Timwi wrote on Wikien-l:
OK, here are my major problems with Wiktionary:
- English-centric (as has already been said)
Uh, it is the English Wiktionary. I guess that makes the English Wikipedia English-centric as well.
- not automated enough. Linking from [[biscuit]] (an English word) to [[Keks]] (a German word) should automatically add a link from [[Keks]] back to [[biscuit]].
That is not Wiktionary's fault! Add a feature request for MediaWiki.
A lot of identical formatting/layout should be automated (perhaps have a template automatically show up in the edit window when you try to edit a not-yet-existing page?).
That would be a neat thing to have for highly structured projects like Wiktionary and Wikiquote.
- too crowded in places. [[e]] should not contain all its meanings in hundreds of different languages on a single page.
That is what jump to TOC links are for.
- make one major change of policy/aim/goal. I think it is completely redundant and futile to try to define (explain the meaning of) all words of all languages *in* all languages.
Kinda like having articles on all encyclopedia-worthy topics? Have you ever heard of translating dictionaries? That is a big part of what Wiktionary is.
My suggestions for major improvement would be:
- wait for MediaWiki to support multi-language projects within a single Wiki. This is already in the plans for Wikipedia. Once that is done, you can have one page [[e]] in Spanish, another [[e]] in Italian, etc.
It will probably be a long time before projects like Wikipedia become one wiki, one database, all languages. Too many naming conflicts to deal with. Meta, Wikibooks, and Wikisource can be much more easily internationalized.
I think a word should only be defined in its own language, and if you want its meaning explained in another language, then you should really look up its translation in that other language.
That makes about as much sense as only having an English version of an encyclopedia article on the United Kingdom.
There are just so many things on Wiktionary that are language-independent (e.g. the translations for each word, or pronunciation written in IPA) that duplicating it hundreds of times seems really dumb.
That is a valid issue, but since Wiktionary isn't internationalized yet it is not a pressing one. IMO, a separate project is not at all needed. What /is/ needed, is for Wiktionary to finally get internationalized.
-- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)