That small discovery made me think about how much information is hidden behind an ordinary Commons file page.
I started asking myself: Could we make Commons file pages tell us more, without making contributors work harder to find it?
Breadcrumb Injector displaying the parent-category navigation trail on a Wikimedia Commons file page.
Notifications are specific to each wiki, so installing it on Commons tracks Commons watchlist changes, while installing it separately on Wikipedia tracks Wikipedia changes.
Give a Commons file a closer lookAll five scripts are available through my Wikimedia Commons scripts collection.
Screenshot by Gauri Guptaa featuring the Wikimedia Commons photograph of Albert Einstein (1947). Original photograph by Orren Jack Turner, digitally modified by PM_Poon and Dantadd.
What can a single photograph tell us about the Wikimedia projects that use it? Five small userscripts offer a way to find out.
Imagine opening a photograph on Wikimedia Commons and discovering that it has been used nearly 10,000 times across Wikimedia projects, in more than 100 language editions. Now imagine being able to explore that information without leaving the file page.
While testing my File Impact Snapshot script on File Einstein Head.jpg, I discovered something unexpected. The test snapshot recorded 9,908 file-usage entries across 141 language editions. Persian Wikipedia accounted for 2,643 uses, while English Wikipedia accounted for 492. These figures were recorded on 2 November 2026 and may change over time. These usage entries do not necessarily mean that the image appears directly in an article’s main content. Some uses can come through templates, which is another interesting aspect of how images travel across Wikimedia projects.
I had expected English Wikipedia to be the largest user. The numbers told a different story.
That small discovery made me think about how much information is hidden behind an ordinary Commons file page. A photograph is not simply an uploaded image. It can have a geographical history, a network of uses, a place in a category hierarchy and connections to communities speaking different languages.
But finding all this information often requires several clicks and a little exploration.
I started asking myself: Could we make Commons file pages tell us more, without making contributors work harder to find it?
That question led me to develop five userscripts to improve different parts of everyday Wikimedia workflows. Four focus on making Commons file pages more informative, while the fifth helps contributors keep track of changes across Wikimedia wikis.
Five questions that inspired five tools
Rather than building one large tool, I explored five smaller improvements that could work independently.
Where was this photograph taken?
Lat/Long Finder converts GPS coordinates available on a Commons file page into a readable location. Using OpenStreetMap’s Nominatim service, it displays the city, state or region, country and a country flag in a small floating panel, along with a link to the exact location on the map. When coordinates are unavailable, the panel simply does not appear.
Lat/Long Finder displaying the geographic location of an India Gate photograph on Wikimedia Commons. Screenshot by Gauri Guptaa. The photograph is by A.Savin, licensed under the Free Art Licence (FAL).
How far does this photograph reach?
This is where File Impact Snapshot adds another dimension. It transforms global usage data into a visual summary, showing total uses, project types and language editions, followed by a project-wise bar chart and a ranking of the eight most-used wikis.
The Einstein photograph was a useful reminder that the reach of an image is not always distributed where we expect it to be.
File Impact Snapshot visualising the global usage of Albert Einstein’s photograph across Wikimedia projects and language editions. Screenshot by Gauri Guptaa. The source photograph is by Orren Jack Turner, modified by PM_Poon and Dantadd, and is in the public domain in the United States and India according to Wikimedia Commons.
Is this file categorised specifically enough?
Commons categories are essential for discoverability, but files can sometimes remain in broad categories even when more specific options exist. Category Depth Checker checks visible categories and identifies those with more than 10 direct subcategories It displays a warning and suggests up to five possible subcategories for further exploration.
During testing on a photograph of the Taj Mahal, it identified the broad category “Symmetry impressions” and suggested more specific options. Importantly, it never changes categories automatically. The contributor always makes the final decision.
Screenshot by Gauri Gupta. The photograph is by Yann Forget, edited by King of Hearts and Jbarta, Wikimedia Commons, licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.
Where does this page sit in the category hierarchy?
Finally, Breadcrumb Injector makes category navigation easier by adding a clickable trail above the heading on file and category pages. It follows parent categories for up to five levels, helping contributors understand the broader context of a page and move through the category tree more easily.
Together, the first four tools make different aspects of a Commons file easier to explore: its location, global reach, categorisation and place within the category hierarchy. Watchlist Notifier addresses another everyday need: helping contributors stay informed about changes to the pages they follow.
Breadcrumb Injector displaying the parent-category navigation trail on a Wikimedia Commons file page. Screenshot by Gauri Guptaa. The photograph is by A.Savin, Wikimedia Commons, licensed under the Free Art License (FAL).
What has changed since my last visit?
For contributors who follow several Wikimedia pages, regularly checking a watchlist can become repetitive. It is easy to miss a new edit when there are many pages to monitor.
Watchlist Notifier makes this process more convenient by checking the user’s watchlist every 60 seconds and sending browser notifications when new edits are detected.
It also adds a session panel to the Tools sidebar, where contributors can keep track of changes during their browsing session.
The script can be installed on any Wikimedia wiki. It checks that wiki’s watchlist every 60 seconds while contributors browse normal page-view mode. Notifications are specific to each wiki, so installing it on Commons tracks Commons watchlist changes, while installing it separately on Wikipedia tracks Wikipedia changes.
The first check establishes a baseline, preventing old edits from generating unnecessary notifications.
Watchlist Notifier displaying a newly detected edit to the WikiEval Wikimania 2026 poster in the Tools sidebar and browser notifications on Wikimedia Commons. Screenshot by Gauri Guptaa. The poster credits Gauri Gupta and the WikiEval Development Team and is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.
The interesting part was not just writing the code
Building these scripts was also an exercise in understanding the technical environment in which Wikimedia operates.
Not every idea that sounds useful is necessarily practical. Wikimedia’s content security policy restricts requests to many external websites. This influenced some of the approaches I could take. For example, OpenStreetMap Nominatim has fair-use limits, so Lat/Long Finder is intended for browsing individual file pages rather than bulk processing.
I also learned to check existing gadgets, templates and platform features before building something new. A new script should solve a problem that is not already adequately addressed.
Debugging brought its own lessons. A script that works in the browser console may not behave the same way when a page loads. Understanding MediaWiki APIs, page-loading behaviour and browser developer tools became an important part of the process.
I wanted these tools to remain small and focused. None of these scripts edits Wikimedia page content, Commons files or categories. They retrieve information and improve the browsing experience through additional interface elements, notifications and navigation aids. Watchlist Notifier also stores the last-seen revision ID in browser storage to avoid sending duplicate notifications.
Give a Commons file a closer look
All five scripts are available through my Wikimedia Commons scripts collection. They are released under the CC0-1.0 licence, allowing others to copy, adapt and share them.
To try the four Commons-specific scripts, visit your Commons common.js page, add their respective import lines, save and perform a hard refresh (Ctrl+Shift+R).
Watchlist Notifier can be installed separately on any Wikimedia wiki where you want to receive notifications. Add its import line to that wiki’s own common.js page.
As with any userscript, please read the source code before installing it. A userscript runs with your account’s permissions.
Your turn: What else should a Commons file tell us?
Here is a small challenge for Commons contributors: choose a photograph you know well and explore it using these five scripts.
Can you find where it was taken, discover an unexpected Wikimedia project using it, understand its reach across language editions, or identify a more specific category?
And then think about one more question:
What information do you wish Commons showed you directly on a file page, but currently makes you search for elsewhere?
Share your ideas, suggestions or potential use cases in the comments. Perhaps the next useful Commons userscript will begin with a problem you encounter every day.
Because improving the Wikimedia experience does not always require building something big. Sometimes, it starts with making one small piece of information easier to find.
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