Hey Amir,

Thanks for the email! It's nice to know we have someone so dedicated to internationalisation involved in the app's development. :-)

On 18 November 2014 04:03, Amir E. Aharoni <amir.aharoni@mail.huji.ac.il> wrote:

Is there any plan to make the app less monolingual? See
https://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=34100

Considering we support switching to every language Wikipedia out there, I think it is a bit hyperbolic to imply the app is overly monolingual. :-)

Back when the feedback mailing list was active this was one of the most requrested features, and I personally strongly support it.

We absolutely could handle language support better. However, that work needs to be balanced relative to our other priorities.

Right now, what we're working on benefits every single person that uses the app. We're making search better so people can find what they need. We're improving the presentation of the content in articles so that it's more consistent and more beautiful. And we're working on giving people suggestions of what they can read next. Given that this work improves the app for everyone, it has to take priority right now.

 

At the very least, searching must work in the language of the currently displayed article, because seeing content in one language and searching in another is badly confusing.

The current way we do things is confusing, but I actually think what you're suggesting here is more confusing in the context of an app.

On desktop or mobile web, the way you read an article in another language is to go to another website. The interface changes language (in most cases), the logo at the top right is in a different language, the URL is different, and so on. So, conceptually, it makes sense that search will function in a different language; you're on a different website!

In the app, however, you're not actually going anywhere; conceptually, you're not loading a different app, it's the exact same app fetching content in a different language. I'm not convinced that choosing to read a specific article in another language, a feature which works on a page-by-page basis, should change an app-level setting and start searching in a different language.

Better yet, there should be a way to define several "favorite languages" in which the user is interested, and to show search results from all of them.

If you've not already, please file a bug for this. It's something we can explore further down the line. However, for the reasons laid out above, our focus is on improving the overall reading experience for everyone.

Thanks,

Dan

--

Dan Garry

Associate Product Manager, Mobile Apps

Wikimedia Foundation

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