Improve how we do translations

[rjmackay]

Improve how we do translations, using something like Transifex

It's especially confusing that en_US and fr_FR are bundled with the core repository, so it's not obvious which to update. In fact the main en_US translation is ahead of Ushahidi-Localizations. Not sure what the fix for this is, but logging it here so it doesn't get lost.

Full rework of translations will probably happen in 3.0 - however 2.x could still have basic connections to a translation platform

[bymerej]

I once mentioned TWN as an option on skype. If you're interested, I'm happy to investigate feasibility or tell you more about it or set up a meeting with their staff.

https://translatewiki.net/wiki/Translating:New_project

[brianherbert]

I have a blue sky idea for handling all translations in line or directly on Crowdmap itself (I say Crowdmap because it's almost always running the most up to date version). I haven't had time to work on it but could be interesting.

[rjmackay]

Comments from Sophie Gautier of The Documentation Foundation:

Some remarks on localization:

• the tool of a localizer are glossaries and Translation Memories, of course spell checker too, but less than the TM. They are very important to ensure consistency among the products and the versions of the product. The more contributors are working together, the more these tools are relevant
• the information given on the context of the string is fundamental
• the ability to refer to a third language is also a good practice, there is a lot of countries where a third language would help to the understanding
• it should be possible to work off line or online. Most of us work off line with our own translation tools, but for small contribution, on line mode is better,
• statistics and checks on the strings are very useful too. Checking for the tags, punctuations, missing translation should be presented by the tool. I don't know the amount of localization you are about to work on, but the tool can save a lot of time and energy to your team. For example, something like Transifex is very poor, because it has not TM, no context, no checks, but if there is only few strings it could be ok. For more, you should chose something more adapted.

[pdestefanis]

IMHO, we need to define a "root" language (and my vote goes for en_US, even if it's not my native tongue), and then create all others from there. We need to have: 1) A clear go-to catalog for devs to pick the Kohana::lang strings. 2) One tool, please. May not be the best, may not be the coolest, but let's commit to one. I'm handling a few sites with more than one location and it is painful 3) Languages as a sub-module. The fact that en_US in the 2.x is ahead of Ushahidi-localizations is bad. Any way to "chain-clone" in Git? 4) Probably add application/i18n/* to .gitignore

[rjmackay]

• en_US is already source language.
• We're working on getting the translations into transifex
• Agreed on the submodule for localizations. We just need to have this all polished before we switch over - targetting the 2.6 release for this.

[rjmackay]

http://blog.ushahidi.com/index.php/2012/08/21/localization-and-translation-with-transifex/

• Ushahidi translations are now managed through Transifex https://www.transifex.com/projects/p/ushahidi-localizations/
• The Ushahidi-Localizations repo is now included in core through a submodule. Run git submodule update --init when you next pull from git or git clone --recursive git://github.com/ushahidi/Ushahidi_Web.git to clone and include submodules
• All localizations will be shipped with core releases

More info https://wiki.ushahidi.com/display/WIKI/Localization https://wiki.ushahidi.com/display/WIKI/Localization+and+Translation+-+How+to https://wiki.ushahidi.com/display/WIKI/Localization+and+Translation+-+FAQ https://wiki.ushahidi.com/display/WIKI/Localizations+-+under+the+hood

Very happily closing this ticket cc/ @heatherleson