded as a

formula In science, a formula is a concise way of expressing information symbolically, as in a mathematical formula or a ''chemical formula''. The informal use of the term ''formula'' in science refers to the general construct of a relationship betwee ...

using

LaTeX Latex is an emulsion (stable dispersion) of polymer microparticles in water. Latexes are found in nature, but synthetic latexes are common as well. In nature, latex is found as a milky fluid found in 10% of all flowering plants (angiosperms ...

(see Math markup). This has been addressed with an optional firmware update, which is pre-loaded on newer WikiReaders. * Treatment of missing information: The WikiReader does not provide indications of sections where information has been removed from a Wikipedia article. Images, tables, mathematical formulas and other information that was not encoded as plain text in the original Wikipedia article is deleted from the WikiReader's output. * Search: The WikiReader's search capabilities are basic. There is no

full text search In text retrieval, full-text search refers to techniques for searching a single computer-stored document or a collection in a full-text database. Full-text search is distinguished from searches based on metadata or on parts of the original texts r ...

capability. Only the titles of Wikipedia articles can be searched. The WikiReader does support

incremental search In computing, incremental search, hot search, incremental find or real-time suggestions is a user interface interaction method to progressively search for and filter through text. As the user types text, one or more possible matches for the text ...

of article titles, beginning with the first characters of each title. Search terms must be spelled correctly.

Wildcard Wild card most commonly refers to: * Wild card (cards), a playing card that substitutes for any other card in card games * Wild card (sports), a tournament or playoff place awarded to an individual or team that has not qualified through normal pla ...

searching is not supported.

Updated Wikireader Images

The last official wikireader image was released by Pandigital in 2011. However, there exists an active for

of the original software capable of producing new images. There is also an active reddit communit

where new wikireader images are shared and discussed. The latest update was released by this community in December 2020.

References

External links

WikiReader source code

Offline Wikipedia Reader
at Openmoko *

Techmoan Matthew "Mat" Taylor, better known by his channel's name Techmoan, is a YouTuber and blogger active since May 2009, featuring consumer tech reviews and retrotech documentaries about technology of historical interest. Apart from reviews and te ...

: , 3 September 2018 {{Wikipedia, state=collapsed Open hardware electronic devices Openmoko Dedicated application electronic devices Wikipedia Computer-related introductions in 2009

Specifications

Limitations

Updated Wikireader Images

See also

References

External links