Not happy at all

[lafeber-dumoleyn2]

Op 22-12-10 13:01, Ask Hjorth Larsen schreef:
> Hi
>
> On Wed, Dec 22, 2010 at 11:20 AM, lafeber-dumoleyn2
> <lafeber-dumoleyn2 op zonnet.nl>  wrote:
>> After having finished the Lucid-e1 Dutch translation I took a look at
>> Lucid-e2 on Launchpad. I discovered that 25% (415 strings) was
>> untranslated, but when I checked the first "untranslated" string I
>> noticed that there was only a minor change. Most of it was like in
>> Lucid-e1, but someone had translated the whole string all over again. I
>> am afraid this is the case with most of the "untranslated" strings. When
>> there is a minor change, LP will not copy the translation of the string
>> from Lucid-e1, which means that people start translating the whole
>> string all over again.
>> It is sad that a lot of effort and hard work is spent on something that
>> has been done already.
>> I see no quick solution to this problem, but perhaps it is better NOT to
>> make minor changes, unless it is really necessary.
>> I will give one example of a (pretty long) string that has been
>> translated twice:
>>
>> Lucid-e2
>> With more people working on the project than ever before, Ubuntu
>> continues to see improvement to its core features and hardware support,
>> and has gained the attention of large organizations worldwide. For
>> example, in 2007, \Index{Dell} began a collaboration with
>> \Index{Canonical} to sell computers with Ubuntu preinstalled.
>> Additionally, in 2005, the French Police began to transition their
>> entire computer infrastructure to a variant of Ubuntu\dash a process
>> which has reportedly saved them ``millions of euros'' in licensing fees
>> for Microsoft Windows. By the year 2012, the French Police anticipates
>> that all of their computers will be running Ubuntu. \Index{Canonical}
>> profits from this arrangement by providing technical support and
>> custom-built software.
>>
>> Lucid-e1
>> Now with more people working on the project than ever before, Ubuntu
>> continues to see improvement to its core features and hardware support,
>> and has gained the attention of large organizations worldwide. For
>> example, in 2007 Dell began a collaboration with Canonical to sell
>> computers with Ubuntu pre-installed. Additionally, in 2005 the French
>> Police began to transition their entire computer infrastructure to a
>> variant of Ubuntu\dash a process which has reportedly saved them
>> ``millions of Euro'' in licensing fees for Microsoft Windows. By the
>> year 2012, the French Police anticipates that all of their computers
>> will be running Ubuntu. Canonical profits from this arrangement by
>> providing technical support and custom-built software.
>>
>> Nu, met meer mensen dan ooit die aan het project meewerken, worden er in
>> Ubuntu nog steeds verbeteringen aangebracht, zowel aan de kernfuncties
>> als aan de hardware-ondersteuning, en krijgt het wereldwijd aandacht
>> van grote organisaties. Zo ging Dell in 2007 samenwerken met Canonical
>> om computers te verkopen waarop Ubuntu reeds geïnstalleerd is. Bovendien
>> begon de Franse politie in 2005 met de overstap naar een variant van
>> Ubuntu – dit zou hen “miljoenen euro’s ” hebben bespaard aan
>> licentierechten voor Microsoft Windows. Tegen 2012 verwacht de Franse
>> politie dat al hun computers op Ubuntu zullen draaien. Canonical
>> profiteert hiervan door
>> technische ondersteuning en software-op-maat aan te bieden.
>>
>> If this kind of translation is not transferred from e1 to e2 I see no
>> quick way of reviewing 415 strings that have been retranslated in the
>> form of suggestions.
>> Hannie
>> Ubuntu Dutch Translators
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> ubuntu-translators mailing list
>> ubuntu-translators op lists.ubuntu.com
>> https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-translators
>>
> It's unfortunate that the `fuzzy' feature of gettext is not supported
> in LP, and there have been previous discussions in the manual team
> about what to do, but there's no really good solution as it is.
>
> The best solution for the time being is to export the po-files of both
> manual versions from Launchpad and use msgmerge to merge the
> translations from the old one into the new template.  This will
> produce `fuzzy' strings in the new template, which can then be
> reviewed (although offline).  You may find a po-editor useful, as well
> as podiff + wdiff.
>
> It's a social problem that one will have to specifically prevent
> contributors from wasting their time by contributing to the wrong
> version in Launchpad.  Try to communicate over a mailing list and
> agree who does what in which version.  That's all the advice I can
> give.
>
> Best regards
> Ask
>
Hi Ask,
Thank you very much for your reaction.
I think one of the major problems here is that in Lucid-e2 some/many(?) 
strings have changed only slightly (like in my previous example), 
causing LP to see them as totally new. So LP does not transfer the 
translation from version e1 to e2.
What happens next is that people who open version e2 in LP find a lot of 
"untranslated" strings (415 in this case) and start translating them, 
not realising that  some/many of them have been translated in e1 already 
(except for the minor changes, of course).
For me as a reviewer it becomes even worse, because now I see a 
suggestion in e2 that differs from e1 (not only the changes, but also 
different use of words, different construction etc.). I have to open e1, 
find the same string there using a keyword (stringnumbers are different 
in e1 and e2), copy and paste the whole string to e2 and finally make 
the minor changes. This is unworkable and time-consuming.
So the best solution would be not to make minor changes, unless it is 
absolutely necessary. There is no problem with completely new strings 
because these have not been translated yet.
Regards,
Hannie