Update of the developers-reference I18N/L10N sections
Hello,
(sorry for the delay, Lucas)
The developers-reference needs some update in the I18N/L10N section.
Here is a proposal, but I think it needs first to be reviewed on
debian-i18n.
I opened http://bugs.debian.org/436162 some time ago, but the patch do
not apply anymore, so here is an updated patch.
Some parts of my patch may not be accurate, and some other parts of the
developers-reference might need updates. Please comment!
Lucas reminded me about it recently, and I think it would be nice to
clarify some sections of that manual, which should be read by every new
developers.
Best Regards,
--
Nekral
diff -rauN ../orig/developers-reference-3.3.9/l10n.dbk ./developers-reference-3.3.9/l10n.dbk
--- ../orig/developers-reference-3.3.9/l10n.dbk 2008-02-27 23:09:51.000000000 +0100
+++ ./developers-reference-3.3.9/l10n.dbk 2008-06-03 00:48:17.064038456 +0200
@@ -45,30 +45,33 @@
<para>
For program messages, the gettext infrastructure is used most of the time.
Most of the time, the translation is handled upstream within projects like the
-<ulink url="http://www.iro.umontreal.ca/contrib/po/HTML/";>Free Translation
+<ulink url="http://translationproject.org";>Free Translation
Project</ulink>, the <ulink
url="http://developer.gnome.org/projects/gtp/";>Gnome translation
-Project</ulink> or the <ulink url="http://i18n.kde.org/";>KDE one</ulink>. The
-only centralized resource within Debian is the <ulink
+Project</ulink> or the <ulink url="http://i18n.kde.org/";>KDE one</ulink>.
+Debian provides a <ulink url="http://i18n.debian.net";>Debian I18N
+server</ulink> with some I18N related resources, and a summary in the <ulink
url="http://&www-debian-org;/intl/l10n/";>Central Debian translation
statistics</ulink>, where you can find some statistics about the translation
-files found in the actual packages, but no real infrastructure to ease the
-translation process.
+files found in the actual packages. Translators can be helped in their
+translation process with a mailing list and a <ulink
+url="http://i18n.debian.net/debian-l10n/";>robot</ulink> which gather what work
+was done and what needs to be done.
</para>
<para>
An effort to translate the package descriptions started long ago, even if very
-little support is offered by the tools to actually use them (i.e., only APT can
+little support <-- Is it still true? -->is offered by the tools to actually use them (i.e., only APT can
use them, when configured correctly). Maintainers don't need to do anything
special to support translated package descriptions; translators should use the
<ulink url="http://ddtp.debian.org/";>DDTP</ulink>.
+<-- should it be .net?
+ Should we point to DDTSS? -->
</para>
<para>
For debconf templates, maintainers should use the po-debconf package to ease
-the work of translators, who could use the DDTP to do their work (but the
-French and Brazilian teams don't). Some statistics can be found both on the
-DDTP site (about what is actually translated), and on the <ulink
+the work of translators. Some statistics can be found both on the <ulink
url="http://&www-debian-org;/intl/l10n/";>Central Debian translation
-statistics</ulink> site (about what is integrated in the packages).
+statistics</ulink> site.
</para>
<para>
For web pages, each l10n team has access to the relevant CVS, and the
@@ -107,7 +110,7 @@
<title>How to get a given text translated</title>
<para>
To translate package descriptions or debconf templates, you have nothing to do;
-the DDTP infrastructure will dispatch the material to translate to volunteers
+the Debian I18N infrastructure will dispatch the material to translate to volunteers
with no need for interaction from your part.
</para>
<para>
@@ -118,6 +121,20 @@
and of the reviewing process. Once they are done, you will get your translated
document from them in your mailbox.
</para>
+<para>
+<command>podebconf-report-po</command> (from the
+<package>po-debconf</package> package) permits to automate call for
+translation to the debian-i18n mailing list (using the
+<option>--call</option> option), for PO files (this is not restricted to
+debconf PO files).
+<!-- starting from po-debconf 1.0.14, the recommended usage is
+ podebconf-report-po \-\-call
+ from the po/ directory -->
+</para>
+<para>
+It is good practice to ask for a review of the document on the
+debian-l10n-english mailing list before sending call for translations.
+</para>
</section>
<section id="l10n-faqm-rev">
@@ -147,6 +164,12 @@
the reader should refer to the original document if possible.
</para>
<para>
+<command>podebconf-report-po</command> (from the
+<package>po-debconf</package> package) permits to automate requests for
+translation update, sent to the previous translators and/or translation
+mailing lists, for PO files (this is not restricted to debconf PO files).
+</para>
+<para>
Avoid removing a translation completely because it is outdated. Old
documentation is often better than no documentation at all for non-English
speakers.
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