A few comments on the localization of volunteer.wikimedia.org:
* the translations for "Volunteer now" are beyond horrible (e.g. volunteer
translated as a noun in the Hungarian version), and apparently do not come from
the usual translation process (I found no trace on strategywiki, at least). Did
somebody use Google Translate, or what? One would expect such mistakes on the
packaging of a chinese product, but on an official Wikimedia web page which is
trying to convince people to join, it is rather awkward and should be fixed ASAP.
* same goes for the translation of the title in some languages, or so I've been
told. The title is present on the translation page
([[strategy:Call_for_participation/Appeal_letter]]) but has been added after
many of the translations were already done and without notification, so I
suppose it was simply not noticed in some cases.
* asking people the last day to translate the task force application text and
then not using it at all is probably not a very good idea.
* all options in the language select box are in the content language (that is,
in English when you first visit the page) which is not very helpful. It would be
better if each would be in its own language like the interwiki links.
* sorting of the options is done based on the English names of the languages,
which looks stupid when they are not actually in English. (Not very relevant as
there is no reason to use the select box twice, but if you already go through
the effort of translating them...)
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Alex <alex(a)caseybrown.org>
Date: Mon, Sep 14, 2009 at 1:07 PM
Subject: [TB] Aug/Sept
=== New requests/Priorities ===
[Strategy] - the Strategic Planning project
has a new request and additional translations are especially needed.
This initiative is the main focus of the Wikimedia Foundation and they want
to have as many people participate as possible (even those who don't
speak English). Your translation skills are very much needed here. :-)
http://strategy.wikimedia.org/wiki/Call_for_participation/Appeal_letterhttp://strategy.wikimedia.org/wiki/Strategic_Planning:Translation - other
requests
=== Ongoing requests ===
[Privacy policy] - the Foundation's Privacy Policy was updated a while
ago but many of the translations still need to reflect those changes, we
could use your help.
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Privacy_policy
[Staff] - a few new staff members have been added to the page, so it should
be stable for now. Watchlist the translation page for updates.
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Translation_requests/WMF/Staff
[Local chapters] - a few new chapters were approved by the foundation so the
Local chapters page could use some updated translations.
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Translation_reqests/WMF/Local_chapters
------------------------------------------
Editor(s): Alex, Casey
Copyeditor(s):
Special thanks to: E-mail: translation AT wikimedia DOT org
------------------------------------------
* This is a newsletter of the Translation subcommittee, aiming to help
further traslation efforts related to the Wikimedia Foundation. Its content
is released into the public domain.
* Editors of this newsletter are subcommittee members, contributing
as individual volunteers only. This newsletter is not a publication of the
Wikimedia Foundation. Submissions or notes about related initiatives are
welcome on the talk page:
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Communications_subcommittees/Trans
--
Az1568
Hey all,
We're preparing for the Call for Participation launch tomorrow and the
appeal letter has been translated into quite a few languages already
(almost 20 last time I checked), great job!
However, it looks like the application page hasn't been:
<http://strategy.wikimedia.org/wiki/Call_for_participation/Task_force_applic…>.
The request isn't too much, a lot of the text is just one-worded
field options.
All languages are welcome, but the languages we'd really love before
launch are: en, es, fr, de, and it.
Philippe knows this is a lot to ask the day before, but anything you
can pull together is great... and you'll have his undying gratitude!
Thanks,
Casey
--
Casey Brown
Cbrown1023
Hey translators,
There's a new request from the Strategic Planning Project, an appeal
that will go out to both logged-in and anonymous users. If you need
to prioritize, we hope to have the translations ready by the September
8th. (We need to do some work with them before the September 14th
launch to get them to work in the templates.)
The workspace is on strategywiki:
<http://strategy.wikimedia.org/wiki/Call_for_participation/Appeal_letter>
Just a reminder that this process is the highest priority for the
Foundation (and transcom) at the moment, so if you could put this
ahead of other translation project you're working on it would be
great. :-)
--
Casey Brown
Cbrown1023