Localisation of the languages of India - WikimediaIndia-l

Anirudh

25 Dec 25 Dec

2:31 p.m.

New subject: [Wikimediaindia-l] Localisation of the languages of India

Hi Gerard, Thank you for your interest in the development of MediaWiki interface in Indian languages. Rest assured that the participants of the chapter and the local-language Wiki projects would contribute as much as they can. Best wishes, --Anirudh On Dec 25, 2007 7:48 PM, Gerard Meijssen <gerard.meijssen(a)gmail.com> wrote:

...

Hoi, India is a big country populated by many people speaking many languages. It is no surprise that there are many wikipedias in languages spoken in India. As you are active in organising a chapter for the Wikimedia Foundation, I want to ask your collaboration on the localisation for the Indian languages in MediaWiki. When you look at the statistics for the localisation of MediaWiki and its extensions, you will find that the Indian languages are not really supported. This in marked contrast with the experience when you visit for instance the hi.wikipedia.org. I want to ask you to collaborate on the central localisation of MediaWiki in the "BetaWiki". Central localisation has big advantages, a user interface will be properly supported in all Wikimedia Foundation projects and the language will also be supported in Wikis outside of the Wikimedia Foundation. At the moment more then hundred MediaWiki extensions are supported in MediaWiki. Some are of specific importance for projects or languages. As BetaWiki is appreciated more and more as the place to be for MediaWiki localisation, this number grows and with it the potential for collaboration. The first step is to import the existing localisation from your active projects in to BetaWiki. The next step is to make sure that all the messages do not contain information that is specific to Wikipedia so that it is indeed useful in other projects. Localisation of MediaWiki is important and this makes it a requirement for new projects in a language. What is of more relevance is that it is easier to edit a Wiki when the user interface is consistent from one project to the next. When we make it easier for people to read and edit MediaWiki, we will grow the community of people that make our projects a success. Thanks, GerardM http://translatewiki.net/wiki/Main_Page BetaWiki http://translatewiki.net/wiki/Translating:Group_statistics Statistics _______________________________________________ Wikimediaindia-l mailing list Wikimediaindia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediaindia-l

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Anirudh

3:54 p.m.

New subject: [Wikimediaindia-l] Localisation of the languages of India

Transliterating English words into Devanagari script is the common practice on most of the websites with content in Hindi and other Indian languages. On Dec 25, 2007 9:18 PM, Akash <akash.great(a)gmail.com> wrote:

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Hi. I started working on the Gujarati translations in Betawiki a few days back. http://translatewiki.net/wiki/Special:Contributions/Aksi_great . The biggest hurdle in translation for me is that there aren't any words for some terms in Gujarati (eg. password, username, login, logout, etc). I guess I'll take a look at what hi.wiki are doing and follow suit. I think it would be better if we model all translations based on the bigger Indian wikis like Hindi, Kannada, Tamil, Bengali, etc. To all those who speak Gujarati, please help me out at Betawiki. You'll find http://translatewiki.net/wiki/Translating:Intro to be very useful. Akash On Dec 25, 2007 7:48 PM, Gerard Meijssen <gerard.meijssen(a)gmail.com> wrote:

Hoi, India is a big country populated by many people speaking many languages. It is no surprise that there are many wikipedias in languages spoken in India. As you are active in organising a chapter for the Wikimedia Foundation, I want to ask your collaboration on the localisation for the Indian languages in MediaWiki. When you look at the statistics for the localisation of MediaWiki and its extensions, you will find that the Indian languages are not really supported. This in marked contrast with the experience when you visit for instance the hi.wikipedia.org. I want to ask you to collaborate on the central localisation of MediaWiki in the "BetaWiki". Central localisation has big advantages, a user interface will be properly supported in all Wikimedia Foundation projects and the language will also be supported in Wikis outside of the Wikimedia Foundation. At the moment more then hundred MediaWiki extensions are supported in MediaWiki. Some are of specific importance for projects or languages. As BetaWiki is appreciated more and more as the place to be for MediaWiki localisation, this number grows and with it the potential for collaboration. The first step is to import the existing localisation from your active projects in to BetaWiki. The next step is to make sure that all the messages do not contain information that is specific to Wikipedia so that it is indeed useful in other projects. Localisation of MediaWiki is important and this makes it a requirement for new projects in a language. What is of more relevance is that it is easier to edit a Wiki when the user interface is consistent from one project to the next. When we make it easier for people to read and edit MediaWiki, we will grow the community of people that make our projects a success. Thanks, GerardM http://translatewiki.net/wiki/Main_Page BetaWiki http://translatewiki.net/wiki/Translating:Group_statistics Statistics _______________________________________________ Wikimediaindia-l mailing list Wikimediaindia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediaindia-l

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Anirudh

4:03 p.m.

New subject: [Wikimediaindia-l] Localisation of the languages of India

Well, I can certainly empathise with the reservations they might have with such a practice. But, IMO, not many users of the internet from India, who like to view and use content available in vernacular medium, are very fluent in what we call the pure and unchaste form of Indian languages, and specially Hindi. There are national organisations, including governmental, which have chosen to use transliterated words rather than the so-called "pure" words, most of which are non-existent. But, this is just a suggestion. Best wishes, --Anirudh On Dec 25, 2007 9:28 PM, Akash <akash.great(a)gmail.com> wrote:

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Some of the users of guwiki were against the practice. But I think transliterating the words is much better than just keeping them in English On Dec 25, 2007 9:24 PM, Anirudh < anirudhsbh(a)gmail.com> wrote:

Transliterating English words into Devanagari script is the common practice on most of the websites with content in Hindi and other Indian languages. On Dec 25, 2007 9:18 PM, Akash < akash.great(a)gmail.com> wrote:

Hi. I started working on the Gujarati translations in Betawiki a few days back. http://translatewiki.net/wiki/Special:Contributions/Aksi_great . The biggest hurdle in translation for me is that there aren't any words for some terms in Gujarati (eg. password, username, login, logout, etc). I guess I'll take a look at what hi.wiki are doing and follow suit. I think it would be better if we model all translations based on the bigger Indian wikis like Hindi, Kannada, Tamil, Bengali, etc. To all those who speak Gujarati, please help me out at Betawiki. You'll find http://translatewiki.net/wiki/Translating:Intro to be very useful. Akash On Dec 25, 2007 7:48 PM, Gerard Meijssen <gerard.meijssen(a)gmail.com> wrote:

Hoi, India is a big country populated by many people speaking many languages. It is no surprise that there are many wikipedias in languages spoken in India. As you are active in organising a chapter for the Wikimedia Foundation, I want to ask your collaboration on the localisation for the Indian languages in MediaWiki. When you look at the statistics for the localisation of MediaWiki and its extensions, you will find that the Indian languages are not really supported. This in marked contrast with the experience when you visit for instance the hi.wikipedia.org. I want to ask you to collaborate on the central localisation of MediaWiki in the "BetaWiki". Central localisation has big advantages, a user interface will be properly supported in all Wikimedia Foundation projects and the language will also be supported in Wikis outside of the Wikimedia Foundation. At the moment more then hundred MediaWiki extensions are supported in MediaWiki. Some are of specific importance for projects or languages. As BetaWiki is appreciated more and more as the place to be for MediaWiki localisation, this number grows and with it the potential for collaboration. The first step is to import the existing localisation from your active projects in to BetaWiki. The next step is to make sure that all the messages do not contain information that is specific to Wikipedia so that it is indeed useful in other projects. Localisation of MediaWiki is important and this makes it a requirement for new projects in a language. What is of more relevance is that it is easier to edit a Wiki when the user interface is consistent from one project to the next. When we make it easier for people to read and edit MediaWiki, we will grow the community of people that make our projects a success. Thanks, GerardM http://translatewiki.net/wiki/Main_Page BetaWiki http://translatewiki.net/wiki/Translating:Group_statisticsStatistics _______________________________________________ Wikimediaindia-l mailing list Wikimediaindia-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediaindia-l

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Utkarshraj Atmaram

31 Dec 31 Dec

8:43 a.m.

New subject: [Wikimediaindia-l] Localisation of the languages of India

On Dec 26, 2007 12:13 AM, Hari Prasad Nadig <mail(a)hpnadig.net> wrote:

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In Kannada context I can say that in cities, English words are predominantly used in the spoken language. But as you go outside metros, the usage of English words narrows down to only those that do not have alternative Kannada words. For instance, "Bus", "CD", "Cigarette" etc. We should keep the larger audience in mind rather than just Urban users when translating/transliterating since Internet penetration outside cities is increasing by every passing day.

I agree, simply transliterating English words into Indian languages is a bad idea. But, IMHO, it's even worse to coin new equivalents that do not exist in the language already. For example, using "સંગણક" ("Sanganaka") for "Computer": http://gu.wikipedia.org/wiki/વિકિપીડિયા:ગુજરાતી_અનુવાદની_યાદી I've read the term "संगणक" (Sanganaka) in some Hindi-Marathi textbooks, but even the people in the remote Hindi/Marathi rural areas use the term "कम्प्यूटर" (Computer) to refer to the machine. In many such cases, it's much better to use use the popular English words, which have entered local languages. Nobody in Hindi-Marathi speaking areas (including the remotest villages) uses "दूरध्वनि" to describe a telephone, everybody calls it a टेलिफोन (or टेलिफ़ोन, to be more accurate). Using newly-coined words that'll remain limited to books or news broadcasts on government is of little practical use. -- Utkarshraj Atmaram http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Utcursch

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