Email Archive: translate-decathlon (read-only)
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[d7n] News about the Decathlon V
From: Samuel Murray (Groenkloof) <samuel@tr...> - 2008-11-09 19:40
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G'day everyone! NEWS ABOUT THE DECATHLON V This is the 5th general newsletter of the Decathlon project. Please share this e-mail with people who may be interested in our project. Invite your friends to join this mailing list about the Decathlon project. And encourage anyone to help translate software into their language. In this letter, we look at the following issues: * Last two projects: - FileZilla - wxDownload Fast * Previous projects: - OpenProj - VLC * Involvement of ProZ.com translators * Stats added to projects on wiki * Translators given credit on the wiki * Getting translators more involved * Splitting files * Feedback on second-language feature * New offline translation tool, VirTaal * Overview of all our projects * Tools and resources for translators TWO FINAL PROJECTS: FILEZILLA During the month of October we started translating FileZilla, an FTP client. FileZilla has been translated into several languages already, but a number of those translations have not been updated for a while now. We posted a notice on ProZ.com about our FileZilla's translation and had many e-mails of interest. A number of FileZilla's existing translators also decided to start making use of Pootle, and in three cases the Decathlon translators got permission to take over a language's translation completely. So far, things are looking good for FileZilla's translation, but we need still more translators. So if you're interested in translating it (especially in a language not yet covered), please let me (samuel@tr...) know. The current progress for languages where Decathlon is involved, is: Arabic 70%, Hebrew 44%, Korean 100%, Macedonian 20%, Serbian 29%, Swedish 100% and Turkish 53% (to name but a few). More information about translating FileZilla can be found here: http://translate.sourceforge.net/wiki/decathlon/filezilla TWO FINAL PROJECTS: WXDOWNLOAD FAST The very last project of the year 2008 is a small one -- less than 2000 words. We are translating a download manager called wxDownload Fast. With this program you can schedule your downloads and download files in chunks. It has not been translated into many languages yet, and I'm sure we can make a great contribution to it. The translation of wxDownlaod Fast will not be advertised on ProZ.com, so here's an opportunity for all the existing Decathlon translators to do one last project for 2008. More information about wxDownload Fast's translation procedure is here: http://translate.sourceforge.net/wiki/decathlon/wxdfast PREVIOUS PROJECTS: OPENPROJ In our previous newsletter we announced the project OpenProj for translation. OpenProj is a project management program with features similar to Microsoft Project. Although we had a lot of interest from several languages, the biggest success no doubt is the Arabic translation, which is at 100%. Other languages showing lots of progress includes Tagalog 31%, Turkish 12%, and Catalan 11%. PREVIOUS PROJECTS: VLC As you all know, VLC is a large project to translate. The language file is nearly 30 000 words long. But, if you're willing to translate just 5000 words, VLC will appear almost fully translated when you run it. VLC is also nearing its first 1.0 release, and we encourage you all to help translate VLC into your language. The progress statistics for VLC may not seem so spectacular, but remember that it is a large translation, and we would be happy if translators finish the graphical user interface (5000 words, roughly 20%). The current progress for VLC is: Friulian 8%, Hebrew 10%, Hindi 8%, Irish 3%, Catalan 37%, Malaysian 75%, Polish 53%, Chinese (CN) 37%, Chinese (TW) 13%, Tagalog 10%, and Czech 28%. INVOLVEMENT OF PROZ.COM TRANSLATORS A project such as the Decathlon is nothing without translators, and a lot of our time is spent trying to get more translators involved. In the past, we tried to find translators at universities, language institutes, translation associations, and even existing software translation projects. But recently we started making use of the professional translators' web portal ProZ.com to get more translators. It turned out to be a goldmine. Many, many professional translators seem interested in volunteer translation. We were uncertain at first whether professional translators would be willing to make use of a translation tool originally designed for volunteers (i.e. Pootle), but we were not disappointed. We generally get over fifty "applications" per month from translators responding to our posts. Unfortunately, only a small number of those showing interest actually start translating, but it is good exposure for volunteer translation and opensource in general. STATS ADDED TO PROJECTS ON WIKI If ever you wondered how much of a project has been translated into a certain language, you can see it on our Pootle server. The default view is the statistical view. Still, some of the languages hosted on Pootle were not translated as part of the Decathlon project. So we decided to put the Decathlon specific statistics on our wiki. Visit the page of the project you're interested in, and you'll see an overview of translation progress under the heading "Current status". For example, here are the statistics of Art of Illusion (updated in September): http://translate.sourceforge.net/wiki/decathlon/art_of_illusion#current_status TRANSLATORS GIVEN CREDIT ON THE WIKI Our interaction with ProZ.com made us rethink the way translators are credited for their work. Not all software projects give credit to translators visibly. Some might mention the translators in the About box, whereas others may only mention the translator's name in the source code where no other translator is likely to see it. For this reason we decided to credit Decathlon translators directly on the Decathlon wiki. Making the names of translators available also helps translators communicate with each other. The whole point of Decathlon is to break down the silos of knowledge that form when translators do not mingle, and to that effect it is vital that the translators in all our projects know of each other and have the opportunity to share their expertise. Volunteers who translated a sizeable number of segments are mentioned on the wiki page for each project. We do not mention usernames, only real names (where available), and contact details are soundly munged. When you visit the page of the project you're interested in, you'll see the credits (including the number of lines translated by each translator) under the heading "Decathlon l10n progress". For example, here are the credits of WordPress: http://translate.sourceforge.net/wiki/decathlon/wordpress#decathlon_l10n_progress GETTING TRANSLATORS MORE INVOLVED Over the course of the year you may have noticed that we tried various approaches for translator involvement in the actual software projects they are translating. We find that many software projects have hopelessly complicated translation procedures, and we know that translators want to focus on what they do best -- translation itself. For this reason, during the first number of projects in the Decathlon, we tried to shield translators from the technical aspects of the software development as much as possible. As the year progressed, we changed our tactic so that translators were guided to take a more active role in managing their translations as part of the larger software development process. If you visit our Decathlon wiki again, you'll notice that we added instructions to the pages about how to join each project's translation process, even if you're not planning on using Pootle. By expecting translators to follow a certain procedure before they can translate, we bring them and the developers closer together. For example, we ask translators to join the development mailing lists and introduce themselves. This small act can grease the wheels for much better interaction. SPLITTING FILES It can be daunting to translate a large file. For this reason two of our projects, VLC and WordPress, were split into smaller files, so that translators could focus on translating the more important stuff first. We found that splitting the files into smaller units was popular with translators initially, but sadly most translators did not focus on the important files -- they focused on the smallest files! The smallest files are not necessarily the important ones. For example, in VLC, the most important file is interface_GUI.po, which is actually the largest file (5000 words). Splitting the files also make it more difficult for the project leader to send translations upstream again. We would like to know from you (readers of this newsletter) what you think about this. Have you helped translate either VLC or WordPress, and if so, what did you think of the split file approach? FEEDBACK ON SECOND LANGUAGE FEATURE As mentioned in our previous newsletter, Pootle now has a feature to display a second source language as reference for translators whose English may not be as good as another language. For example, if a project has already been translated into French, and your French is better than your English, you can now translate in Pootle with all French translations visible. In order to get maximum benefit from the second language feature, we decided to upload existing translations in eight major languages to our Pootle server, in read-only format. We also asked a number of translators on ProZ.com to help us turn unfinished translations into 100% translations for those major languages. But the response we had from existing translators in major languages was disappointing. Very few volunteer translators in languages like Arabic, French, German, Spanish, Russian, Japanese etc seemed interested in getting help from even professional translators, to get their translations up to 100%. So we ask of our readers, if you speak one of these major languages, please encourage the existing translators of the Decathlon projects to contact me, samuel@tr..., and we'll send them willing translators to assist with their translations. NEW OFFLINE TRANSLATION TOOL, VIRTAAL Our parent organisation, Translate.org.za, recently released an offline translation tool called VirTaal. All files hosted on Pootle can now be translated without an internet connection using this tool. If you're interested in using VirTaal instead of Pootle for translating one of our projects into your language, do let me (samuel@tr...) know and I'll arrange for the appropriate web permissions. Download VirTaal here: http://translate.sourceforge.net/wiki/virtaal/index OVERVIEW OVER ALL OUR PROJECTS Once again, here is a reminder of all the projects we're translating at the moment: * Freemind (a mind mapper) http://translate.sourceforge.net/wiki/decathlon/freemind * Art of Illusion (a graphics and animation editor) http://translate.sourceforge.net/wiki/decathlon/aoi * WordPress (a blogger) http://translate.sourceforge.net/wiki/decathlon/wordpress * FileZilla (an FTP program) http://translate.sourceforge.net/wiki/decathlon/filezilla * VLC (a media player) http://translate.sourceforge.net/wiki/decathlon/vlc * Tux Paint (a children's drawing tool) http://translate.sourceforge.net/wiki/decathlon/tuxpaint * TuxGuitar (a sheet music editor) http://translate.sourceforge.net/wiki/decathlon/tuxguitar * SpeedCrunch (a scientific calculator) http://translate.sourceforge.net/wiki/decathlon/speedcrunch * OpenProj (a project management tool) http://translate.sourceforge.net/wiki/decathlon/openproj * wxDownload Fast (a download manager) http://translate.sourceforge.net/wiki/decathlon/wxdfast TOOLS AND RESOURCES FOR OUR TRANSLATORS It may be useful to remind you of some of the things available that might help with your translation efforts. * po-terminology.po Every project in Pootle has a file called "po-terminology.po". This is a glossary file. If you translate it first, Pootle will use it to offer suggested translations while you translate the other files. If you don't want to use Pootle but you think you might find the glossary useful, you can download it from our wiki pages -- it is generally the 4th link from the top of each software project's page. * Custom Google search We created mini search engines to search only very specific files that may be related to the program you're translating. These search engines are powered by Google. One of the first four links on each project's page in our wiki will take you to the search engine. It is very useful for research into difficult terms to translate. * The Pootle users mailing list There are several Pootle servers in the world, and many of their users are on the Pootle users mailing list. It is okay for new users to post questions there. If you struggle with any aspect of Pootle, simply send a message to the Pootle users mailing list. Join here: https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/translate-pootle * The Pootle IRC channel If you know how to use IRC, you can ask Pootle related questions on the Pootle IRC channel. The server is irc.freenode.net, and the channel is #pootle. Interestingly, many of the programs we translate also have channels for their users on that server, so it can be useful if you want to ask a quick question from people that use the program regularly. * Quick start guide for translators If you're a translator on our Pootle server, don't forget to indicate your project and your language in your user profile. This makes it easier for us to assign rights to you. The procedure is also explained in our Quick Start guide, that we recommend everyone to read. http://translate.sourceforge.net/wiki/decathlon/quickstart * Localisation guide Finally, it is worth taking a look at the Localisation Guide that is being written by Translate.org.za and other people. It is full of useful information for localisation translators and project managers. Go check it out, and add to it! http://translate.sourceforge.net/wiki/guide/start I look forward to seeing some activity this month on OpenProj, VLC and WordPress. Sincerely Samuel Murray -- Samuel Murray samuel@tr... Decathlon, for volunteer opensource translations http://translate.sourceforge.net/wiki/decathlon/ |
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| Thread | Author | Date |
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| [d7n] News about the Decathlon V | Samuel Murray (Groenkloof) <samuel@tr...> |
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