Re: Do you have experiences using source code management in translation?
On Mon, Mar 2, 2009 at 7:25 PM, Paul Menzel <pm.debian@googlemail.com> wrote:
> Dear everyone,
>
>
> I hope this is the correct list to write to. If not please point me to
> the correct one.
>
> On the German list we discuss the topic, if using source code management
> (SCM) tools in addition would be beneficial for everyone especially in
> saving time.
>
> On the German list (debian-10n-german) translation and reviewing is
> currently done as follows.
>
> The translations request gets send to the list, the responsible
> translator translates or updates the translation and sends the po-file
> to the list. Afterward reviewers send a reply with parts of the po-file
> quoted and annotations to it. The translator incorporates what fits and
> unfit things are discussed.
>
> In my opinion editing in an e-mail message window is not very
> convenient. Either for the one who checks the list nor for the one who
> incorporates the fixes. A mailing list is the worst patch management
> system, one guy at coreboot said once I think. I agree and that is the
> reason SCM tools were invented.
>
> A lot of people on the German list objected this proposal thinking that
> it is too much effort and makes the process much more complicated –
> although it was stated that it should be an *additional* option.
>
> My proposal was something like this. The translator makes his/her
> modifications and commits/pushes this to his branch. A post-commit hook
> would notify the list with the blob, a diff and a link to his/her
> repository.
>
> People now can reply via list or update their branch, make their
> corrections commit and publish it in their branch after which the list
> gets also notified. The original translator can than pick the obvious
> changes and incorporate those into his branch, publishing it, and so on.
>
> Ideas or Experiences
> --------------------
>
> So here is the reason of this message. How do translation teams of other
> languages handle this? Are there solutions using SCM or was that
> abandoned because it did not prove beneficial?
>
> Can you think of a solution involving Alioth or some other service?
I think using SCM is good, although it is complicated for a lot of
people. If you could translate against the original SCM it speeds up
the "return of the translation" step, but translators could trash the
repository.
Another case is for allowing in a better way the translation of a
project: for example we use a svn repository for translating and one
time a month we make a checkout and we send the updated translations
to the developers, but this takes more work (we have to commit the new
POT files) and is more slow.
Bye,
Leandro Regueiro
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