Testing Announcement: New Ways to Embed Interactive Maps on Pages

Hello everyone!

While we’re currently running the third iteration of the experiment to track progress in maps, I’m here to announce another planned enhancement to this interactive feature for every community. Since the end of March, we already announced we were working in parallel, to both experiment with features like progress tracking, but also adding native enhancements to the Interactive Maps tool and for all the communities. The first one was the option to use the full screen to display a map, and we’re currently starting to test how we can embed maps on pages in different ways.

Project Name: New Ways to Embed Interactive Maps on Pages

Test Launch: June (Tentative) *

Type: Early Testing with Voluntary Communities

Will Be Tested On: All logged-out and logged-in desktop and mobile users from all voluntary wikis from every vertical using at least 1 interactive map on English and other international languages

Description: The upcoming implementation is not an experiment to investigate if this update is improving users behavior, but an early testing - using selected communities - of an enhancement that we’re planning to release as a full and native tool for everyone.

Before this full implementation, we would like to collaborate with any voluntary community (using at least 1 Interactive Map and embedding them on their pages) to ensure our improvements are working properly and are actually useful and meaningful for everybody.

If you want to include your wiki as one of the early testers, please reach out to Héctor or to your assigned Community Manager.

Other Notes: The only current way to embed Interactive Maps on wiki content pages is adding them with 100% width embed and with a fixed height. For the desktop experience, we would like to implement these improvements:

• Embedding maps in different positions and sizes:
  • A map can be embedded as a full width view (with controlled height) — extended current option.
  • A map can be embedded either on the left or right of the page, similar to how images are embedded.
  • A map can be embedded with a focused marker:
    • When a marker is linked in an embed map, refrain from displaying the marker popup by default. Instead, ensure that the map is zoomed in with the marker.
    • We display only this one marker on the map.
    • All category filters are unselected (user displays the rest of markers by clicking on category filters).
  • A map can be embedded with a selected category:
    • Once you have the category id, getting it from the source mode editor, you can embed a map only showing it.
    • Markers are visible only from this one category.
    • The rest of the categories are hidden.
    • Users can select more categories using the filters tool.
• Fullscreen can be opened within the article view, inside map embed.
• Add captions underneath the embedded map, similar to how you can caption embedded images.
• Hide or show the filter above the embedded map.
• Adding an embedded map can be handled using the source editor.
• The minimum size requirement for displaying a map embed effectively is 250px (width) by 200px (height).
• Any map embed that is 300x300px and below only shows the fullscreen button. The zoom controls will be hidden to optimize the user experience and allow for better visibility of the map.
• For a map embed that is 300x300px and below, display the marker popup in fullscreen mode.
  • Hovering over the marker shows a small tooltip with the title.
  • Clicking on the marker opens the map in fullscreen mode with the marker popup open.

On the other hand, for the mobile experience we would like to implement the next improvements:

• The viewport height will be limited to 50vh (the max).
• Zoom controls will be removed to accommodate the limited space.
• The fullscreen feature is always visible.
• For a map embed that is 300x300px and below, display the marker popup in fullscreen mode. Clicking on the marker opens the map in fullscreen mode with the marker popup open.

Preliminary mockups:

New ways to embed maps on desktop.

New ways to embed maps on mobile.

* The testing launch date is subject to change and could be delayed.

Héctor Donís

Fandom Staff

Héctor Donís is one of the Community Managers at Fandom. He has been a Fandom user since 2007. He loves video games, music, sports, movies, TV... and everything that can be fun! He has been working as a Fandom staff since 2011, initially helping the Spanish community.

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