WikidataCon 2017

Next weekend I'll attend the first Wikidata conference in Berlin, and despite being active for 14 years on Wikipedia now its the first ever conference on Wikipedia I'll visit. It was my Wikipedia editing which made me get into this obscure topic, and since I now mostly edit on Wikidata to give the data I collected more publicity, this conference sounded like something very interesting. The reason why I mention it here - I also opted to give a talk on my experiences with sharing my data on Wikidata.

As I could only get into one of the 10 minute Lightning Talk slots, my presentation certainly can't get deep into the specialties of the administrative structure, especially as the main topic is supposed to be Wikidata. My slides are already prepared,so you are welcome to take a view before. The talk will be recorded, I will post the link to the video next week then.

New ccaatt geocodes

Not only did the DOPA statistics page get a facelift - including a double spelling mistake "Official Statstics Registration Sytstems" - but also the geocode lists were updated a second time this year. Now the new subdistrict of Bangkok are included - funnily all the codes I added temporarily into my XML were actually the final ones - and also some further municipalities now have a code. Unlike the previous update, the codes deleted in the ccaatt table were all added again.

Central administrative codes

From ccaatt Excel sheet

• 100910: Phra Khanong Tai subdistrict (แขวงพระโขนงใต้)
• 101406: Phaya Thai subdistrict (แขวงพญาไท)
• 103402: On Nut subdistrict (แขวงอ่อนนุช)
• 103403: Phatthanakan subdistrict (แขวงพัฒนาการ)
• 104702: Bang Na Nuea subdistrict (แขวงบางนาเหนือ)
• 104703: Bang Na Tai subdistrict (แขวงบางนาใต้)
• 105002: Bang Bon Buea subdistrict (แขวงบางบอนเหนือ)
• 105003: Bang Bon Tai subdistrict (แขวงบางบอนใต้)
• 105004: Khlong Bang Phran subdistrict (แขวงคลองบางพราน)
• 105005: Khlong Bang Bon subdistrict (แขวงคลองบางบอน)

Oddly, the two new subdistricts of Saphan Sung were forgotten. There are also no codes prepared for planned new districts in Yala yet.
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Local administrative codes

From rcode Excel sheet

• 1286: Sao Thong Hin subdistrict municipality (เทศบาลตำบลเสาธงหิน), Nonthaburi province
• 1287: Bang Phlap subdistrict municipality (เทศบาลตำบลบางพลับ), Nonthaburi province
• 1288: Phimon Rat town (เทศบาลเมืองพิมลราช), Nonthaburi province
• 1380: Bang Phun subdistrict municipality (เทศบาลตำบลบางพูน), Pathum Thani province
• 4055: Khok Sung subdistrict municipality (เทศบาลตำบลโคกสูง), Khon Kaen province
• 5040: Buak Khang subdistrict municipality (เทศบาลตำบลบวกค้าง), Chiang Mai province
• 7380: Bo Phlap subdistrict municipality (เทศบาลตำบลบ่อพลับ), Nakhon Pathom province
• 8471: Ban Sadet subdistrict municipality (เทศบาลตำบลบ้านเสด็จ), Surat Thani province

My usual comment to these municipal codes - the current coding scheme cannot cover all the municipalities, internally in my software I already use the one I proposed some years ago, and it works fine.

Wang Nuea TAO to be merged with Wang Nuea municipality

There hasn't been any changes to the local governments since the upgrade of Pa Sak almost exactly two years ago, maybe due to the proposed abolish of the TAO level. However, in the meeting number 44 of the board two to consider draft laws on September 9, the merge of Wang Nuea TAO (องค์การบริหารส่วนตำบลวังเหนือ) with Wang Nuea subdistrict municipality (เทศบาลตำบลวังเหนือ) was discussed. As I still cannot access moi.go.th, I can only read indirectly through the Google cache, yet what I can find in the transcript of the meeting suggests the change is forthcoming very soon - maybe directly with end of the term of the TAO council on October 19th. Waiting for the end of the council term is somewhat strange, given that the local elections are suspended since the coup in 2014 already, but it was similar with the upgrade of Pa Sak mentioned before.

The transcript states, that due to the low population in the TAO - 1949 according to the transcript, 2167 in the latest DOPA statistics - the TAO should be abolished. A poll on whether the citizen approve this dissolution has been done, asking with which local government Wang Nuea shall be merged.

• Wang Nuea municipality: 679 votes
• Ban Mai municipality: 217 votes
• Wang Sai TAO: 25 votes
• Thung Hua TAO: 5 votes
• Wang Tai TAO: 5 votes

The voters chose the obvious solution, to let the Wang Nuea municipality cover almost whole subdistrict Wang Nuea (Ban Mai covers a small part of the sub district as well).

Fun with flags

On September 28th the Thai flag celebrated its centennial, which coincides with the timing of the latest Royal Gazette announcement on the Thai flag published yesterday, clarifying the Thai flag act of 1979 with the exact definition of the colors of the flag in the CIELAB color space.

Colour	L*	a*	b*	ΔE
Red	36.4	55.47	25.42	Not exceeding 1.5
White	96.61	-0.15	-1.48	Not exceeding 1.5
Blue	18.63	7.89	-19.45	Not exceeding 1.5

And it seems I am not the only one who is constantly monitoring the Royal Gazette announcements, as the Wikipedia article on the Flag of Thailand was already updated yesterday accordingly by Paul012.

And since the Wikipedia article also linked an unofficial translation of the flag act, its notable that this act does not mention anything about the flags for each province, the obscure flags I never saw anywhere but seem to exist - yet many other flags are defined in the act, even obscure one like the Boy Scout provincial flags.