Re: Do not touch l10n files (was Re: DDTP issue)
On Sun, 18 May 2003, Denis Barbier wrote:
> [All Cc's removed]
>
> On Sat, May 17, 2003 at 07:54:55AM +0200, Fabio Massimo Di Nitto wrote:
> [...]
> > I don't believe that there is not an estestic layout that can satisfy
> > all the languages we have in Debian.
>
> What is the rationale for having a single layout for all languages?
since we are talking about estetic, i believe that it looks nicer keeping
the layout coherent across translation.
> How do developers check how translations are rendered?
sorry but i don't understand what you mean.
> > Don't forget that most of the text we use in descriptions (or
> > templates, or whatever) are based on technical language and terms,
> > imho most of them farly new i would say and only recently adopted by
> > common languages.
>
> Could you please be more explicit? I do not understand how this sentence
> is related to the issue discussed here.
I will make a couple of example so we can understand each other better but
they are just examples that i don't mind to discuss, but out of the
mailing list since it will become too much off-topic imho.
When you translate old literature, for instance, it is extremely difficult
since you have to stick to tons of rules (ancient and new ones) and
probably you will have to use some obsolete terms in your language that
correspond to the same one in the other. In a case like this you need to
apply atleast 3 grammatic rule sets. the old one in the other language,
the old one in your language and the new one in your langauge, and if you
don't do that in a really pedantic way you will loose everything of the
meaning of the original text.
Now evaluate computer related terms. They are not older than 20 years,
only some of them have been accepted in common languages (read
dictionaries), and in most cases we inveted new terms that will probably
never flow in laguages other than computer ones. Think to something like:
"I've debianized X4.3! ;-)" (an exagerate example but just to get the
idea) in italian i would translate in something like: "Ho debianizato
X4.3! ;-)". The verb "to debianize" doesn't exist in any dictionary other
than the "Debian one" but somehow we imported it and adapted to out
language. Keeping the same meaning and a very close layout. Point is that
this is a shorcut to a more long and possibly boring translation that will
look like: "Io ho creato un pacchetto Debian che contiene i binari di
X4.3" (exagerated a bit in the other way but still just to get the idea).
Somehow the language evolves and since computer related language is farly
new i don't see any problem in adapting it a bit for our targets. Of
course you might argue that is not clean but afaik noone has ever really
set rules for cases like this one.
The point is that using a farly new language gives us a bit more freedom
than using a normal language in a strict way. Can you see my point?
Fabio
--
Our mission: make IPv6 the default IP protocol
"We are on a mission from God" - Elwood Blues
http://www.itojun.org/paper/itojun-nanog-200210-ipv6isp/mgp00004.html
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