Google Site Landing Page for West Java Cultural Heritage Documentation (WCB 2.0 Project)
For the people of West Java, Indonesia (the homeland of the Sundanese culture), do we truly know the richness and diversity of its culture, or is it just limited to stories from school?
To bridge this gap, the Wikimedia Bandung Community initiated Wiki Cagar Budaya 2.0 (WCB 2.0), a cultural heritage documentation project in West Java by utilizing the Wikimedia project, integrating several projects such as Wikimedia Commons, Wikidata, Sundanese Wikipedia, Indonesian Wikipedia and implemented with the supported by a rapid fund from the Wikimedia Foundation.
Following the success of the Wiki Cagar Budaya project in 2024 which focused on the Bandung City and Sumedang Regency, WCB 2.0 continued this initiative from May-July 2025. The project expanded the documentation coverage to include Cimahi City, Cirebon City, Purwakarta Regency, and Majalengka Regency. WCB 2.0 was carried out by 3 members of the Wikimedia Bandung community, namely User: Lany pirna, User: Mirani Pramitasari, and User: Pijri Paijar.
Behind the Scenes of WCB 2.0: The Documentation Process
The project followed four phases: data inventory, field documentation, uploading, and article editing. We began by inventorying cultural heritage sites using official data from the website of the Ministry of Education and Culture.
Field documentation was conducted over seven periods in 2025 across Cimahi City (May 3-4), Cirebon City (May 10-11 and May 31-June 1), Purwakarta Regency (May 17-18, June 14-15, and June 21-22). And additional documentation in Majalengka Regency on July 12-13, 2025. We captured comprehensive visual records of cultural heritage sites from multiple angles. All photos were uploaded to Wikimedia Commons under a Creative Commons license, ensuring they can be freely accessed and utilized by the general public.
To enhance information accessibility, project members enriched Wikidata entries, while Indonesian and Sundanese Wikipedia were updated through a crowdsourcing approach. This included an edit-a-thon (Kopdar) on July 19, 2025 and a WikiTraining on June 29, 2025 collaborating with community members in Cirebon City (Literasi Senja Community), assisted by five committee members.
Results: Cultural Heritage in West Java in a Digital Archive
The documented 71 cultural heritage sites, including lakes, caves, and hermitages, resulting in 580 photos uploaded to Wikimedia Commons. On Wikipedia, 70 new articles were created (36 articles in Sundanes and 34 articles in Indonesian) through collaborative effort: 19 new users through WikiTraining contributed 17 new articles, 11 members of the Wikimedia Bandung community through Kopdar contributed 19 new articles (averaging 2,500 bytes), and three project members who completed the remaining entries. Additionally, the project generated 83 Wikidata items, consisting of 46 new items and 37 expanded ones. This project also created a Google Sites landing page to centralize our documentation results and project results.
Project Reflection: Obstacles and Lessons
A primary challenge encountered was obtaining documentation permits. Our fieldwork revealed that while sites are public assets, physical access is often restricted by specific regulations, necessitating better advocacy for public access. The limited digital data further underscores the project’s vital role in bridging information gaps through cross-sectoral collaboration. Through this project, we realized that each documented building is a complementary piece of a historical puzzle. For example, the close relationship between cultural heritage sites in the Purwakarta and Cirebon regions significantly illustrates the interconnected history of the spread of Islam in West Java.
Moving Forward: WCB 3.0
Building on the foundation of previous WCB projects, we aim to realize our vision of continuously enriching the availability of information and documentation on cultural heritage in West Java across Wikimedia projects. Through the upcoming Wiki Cagar Budaya 3.0 project supported by a rapid fund from the Wikimedia Foundation, the Wikimedia Bandung will expand its scope to Banten, a region with deep historical ties to West Java, allowing us to explore and document its history and cultural heritage. By applying valuable lessons from previous projects, we hope to collaborate with various parties to promote and utilize the freely accessible cultural heritage information for education, research, and preservation.
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