Re: [RANT] French translation for debconf templates stucked at 90% : analysis
Quoting Marc Haber (mh+debian-devel@zugschlus.de):
> Being a German native speaker, I write everything in English.
Do you also daily speak English when going to the grocery store? Or
when ordering a bier in a bar?
I guess not and I guess I know why : mostly because the people you're
talking with are not English speakers.
These people also deserve a Linux distribution they may use daily
which is mostly why some other German people care about
translations. Just like the kids and teachers in Norway need a
norwegian-speaking Skolelinux. Even though these Norwegian people most
often speak damn good English as well.
When working on l10n stuff, I think I work more for a much wider
target than the geek community. That is the point.
> Occasionaly, some other German native speaker decides to translate my
> work to German.
>
> Usually, I am not impressed by the translations because they usually
> feel clumsy and awkward to me, as if I were explaining the things to a
They maybe feel clumsy because the german team does not have enough
manpower...or because you're not used to them. And, believe me, the
german translation uses far more englishisms than the french one for instance.
But, as Martin wrote, they probably don't look more or less clumsy
than some "English" things I see here and there in free software.
As I mentioned elsewhere, English is probably among the worst
translations in Debian.....:)
So, you're maybe comfortable with (bad) English. I personnally am more
comfortable with good French. This is also the reason I use my crappy
french keyboard though it's definitely not geeky (a good french geek
uses a US keyboard and just makes strange incantations for entering
the appropriate characters with it)
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