Helo Dev and ClipToCommons Development Team,
I would like to thank you for developing the ClipToCommons tool. I recently
used it to upload a couple of videos to Wikimedia Commons, and I found it
to be a very interesting and user-friendly tool. The workflow is simple,
and it makes uploading video clips much easier compared to other methods.
While using the tool, I noticed a few issues and have some suggestions that
may help improve the user experience:
1.
*Metadata Fetching:* The tool couldn't automatically fetch metadata for
some videos (e.g., date).
2.
*Licence*: Although there is an option to specify the license during
upload, the license is not displayed on the uploaded file page, resulting
in a Wikimedia Commons speedy deletion warning.
3.
*Description Editing:* It would be great if the description field could
integrate with the Content Translation tool or provide multilingual editing
support. This would make it much easier for contributors to prepare
descriptions in multiple languages before uploading.
4.
*Custom Thumbnail Selection:* It would be a valuable addition if users
could select a custom thumbnail (or choose a frame from the video) before
uploading. This would allow contributors to highlight the most
representative or visually appealing frame, making the uploaded videos more
informative and attractive on Wikimedia Commons.
Overall, I really enjoyed using ClipToCommons and appreciate the effort
that has gone into developing this tool. I hope these suggestions are
helpful and contribute to making it even better for the Wikimedia community.
Thank you for your hard work and continued support of Wikimedia
contributors.
Best,
Bharathesha Alasandemajalu
On Sat, 16 May 2026 at 18:32, Dev Jadiya via Wikimedia-l <
[email protected]> wrote:
> Hi all,
>
> I'd like to share a Toolforge tool I've built for uploading
> device-recorded videos to Wikimedia Commons: clip2commons.
>
> https://clip2commons.toolforge.org/
>
> It encodes locally in the browser using the WebCodecs API and uploads
> via the official MediaWiki API.
>
>
> WHY ANOTHER TOOL
>
> This is intended to complement, not replace, video2commons.
> video2commons handles URL imports (YouTube, archive.org, etc.) and
> remains the right tool for that workflow.
>
> clip2commons covers a different case: a video file already on the
> user's device that needs to reach Commons. For that case, the
> existing options are:
>
> - video2commons (file upload mode): the file goes to a Toolforge
> encoder pool that is shared and currently overstretched
> (Community Wishlist W447, W392, W443, W512, W523, W536 are open
> about v2c stability or capability gaps).
> - UploadWizard: accepts files up to 5 GB chunked, but does not
> convert formats. iPhone .mov and many Android .mp4 files fail
> TimedMediaHandler post-upload or upload as patent-encumbered
> formats.
> - Manual ffmpeg + UploadWizard: works for those who can do it,
> but is outside what most uploaders are willing or able to manage.
>
> clip2commons does the WebM/VP9 conversion in the browser via
> WebCodecs, then uploads chunk-by-chunk to commons.wikimedia.org.
> There is no shared queue, no server-side encoder pool, and no
> infrastructure that needs maintenance to keep the tool running.
> The only resource constraint is the user's own device.
>
>
> VALIDATION
>
> End-to-end test, 1-2 Mbps connection, 683 MB 1080x1920 portrait
> (Original) file (6 min 13 s):
>
> - In-browser encode: 15 min 20 s
> - Total wall-clock (encode + upload combined): ~16 minutes
> - Final file: 163 MB, VP9/Opus, 1080x1920
> - Result on Commons:
>
> https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Wiki_Script_Publisher_Presentation_at_Developer_Skill_Development_Program_India_01.webm
>
>
> PROVENANCE / LICENSING UI
>
> The "Release rights" step mirrors UploadWizard's question tree
> exactly: same root choice (own work vs. someone else), same
> sub-questions for "contains the work of others" and "not protected
> by copyright law", same hard blocks for "I don't know" and
> "copyright-protected", same VRT-pending workflow for permission
> uploads, same set of accepted CC license templates per branch.
>
> This was deliberate. Files uploaded through clip2commons should be
> indistinguishable in policy terms from files uploaded through
> UploadWizard or video2commons. The wikitext output uses the
> standard {{Information}} + {{self}} / bare-license-template
> structure with [[Category:Uploaded with clip2commons]].
>
>
> BROWSER SUPPORT
>
> Verified working (full encode + upload):
> - Google Chrome (desktop and mobile)
> - Microsoft Edge (desktop only)
> - Brave
> - DuckDuckGo browser
> - Samsung Internet
> - Dolphin
> - Bing browser
> - Opera Mini (already-WebM/VP9 files only)
>
> Limited mode (already-WebM/VP9 files; cannot re-encode):
> - Firefox (desktop and mobile)
> - Safari (encoder support coming in 26.1)
>
> Not currently supported:
> - Microsoft Edge on Android (WebCodecs implementation incompatible)
> - Opera (decoder errors at encode start)
> - Yandex
> - Tor Browser (WebCodecs disabled as fingerprinting protection)
>
> Browsers in the "limited mode" or "not supported" lists show a
> clear banner up front instead of letting the user start a doomed
> upload. video2commons remains the recommended fallback for those
> browsers.
>
>
> KNOWN LIMITS
>
> - No URL imports. video2commons remains the right tool for that.
> - Hard cap: 1 GB / 1 hour input file. Larger files risk OOM during
> in-browser encode on memory-limited devices.
> - Encode time depends on the device. Modern hardware encodes at
> roughly 0.2x to 1x video duration; older devices can be slower.
>
>
> FEEDBACK WELCOME
>
> This is beta. Bug reports, policy / wikitext / copy review, and
> testing on devices and connections I do not have are all welcome.
>
> - GitLab issues:
> https://gitlab.wikimedia.org/toolforge-repos/clip2commons (MIT)
> - My talk page:
> https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Dev_Jadiya
>
> Thanks,
> Dev Jadiya
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