Hi,
There's something that I had to consider several times recently: If there are doubts about a language's eligibility for having its own Wikipedia, but it does have an ISO code, is there any reason to deny translation into it in translatewiki?
More precisely: The language definitely passes criterion 2 in "Requisites for eligibility" [1] ("The language must have a valid ISO 639 1–3 code"), but there is no conclusive decision about whether it passes criterion 3 ("The language must be sufficiently unique that it could not coexist on a more general wiki").
Example 1: Montenegrin (cnr), which was discussed lately, and about which most of the Language committee seems to have the opinion that it doesn't pass criterion 3.
Example 2: Ancash Quechua (qwh). There is some discussion about it at https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_languages/Wikipedia_Ancash_... , but I cannot find any discussion by committee members (other than Steven). (I don't have an opinion about it myself, and I'm not opposed to marking it as eligible.)
Example 3: Dari (prs). This was already rejected by the committee with an explanation similar to Montenegrin, but it is already enabled in translatewiki. (Curiously, translatewiki also has Zoroastrian Dari [gbz]; I'm not sure why, but I'm not really opposed to it.)
I'd say that in such cases, localization in translatewiki should usually be allowed. In translatewiki we have English, UK English, and Canadian English; German and Formal German (Sie); Hungarian and Formal Hungarian. If these are eligible for translatewiki, then I'd say that cnr and qwh are eligible for translatewiki, because both seem to have at least some differences from related languages.
Of course, there's the question of whether Language Committee decisions apply to translatewiki at all, given that it's not really a Wikimedia project, but it's probably legitimate to at least express an opinion.
[1] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Language_proposal_policy#Requisites_for_elig...
-- Amir Elisha Aharoni · אָמִיר אֱלִישָׁע אַהֲרוֹנִי http://aharoni.wordpress.com “We're living in pieces, I want to live in peace.” – T. Moore
Hoi, The original reason why we first provide eligibility prior to localisation at translatewiki.net was that we do not want to disappoint people who did a lot of work only to be denied.
There is now a second issue; it is with Wikidata and enabling the addition of labels and descriptions. The original question was to allow the use of language codes within Wikidata for use of monolingual strings ( use case the name in Ottoman Turkish for an Ottoman Turkish citizen). Now the idea is to have AI and people knowledgeable in Arabic languages add labels and descriptions.
When the Egyptian Wikipedia was added there was a lot of blow back. The result is that we have been negative about new Arabic languages. IMHO they are eligible not only for this use in Wikidata but also for a Wikipedia. I would like to hear from James / the WMF board their current stance on Wikipedias in Arabic languages. Thanks, GerardM
On 20 February 2018 at 10:36, Amir E. Aharoni amir.aharoni@mail.huji.ac.il wrote:
Hi,
There's something that I had to consider several times recently: If there are doubts about a language's eligibility for having its own Wikipedia, but it does have an ISO code, is there any reason to deny translation into it in translatewiki?
More precisely: The language definitely passes criterion 2 in "Requisites for eligibility" [1] ("The language must have a valid ISO 639 1–3 code"), but there is no conclusive decision about whether it passes criterion 3 ("The language must be sufficiently unique that it could not coexist on a more general wiki").
Example 1: Montenegrin (cnr), which was discussed lately, and about which most of the Language committee seems to have the opinion that it doesn't pass criterion 3.
Example 2: Ancash Quechua (qwh). There is some discussion about it at https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_ languages/Wikipedia_Ancash_Quechua , but I cannot find any discussion by committee members (other than Steven). (I don't have an opinion about it myself, and I'm not opposed to marking it as eligible.)
Example 3: Dari (prs). This was already rejected by the committee with an explanation similar to Montenegrin, but it is already enabled in translatewiki. (Curiously, translatewiki also has Zoroastrian Dari [gbz]; I'm not sure why, but I'm not really opposed to it.)
I'd say that in such cases, localization in translatewiki should usually be allowed. In translatewiki we have English, UK English, and Canadian English; German and Formal German (Sie); Hungarian and Formal Hungarian. If these are eligible for translatewiki, then I'd say that cnr and qwh are eligible for translatewiki, because both seem to have at least some differences from related languages.
Of course, there's the question of whether Language Committee decisions apply to translatewiki at all, given that it's not really a Wikimedia project, but it's probably legitimate to at least express an opinion.
[1] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Language_proposal_policy# Requisites_for_eligibility
-- Amir Elisha Aharoni · אָמִיר אֱלִישָׁע אַהֲרוֹנִי http://aharoni.wordpress.com “We're living in pieces, I want to live in peace.” – T. Moore
Langcom mailing list Langcom@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/langcom
The thing with Arabic varieties other than MSA is that—as far as I know—they are not standardized. There are descriptive dictionaries and grammars of these varieties, but no literary standard. With Tunisian and Moroccan there were efforts by groups of enthusiasts; I don't want to invalidate them, but I didn't get the impression that they were made by established academies or governments, which makes a decision difficult. Not being standardized is not, by itself, is not a reason to deny it, but there is a question of what do people mean when they say, for example, "Tunisian".
Montenegrin is definitely standardized. The question with it is whether the difference between Montenegrin and Serbian is large enough to justify a separate project. But my impression is that this standardized spelling is at least as different for translatewiki as English (unmarked, but de-facto American) and English (UK).
-- Amir Elisha Aharoni · אָמִיר אֱלִישָׁע אַהֲרוֹנִי http://aharoni.wordpress.com “We're living in pieces, I want to live in peace.” – T. Moore
2018-02-20 15:59 GMT+02:00 Gerard Meijssen gerard.meijssen@gmail.com:
Hoi, The original reason why we first provide eligibility prior to localisation at translatewiki.net was that we do not want to disappoint people who did a lot of work only to be denied.
There is now a second issue; it is with Wikidata and enabling the addition of labels and descriptions. The original question was to allow the use of language codes within Wikidata for use of monolingual strings ( use case the name in Ottoman Turkish for an Ottoman Turkish citizen). Now the idea is to have AI and people knowledgeable in Arabic languages add labels and descriptions.
When the Egyptian Wikipedia was added there was a lot of blow back. The result is that we have been negative about new Arabic languages. IMHO they are eligible not only for this use in Wikidata but also for a Wikipedia. I would like to hear from James / the WMF board their current stance on Wikipedias in Arabic languages. Thanks, GerardM
On 20 February 2018 at 10:36, Amir E. Aharoni < amir.aharoni@mail.huji.ac.il> wrote:
Hi,
There's something that I had to consider several times recently: If there are doubts about a language's eligibility for having its own Wikipedia, but it does have an ISO code, is there any reason to deny translation into it in translatewiki?
More precisely: The language definitely passes criterion 2 in "Requisites for eligibility" [1] ("The language must have a valid ISO 639 1–3 code"), but there is no conclusive decision about whether it passes criterion 3 ("The language must be sufficiently unique that it could not coexist on a more general wiki").
Example 1: Montenegrin (cnr), which was discussed lately, and about which most of the Language committee seems to have the opinion that it doesn't pass criterion 3.
Example 2: Ancash Quechua (qwh). There is some discussion about it at https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_languages/ Wikipedia_Ancash_Quechua , but I cannot find any discussion by committee members (other than Steven). (I don't have an opinion about it myself, and I'm not opposed to marking it as eligible.)
Example 3: Dari (prs). This was already rejected by the committee with an explanation similar to Montenegrin, but it is already enabled in translatewiki. (Curiously, translatewiki also has Zoroastrian Dari [gbz]; I'm not sure why, but I'm not really opposed to it.)
I'd say that in such cases, localization in translatewiki should usually be allowed. In translatewiki we have English, UK English, and Canadian English; German and Formal German (Sie); Hungarian and Formal Hungarian. If these are eligible for translatewiki, then I'd say that cnr and qwh are eligible for translatewiki, because both seem to have at least some differences from related languages.
Of course, there's the question of whether Language Committee decisions apply to translatewiki at all, given that it's not really a Wikimedia project, but it's probably legitimate to at least express an opinion.
[1] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Language_proposal_policy#Req uisites_for_eligibility
-- Amir Elisha Aharoni · אָמִיר אֱלִישָׁע אַהֲרוֹנִי http://aharoni.wordpress.com “We're living in pieces, I want to live in peace.” – T. Moore
Langcom mailing list Langcom@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/langcom
Langcom mailing list Langcom@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/langcom