Marcin Cieslak schrieb:
I think we will be better of with flat files (for example in PHP or java properties format or maybe) versioned in some version control, similary as MediaWiki is doing.
The problem is that each user has his/her own svn repo. Pushing messages to each would be rather annoying, especially with respect to access management (whos account would be used?...)
Just providing the files and letting people "pull" them into their repo is going to be slow. Betawiki is *very* interested in getting translations live *fast*. Waiting a month or so before your translation goes live is demotivating (i have let translators wait in the past too. sorry guys).
Java editounter is using Java properties already:
https://fisheye.toolserver.org/browse/editcount/trunk/editcount/i18n/
And Betawiki can already export to PHP, Java, gettext, etc
PHP tools like WikiSense prefer PHP format.
Well, I could easily change that. And I would. Because I know I often have other things on my mind then updating translations. So having it automated would be very nice to me.
The reason for this is that you need to be able to understand message history - you need to know which messages have been added and which messages have been changed since the translation, to flag the modified existing messages on the Wiki. Ability to make diffs is very helpful, and doing this with database is a bit cumbersome.
Hm... I suppose the "master" copy of the messages in the "primary" language should indeed be maintained by the author, as a flat file in the repository. But the "live" messages could be pulled from a db that is updated automatically. Maybe from there they could be exported again into the tools.
Thinking about it, it seems like part of betawiki being mirrored on the toolserver -- with the live messages in the db, and the ability to export to files and check them into the repo. Perhaps we should think of it this way.
On the other hand, we don't really need database for this, given that amount of writes will be much less than the amount of reads.
The main argument for a database is the easy of syncing with betawiki.
An automated way to move commit messages from, say, SVN, to Betawiki that explain why such message has been added would be nice. Is Fuzzybot able to import svn commit messages in the MessagesEn.php to Betawiki?
Would be nice, but I'm more worried about getting new translations from betawiki into a toolserver svn.
-- daniel