Wikimedia Bugzilla is closed!

Currently, clicking on an image goes to the image's 
resource page, metadata page, index page (or whatever 
you want to call the page where the image is 
described, who uploaded it, etc.)

There are some images where it would be useful to 
allow them to become clickable image maps.  One 
example being where a map of the U.S. can be broken
out into the individual states and allow someone to
reference a particular state from that clickable 
image map in order to get more in-depth information
on a subject.

Another example would be to have say, the list of
every county in a country be selectable starting 
from the country at large having individual states, 
then each state having the list of every city and 
county being clickable, then the link goes to that 
particular county.

A lot of this has already been done in versions that
are already public domain; the White House website 
has a state-clickable map for all 50 states and DC, 
so there is a source for that purpose, for example.

Now, there is the issue of how to allow access to 
the original image metadata page.  I think this 
would require an extra link be available (generated) 
after the image to allow both clicking on a page as 
a client-side map and as access to the underlying 
metadata describing the image and who created it.

I have, in certain articles I have written/edited, 
realized that if the image in the map was a 
clickable client-side image map, it would have made
the article much easier to work with, as I would 
not have had to include all the links for each item
separately after the image.

In generating the map, it may be that we want to 
have all of the points identified, and thus the
means to describe the map would require identifying
the points in order that an automatic table of links
following (or preceding) the image be made for those
that do not generate images or who cannot click on
an image because of visual impairment, would still
be able to use the linkages provided by the map as
it would be usable for people with normal vision
capability.

As a side note, it may be that being able to create 
an image as a clickable client-side map should be 
something that requires an additional privelege or 
that requires one request it be enabled from someone
who has the privelege to do so if it is felt that 
allowing anyone to make an image into a clickable 
client-side map could be something that would be 
abused or is seriously abusable in some cases.

I think allowing the implementation of clickable 
client-side maps would improve Wikipedia and the 
related services (wiktionary etc.) as it would 
enhance the multimedia capability of what this 
project is supposed to provide, a truly rich content, 
web-based encyclopedia (and other services).

In the interim, I would like to recommend that where
client-side image map HTML syntax is written into a 
page that the system simply ignore it, rather than
writing out the code back to the page, or give an
indication that client-side maps are not (yet)
supported; putting a client-side map into a page 
causes the client-side map code to render as text 
instead of being simply quietly included as 
non-functional html that is simply not sent to the 
user's browser.

I therefore recommend the inclusion of capacity to
provide client-side image map capability.  The 
ability to add the client-side map coding can, if 
need be, made subject to having a privelege to do
so if it is deemed necessary.

Paul Robinson
paul@paul-robinson.us