Labelling and Inline Wording in Joomla! 1.5 beta2 + (+ being svn!)

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Re: Labelling and Inline Wording in Joomla! 1.5 beta2 + (+ being svn!)

Post by humvee » Sun May 20, 2007 10:06 pm

Hi Leandro,

How individual TP's translate the English is ultimately down to their languages as far as I understand it.

I know English can be "quirky" some times, but there is nothing to stop the TP's from using their own language requirements for a particular word translation. In your quoted instance Archive for the noun and verb, they would use the correct words in their appropriate places I would assume.

I don't think it is necessary for us to be considering changing the words in the project in this instance?

This idea has been about using "real" words that actually exist and emphasis ought now to be on making the headings and other labels and content consistent and to add corrections to the mouseover tips etc

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Re: Labelling and Inline Wording in Joomla! 1.5 beta2 + (+ being svn!)

Post by leadict » Mon May 21, 2007 12:01 am

Hi Andy,

Let me explain it in more detail.

I know that Translation Partners can use their own language, but the issue i have mentioned (regarding to the Chris' comment) can't be solved in this way.

As for the example i have mentioned, the word "Archive" is used in different contexts, needing different translation (verb and noun), but the problem is that the same key (see ARCHIVE in the "en-GB.com_content.ini" administrator language file) is used in both contexts (Archive Manager and Menu Item Type Tree). So in this case the TP would need a different key for "Archive" as verb and as noun in that language file.

Maybe this is a case to transfer to Translation Team. I just have mentioned it here to consult if someone more have found a similar issue (to take advantage of the TP's member input in this thread).

Leandro
Last edited by leadict on Mon May 21, 2007 12:10 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Labelling and Inline Wording in Joomla! 1.5 beta2 + (+ being svn!)

Post by Atrevidoweb » Mon May 21, 2007 5:04 am

http://forum.joomla.org/index.php/topic,156154.0.html
We started to discuss this a few weeks ago. It's in the open translation forum and the tittle refers to Danish translation problems only. Perhaps it's better to open a new one at the private translation forum, to call everyones attention.
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Re: Labelling and Inline Wording in Joomla! 1.5 beta2 + (+ being svn!)

Post by humvee » Mon May 21, 2007 6:14 am

Atrevidoweb wrote: http://forum.joomla.org/index.php/topic,156154.0.html
We started to discuss this a few weeks ago. It's in the open translation forum and the tittle refers to Danish translation problems only. Perhaps it's better to open a new one at the private translation forum, to call everyones attention.
Yep I was aware of this and hence my comments on that thread http://forum.joomla.org/index.php/topic ... #msg798098
In the absence of any other contributions on this, the Danish original,  or the thread started by infograf on the Private Translation Forum to specifically deal with this led me to believe that there were no other instances of particular issue.

If that is not the case then people should post their words of concern with references as requested...

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Re: Labelling and Inline Wording in Joomla! 1.5 beta2 + (+ being svn!)

Post by Atrevidoweb » Mon May 21, 2007 6:23 am

I forgot about infograf thread at the private forum,... No answers there so far
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Re: Labelling and Inline Wording in Joomla! 1.5 beta2 + (+ being svn!)

Post by svatas » Mon May 21, 2007 6:42 am

Dear all,
another tricky one in Czech language :

Read only / Writable as per file attribute. We can translate Read only but the hardest one is Writable, there is no specific word for this (even Microsoft does not have any translation for it in Windows, Office etc). We are using construction like "it is possible to write to this file")

Another tricky one are some words with amount. There are forms of word we are using if you have:
- 1 piece (in Czech 1 kus)
- 2,3,4 pieces (in Czech 2,3,4 kusy)
- 5 and more pieces (in Czech 5, 6 kusu)

In english there is only 1 pc vs. 2 and more pcs. So we have three forms of word regarding amount...

And what about newsfeeds? Is it possible to use RSS as we do?

Very hard to translate is "breadcrumbs"
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Re: Labelling and Inline Wording in Joomla! 1.5 beta2 + (+ being svn!)

Post by pvh123 » Mon May 21, 2007 11:09 am

The explanation of a noun/verb is this:

A noun can be a person, place or thing, for example: 'My sister is a dentist.'
A verb is a 'doing' word that describes an action, for example: 'I eat breakfast at 8am every day.'

So IMHO it depends whether you regard the word " Archive"  as a thing or an action.
But than again, I am a Dutchman trying to understand English and therefore the grammatics could be different.

In dutch Archive would translate as: "Archief"  (Noun/Thing)  and the action to archive something (Verb/action)  will be " Archiveren" . I would therefore never translate "Archive" as "Archiveren", because I am not "doning" it (no action) but it is the name of something called "Archive". It is a list/column of Archive names.
The difficult thing is that many english words are also used in the local language; in Dutch anyway. Translating them can sometimes result in very strange words/expressions.

My suggestion would be that translaters in local languages would " interpret' the english words and translate them in local equivalents rather than a one-on-one word translation. 
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Re: Labelling and Inline Wording in Joomla! 1.5 beta2 + (+ being svn!)

Post by leadict » Mon May 21, 2007 12:44 pm

pvh123 wrote: In dutch Archive would translate as: "Archief"  (Noun/Thing)  and the action to archive something (Verb/action)  will be " Archiveren" . I would therefore never translate "Archive" as "Archiveren", because I am not "doning" it (no action) but it is the name of something called "Archive". It is a list/column of Archive names.
....
My suggestion would be that translaters in local languages would " interpret' the english words and translate them in local equivalents rather than a one-on-one word translation. 
Hi Pieter,

I have mentioned this case because it implies a unique "key" (ARCHIVE at content component language file)  which is used in two different contexts (two meanings):
  • In the Article Manager Toolbar the word "Archive" is used as verb (in Spanish would be translated as "Archivar" and i assume it would be "Archiveren" in Dutch).
  • In the Menu Item Type Tree the word "Archive" is used as noun (in Spanish would be translated as "Archivo" and i assume it would be "Archief" in Dutch).
So, in this case we couldn't "interpret" the english word. We would be forced to depreciate one of the meanings (we have to use the same key in two contexts). Anyway i don't want to be too insistent and i am starting to be :-[.
Last edited by leadict on Mon May 21, 2007 12:57 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Labelling and Inline Wording in Joomla! 1.5 beta2 + (+ being svn!)

Post by pvh123 » Mon May 21, 2007 2:54 pm

You are quite right.
And one can never be too insistant. If you want to promote Joomla in the spanish lingo, you have quite an audience all over the world ;)
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Re: Labelling and Inline Wording in Joomla! 1.5 beta2 + (+ being svn!)

Post by leadict » Mon May 21, 2007 5:59 pm

This is the only instance regarding this type of issue that i have identified, but perhaps can exist someone else.

Anyhow, I am very grateful that someone was able to understand me :laugh:.
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Re: Labelling and Inline Wording in Joomla! 1.5 beta2 + (+ being svn!)

Post by humvee » Mon May 21, 2007 10:55 pm

pvh123 wrote:
My suggestion would be that translaters in local languages would " interpret' the english words and translate them in local equivalents rather than a one-on-one word translation. 
To be honest I thought this was what the TP's actually did do. Even the few examples that have been quoted here and in the other forum topic show that there is no easy answer. A word might fit 98% of other languages but the 2% might then feel left out, so a word is then sought out that fits the 2% and you then find 45% of the others can't use that.

I personally believe that provided that Joomla! uses "real" English words for the base release of the core that there should be enough latitude for TP's to adjust/tweak the words used in their translations to meet the needs of their own markets. If there is any uncertainty as to what a word's intention actually is then it should be clarified and then the TP's make a judgement call on how best to handle this.But as I say that is a personal opinion and not an official one.

Hopefully as more folks get involved in this discussion we will also get some way to a consensus and this can then be established into an additional reference for TP's subject to core team approval.

Andy

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Re: Labelling and Inline Wording in Joomla! 1.5 beta2 + (+ being svn!)

Post by leadict » Tue May 22, 2007 12:18 am

1. First part:

I concur with the latest arguments of both (Andy and Pieter). The translators can use their own language to interpret a real English word.

2. Second part:

The issue i have raised can't be solved in this way. And I am not very sure if everyone have understood the reasons (I know that Pieter did).

- Andy, Do you understand it? (see: explanation#1 and explanation#2).

[Even at the risk of being over-insistent, this is an instance in which the translator can't adjust the language used in the translation because there is a only "key" to display two different words in the target language].

Edit: Just to add an image.
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Last edited by leadict on Tue May 22, 2007 1:10 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Labelling and Inline Wording in Joomla! 1.5 beta2 + (+ being svn!)

Post by Atrevidoweb » Tue May 22, 2007 3:29 am

As Leadict is "overinsisting" (just to invent another word), what we are trying to find here are unique keys used in English for two different functions (like verb and noun) that actually we need separately (two different keys) so other tongues can be correctly written. Also we are looking for "invented" words in English, that need to be changed or clarified.
A different thing are those words that have very complex meanings to be translated to a single word in our mother tongues (breadcrumbs is one if them). Translators expertise and discussions inside the translation teams can (in my own experience) solve most of this problems. If a translator team needs to clarified the specific meaning of a word in English to be able to interpret it, then we can open a new thread in the translations forum asking for help.
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Re: Labelling and Inline Wording in Joomla! 1.5 beta2 + (+ being svn!)

Post by pvh123 » Tue May 22, 2007 7:31 am

Atrevidoweb wrote: Translators expertise and discussions inside the translation teams can (in my own experience) solve most of this problems. If a translator team needs to clarified the specific meaning of a word in English to be able to interpret it, then we can open a new thread in the translations forum asking for help.
@Atrovidoweb , Why don't you have a pow wow within your workgroup over this translation problem, since leadict is wrestling within his documentation group and you seem to be a translater in that area.  ;)
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Re: Labelling and Inline Wording in Joomla! 1.5 beta2 + (+ being svn!)

Post by Atrevidoweb » Tue May 22, 2007 8:01 am

There are two open threads in the translation forums about this matter. One in the public area, and other one at the private area. So far the only ones with suggestions or comments are participating of this thread too.
Anyway,... I'll try to bring translators attention to this disscusion.
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Re: Labelling and Inline Wording in Joomla! 1.5 beta2 + (+ being svn!)

Post by leadict » Tue May 22, 2007 11:55 am

Atrevidoweb wrote: As Leadict is "overinsisting" (just to invent another word), what we are trying to find here are unique keys used in English for two different functions (like verb and noun) that actually we need separately (two different keys) so other tongues can be correctly written. Also we are looking for "invented" words in English, that need to be changed or clarified.
An Argentinian using english humour :D.

Now seriously, you are the proper person to deal with that issue as member of the Translation Team WG and as Spanish coordinator.
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Re: Labelling and Inline Wording in Joomla! 1.5 beta2 + (+ being svn!)

Post by humvee » Tue May 22, 2007 1:15 pm

Despite the implied sarcasm above I perfectly understand what the issue is here, thank you!

So far there is one instance of this issue that has been identified, can I suggest that if this exercise is to have any value that others are actually found - if present, the recommendations can then be passed to the developers for future consideration.

If people don't come forward from other TP groups that have not participated in this discussion so far it seems the exercise is fairly limited in value or possibly not the issue that it at first appeared.

If additional instances are not present then we can move on.

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Re: Labelling and Inline Wording in Joomla! 1.5 beta2 + (+ being svn!)

Post by Atrevidoweb » Tue May 22, 2007 10:12 pm

@humvee
My "clarification" wasn't for you, as you've been contributing a lot (more than me).;)

We can send what we found so far to devs, And we can wait for an specific time for more answers and then move forward.
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Re: Labelling and Inline Wording in Joomla! 1.5 beta2 + (+ being svn!)

Post by humvee » Wed May 23, 2007 12:02 am

@Atrevideo and Leadict

Apologies for misconceptions... :)

If we can get more within a reasonable time-scale it can be taken forward now or we can perhaps use the one current example as a tester to set up a process by which these can be put forward more easily in the future.

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Re: Labelling and Inline Wording in Joomla! 1.5 beta2 + (+ being svn!)

Post by leadict » Thu May 24, 2007 5:29 pm

There are another two threads with comments about the use of the terms:

- "Leading" => http://forum.joomla.org/index.php/topic,169778.0.html

- "Menu Type" => http://forum.joomla.org/index.php/topic,169364.0.html

Pointed just in case someone want consider them. As for me, i think the first is used properly. The second can involve some confusion and maybe we could find another term more proper to the function.

Edit: Just to add my opinion :)
Last edited by leadict on Thu May 24, 2007 5:50 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Labelling and Inline Wording in Joomla! 1.5 beta2 + (+ being svn!)

Post by Atrevidoweb » Sat May 26, 2007 2:58 am

Ok, i just found another key...
It's the key DEFAULT in en-GB.ini (es-ES.ini)
in the Menu Manager screen it`s use 3 times in different contexts.
In the toolbar it describes the action of make a selected item as the default item, the item that it's going to show when you enter the site (in the mainmenu menu) ...
In the list it's use as a header for the column that shows a star in the default item.
And it's also used in the error message that you get if you press the button with no selected item, as a verb.

According to the Oxford dictionary defaultused as a verb means: 2 (default to) revert automatically to (a pre-selected option).

In the button it should be changed to something like "make default". (also in the error message) or "set as default"
Or perhaps something that describes more what it really does.
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Re: Labelling and Inline Wording in Joomla! 1.5 beta2 + (+ being svn!)

Post by leadict » Tue Jun 05, 2007 12:43 pm

Just to mention that there is a report on tracker with a related issue with the topics of this thread:

- Different meanings of one and the same translation

I left there a comment pointing to this thread too.
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Re: Labelling and Inline Wording in Joomla! 1.5 beta2 + (+ being svn!)

Post by humvee » Tue Jun 05, 2007 11:12 pm

Hi All,

I have now heard back from the Core Devs their decision on the initial wording proposal as I stated it was submitted above.

I can do little better than to quote the relevant sections of the communication as it has been relayed to me.
While accepting that "unpublish" and "unarchive" may not be dictionary words, their meaning in English is readily apparent.  The feeling is that the alternative words proposed ("recall" and "retrieve") do not suggest their function ("recall" from what?, "retrieve" from what?).  Since the terms always (?) appear in pairs (eg. "Publish" next to "Unpublish" on the toolbar) and the prefix "un-" is well-known to indicate negation, it is clear that one performs the opposite operation to the other.  The proposed words do not suggest any relationship with their opposites ("publish" and "archive").  Consequently, these words will not be changed.

The suggestions for components, modules and plugins faired better.  It was felt that whatever word pair was chosen it should be the same pair for components, modules and plugins.  This is because it is thought that the majority of users/administrators will not appreciate the difference between the three extension types.  So it would be more beneficial to have a common terminology because knowledge about one extension type could then be transferred to other extension types.  Someone who learns the effect of "disabling" a module, for example, would be more likely to guess the effect of "disabling" a plugin, even if they did not understand the difference between a module and a plugin.

However, the exact choice of word pair for components, modules and plugins, is undecided.  For the reasons already given above, it is thought that the pair chosen should clearly be a pair of opposites.  So "publish/recall" suggested for modules would not be acceptable.  However, either one of "enable/disable" or "activate/deactivate" would be good.  Consequently, the core devs would like the Doc Team to choose one of these two alternatives and they will go along with that decision.

The core devs are aware that some of these words may not have direct translations and so can cause some difficulty for translation partners.  But translations should be made according to the intent of the word, rather than being a literal translation.  There are probably no perfect words and we are forced to make compromises even in English.
Thanks to all for their contributions thus far.

Regards

Andy

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Re: Labelling and Inline Wording in Joomla! 1.5 beta2 + (+ being svn!)

Post by rbuelund » Tue Jun 19, 2007 3:47 pm

Well - I just found out that the words "Unpublish" and "Unarchive" actually exist in the online dictionary: http://www.ordbogen.com (they must have sneaked in)  - Looks like we have to Invent a few new words in danish ! I don't quite know if I am satisfied with this, but i t sounds as though the word from Core Devs is final ??!!??

Regarding mod/plug/bot I would like to go for the activate/deactivate solution.
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Re: Labelling and Inline Wording in Joomla! 1.5 beta2 + (+ being svn!)

Post by Chris Davenport » Mon Jun 25, 2007 9:11 pm

'Publish/Unpublish' has now been changed to 'Enable/Disable' when referring to modules, plugins and languages (only).

Thanks to everyone who contributed to the discussion.

Regards,
Chris.
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Re: Labelling and Inline Wording in Joomla! 1.5 beta2 + (+ being svn!)

Post by leadict » Mon Jun 25, 2007 10:17 pm

Hi Chris,

I have verified it on 7780 build. I have noticed that the -Select State- filter drop down still includes the old terms: "Published" and "Unpublished" (instead of "Enabled and "Disabled") at Module and Plugin Managers.

Another issue is that the text over the "Enable/Disable Mini-Icon" shows "Unpublish Item" and "Publish Item" at Plugin and Module Manager, whereas at Extension Manager (Components) it shows "enable/disable" not capitalized.

Regards,
Leandro

[Edited: To add the second issue]
Last edited by leadict on Mon Jun 25, 2007 10:27 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Labelling and Inline Wording in Joomla! 1.5 beta2 + (+ being svn!)

Post by Chris Davenport » Tue Jun 26, 2007 12:13 am

You're right.  Thanks Leandro.

The alt and title tags for the tick/cross icons need changing too.  I hadn't spotted those before.

And I've just noticed that the Language Manager shouldn't have an Enable column anyway.  It should be Default, like the Template Manager.  The toolbar icon is wrong and the tick should be a yellow star!!!

It's getting late so I'll fix this stuff tomorrow.

Thanks for the heads-up Leandro.

Chris.
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Re: Labelling and Inline Wording in Joomla! 1.5 beta2 + (+ being svn!)

Post by leadict » Tue Jun 26, 2007 12:21 am

Chris Davenport wrote: And I've just noticed that the Language Manager shouldn't have an Enable column anyway.  It should be Default, like the Template Manager.  The toolbar icon is wrong and the tick should be a yellow star!!!
Yes, that seems the more proper. Thanks for pay attention to this :).
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Re: Labelling and Inline Wording in Joomla! 1.5 beta2 + (+ being svn!)

Post by CirTap » Wed Jun 27, 2007 3:04 am

Hi,

pardon me for jumping in.
It's plain personal interest on the subject in general (l10n/i18n) and some expertise and practice as a copy editor (for German), and a creator of English->German translations.

My 3 cents:
First of all, literal translations barely make sense, that's why I don't (really) understand the fuzz about why some word's "literal equivalent" doesn't make sense if it's translated, well ... literally -- of course not!
Translations ought to be done by meaning and context. Exclusively. Period.
Culture and habits of the target language/country must be honored as well. Any braindead attempts to do a word-by-word translation are better left of as this usually produces really embarrasing results: aka "Googlish".

I totally agree with the dev's if they say "translations should be made according to the intent of the word."
I however absolutely disagree with a (weak) statement like "it is clear that one performs the opposite operation to the other" - that may be so, but it's nonsense nevertheless, sorry, and apparently (Ex-Mambo) Joomla! users are considered total idiots that do not understand "publish" vs. "withdraw" (or any other valid synonym) so they're better confronted with "artificial unwords" -- despite "the terms always (?) appear in pairs." ;)

Unfortunately there are other disadvantages translators have to face. Context, as mentioned above, is among them (the archive/to archive), and it's unnecessarily the uncreativity or unskills of those very translators, or any unwell-thought "keys" in some language file, but all too often the unspace "reserved" in the GUI that prevents or at least hinders a good translation to fit into.
Consequently, it's not excusively "the devs" to be blamed, but screen designers, too: super-tight and precise designs solely focused to english words, like if other languages might not even exist, and zapp: your accurate translation doesn't fit and breaks the design.

Another more important issue, is the sheer ignorance of the numerus in virtually any "international" application. Even in english. It's so simple to slap a "(s)" to a noun, and everything's fine -- in English.
The translation of an english application is always a PITA thanks to this really, really -- and I mean really -- bad habit. Did I mention ignorance?

Maybe it's because too few developers have a background in linguistics. Many know different programming languages but they don't really bother about human languages at all, thus they don't think (care?) of this very immense problem: to provide an accurate translation of a sentence or phrase that contains a numerus; accurate by meaning and grammar.
Translators are doomed to ravish their own language 'cos someone else, sitting in front of his/her english keyboard dictates that plurals are at best anything larger than 1 and a "(s)" is more than enough; the sole solution. And surprise! The absence of something, the nothings, zeros, nulls, may also require a different wording in an unenglish text.

It's been truly surprising that there's been only one post (by svatas) regarding this issue -- and it's been ignored throughout. Thanks a lot, svatas, anyway!
I admit, I wasn't aware about the distinction between 1, 2-4 and 5+ "whatevers" in Czech myself. I'm really wondering how some gaelic translator would manage (and suffer) to come around the commonly poor support for numbering and plurals.

It's not that hard to add support for "numbered words". It can't be accomplished by throwing in a few extra keys, but would require a special syntax to "encode" any of
- no thing
- one thing
- more than one thing
- n-m things
incl. the order and positiion of number(s), value(s), and noun(s) ;)
I'm pretty confident any serious translator would accept any such "code" in order to do a good job.

There's no justification to promote crappy language.

Oh, one question: who's in charge for the quality of the english language files, and the (new) sample content, anyway?

Thanx for reading.

Have fun,
CirTap
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Chris Davenport
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Re: Labelling and Inline Wording in Joomla! 1.5 beta2 + (+ being svn!)

Post by Chris Davenport » Wed Jun 27, 2007 1:09 pm

Hi CirTap,
CirTap wrote: I totally agree with the dev's if they say "translations should be made according to the intent of the word."
I however absolutely disagree with a (weak) statement like "it is clear that one performs the opposite operation to the other" - that may be so, but it's nonsense nevertheless, sorry, and apparently (Ex-Mambo) Joomla! users are considered total idiots that do not understand "publish" vs. "withdraw" (or any other valid synonym) so they're better confronted with "artificial unwords" -- despite "the terms always (?) appear in pairs." ;)
The issue with the word "unpublish" is not really a translation issue; it's a question of whether we want to use a word that does not appear in the Oxford English Dictionary.  The "un-" prefix is frequently used in colloqial English and is well understood.  Since we agree that translators should not be confining themselves to literal translations of words, it doesn't affect them.  If translating "unpublish" as though it were "restore", or whatever, makes sense in any given language, then so be it.  But replacing "unpublish" with "restore/whatever" in English would reduce usability for the English version (because of its logical pairing with "publish"); hence the decision to stick with "unpublish".
CirTap wrote: Unfortunately there are other disadvantages translators have to face. Context, as mentioned above, is among them (the archive/to archive), and it's unnecessarily the uncreativity or unskills of those very translators, or any unwell-thought "keys" in some language file, but all too often the unspace "reserved" in the GUI that prevents or at least hinders a good translation to fit into.
Consequently, it's not excusively "the devs" to be blamed, but screen designers, too: super-tight and precise designs solely focused to english words, like if other languages might not even exist, and zapp: your accurate translation doesn't fit and breaks the design.
You quite rightly highlight two important issues here.  Firstly, there is a need to have more keys so as to tease out distinctions in context that appear in translations that are not apparent in English.  What we need here are specific and detailed recommendations.  To take the word "archive" as an example, I am now aware that at least one language needs to have more than one tag for this word.  I'm sure we can make that happen, but what the developers will need to know is to which class each occurrence of the word "archive" in the current codebase belongs?  Similarly for other problematical words or phrases.

Secondly, the issue with screen space is also well-known, but again requires constructive feedback from the translators if it is to be addressed effectively.
CirTap wrote: Another more important issue, is the sheer ignorance of the numerus in virtually any "international" application. Even in english. It's so simple to slap a "(s)" to a noun, and everything's fine -- in English.
The translation of an english application is always a PITA thanks to this really, really -- and I mean really -- bad habit. Did I mention ignorance?
Okay, I'm ignorant.  But I'm trying to learn.  But again, what we need is a solution.  Just saying "it's broken" is only the first step.
CirTap wrote: Maybe it's because too few developers have a background in linguistics. Many know different programming languages but they don't really bother about human languages at all, thus they don't think (care?) of this very immense problem: to provide an accurate translation of a sentence or phrase that contains a numerus; accurate by meaning and grammar.
Translators are doomed to ravish their own language 'cos someone else, sitting in front of his/her english keyboard dictates that plurals are at best anything larger than 1 and a "(s)" is more than enough; the sole solution. And surprise! The absence of something, the nothings, zeros, nulls, may also require a different wording in an unenglish text.

It's been truly surprising that there's been only one post (by svatas) regarding this issue -- and it's been ignored throughout. Thanks a lot, svatas, anyway!
I admit, I wasn't aware about the distinction between 1, 2-4 and 5+ "whatevers" in Czech myself. I'm really wondering how some gaelic translator would manage (and suffer) to come around the commonly poor support for numbering and plurals.

It's not that hard to add support for "numbered words". It can't be accomplished by throwing in a few extra keys, but would require a special syntax to "encode" any of
- no thing
- one thing
- more than one thing
- n-m things
incl. the order and positiion of number(s), value(s), and noun(s) ;)
I'm pretty confident any serious translator would accept any such "code" in order to do a good job.
Okay, I wasn't aware that it was such a big issue (I'm ignorant, remember), but if it is then I'd very much like to see this working.  I would suggest starting a new thread in the translation forum so it can be discussed and worked into a solid proposal that can then be worked into actual code.
CirTap wrote: There's no justification to promote crappy language.
I thought English was a crappy language.  Unfortunately it's the only one I speak.  ;)
CirTap wrote: Oh, one question: who's in charge for the quality of the english language files, and the (new) sample content, anyway?
Q&T are in control during the run-up to 1.5 Stable.  Of course, they may rely on other working groups to fix specific issues.  M&M is taking the lead in developing the (new) sample content at the moment, but this will still feed through Q&T.

Regards,
Chris.
Chris Davenport

Davenport Technology Services http://www.davenporttechnology.com/
Lion Coppice http://www.lioncoppice.org/


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