GLAM/Newsletter/December 2024/Contents/Brazil report

This Month in GLAM – Volume XIV, Issue XII, December 2024 Normal version • Single page version

Brazil report

Catrapilha in action: Uploading the Porto Alegre image feed

By DarwIn

Over the past few weeks, the Catrapilha tool has been harnessed to import a remarkable collection of images from the Porto Alegre city administration’s official media feed. This repository, shared under an attribution-only free licence (Template:Agência Porto Alegre), now fills a gap in Commons coverage by documenting key events and everyday life in Porto Alegre, the capital of the Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Sul. The sheer volume of the initiative is impressive—more than 5,000 images have already been uploaded of the ever expanding pool of almost 150.000 images by now - only counting one of its two feeds - with more than 2,000 depicting the dramatic May 2024 floods in the region.

• 
  Our Lady of the Navigator procession, 2017
• 
  "Whatever happened to Baby Jane" theater at Porto Verão Alegre 2017
• 
  Street Carnival, 2017
• 
  Street Carnival, 2017
• 
  Companhia Jovem de Dança performing at the Mostra de Dança Verão 2017
• 
  Saint George & Ogum procession
• 
  Way of the cross, 2017

Leveraging the same React-based approach detailed in the previous article, plus an extensive refactoring of the code to allow multiple projects, Catrapilha enables smooth and semi-automated/automated file uploads to Commons. Each image’s metadata, such as description, date, and tags, is sourced directly from the Porto Alegre image feed. A custom data dictionary then translates the hundreds of source tags into the most fitting Commons categories, ensuring that the images can be effortlessly discovered and reused across Wikimedia projects. This feature proves especially valuable in large-scale endeavours, minimising manual curation while preserving essential descriptive elements—an approach aimed at streamlining the process for volunteers and GLAM professionals alike.

The specific coverage of the May 2024 floods stands out as particularly important. Photographs documenting the event range from aerial shots of flooded streets to on-the-ground imagery illustrating the city’s response teams in action. For historians, urban planners, and environmental researchers, these images are a goldmine of real-time evidence. They capture infrastructure stress points, emergency measures, and the human stories behind large-scale natural disasters. Making them available under a free licence not only broadens public access to critical material but also aids investigators in gleaning insights for improved disaster management and mitigation strategies.

• 
  The moment the floodgates were closed
• 
  Mauá water pump station gets overwhelmed and starts pumping back the river water flooding the city
• 
  Historical Center of Porto Alegre
• 
  People fleeing from the flooded areas with their pets
• 
  Displaced people at the CETE sports venue
• 
  Porto Alegre gari task force cleaning the streets after the flood

By employing Catrapilha to coordinate this import, the usually laborious process of sorting, tagging, and aligning images with Commons standards becomes far more approachable. Operators need only to review the automatically generated file descriptions and categories before finalising the upload, which helps maintain accuracy and consistency. The newly created Category:Files by Agência Porto Alegre ensures that all these materials are neatly indexed under a single Commons hub, while the project itself continues to grow, offering a dynamic view of Porto Alegre’s evolving landscape and cultural heritage.

Ultimately, these images serve an invaluable function in preserving visual records of municipal life and critical historical moments, enriching the Wikimedia ecosystem. Building upon the successes and lessons learned from Arquipelagos, Catrapilha remains flexible and ever-adaptable, connecting a wealth of photographic content from one of the most important cities of Brazil to the broader, global audience of Wikimedia Commons users and reusers.