Robin
Good morning Wallon and Marcelo!
Yes, I did it finally. That was waiting on my todo-roll for years already. (Marcelo will remember we first talked about that around 2020, but still had not the means nor knowledge to make it real.)
Other than gettext translations (.pot/.po/.mo), this file type (html) doesn’t accept dev notes without rewriting the source file itself and adding all explanations for translation directly into the web page itself, which is nonsensical: it bloats the original file which is used by the web server, causing unnecessarily increased mass traffic then in use. So we are reduced to string instructions here unfortunately: They can be applied only to already uploaded resources at transifex (or you need to be a programmer, directly programming their api v3 wich is out of my reach still due to its complexity in handling; nevertheless, once I have spare time I’ll look into this new api stuff how to script that in python, but that’s not a task for weeks, I guess a time frame of 1 or 2 years would be more realistic when taking my limited amount of spare time into account; this is not first priority on my todo list. So we’ll have to manually add the string instructions for now (or somebody else might want to step in concerning the api programming).
Having said that first, you’ll understand why I had planned to announce this resource here only after having managed to complete all the still missing “string instructions” to all these new FAQ resources.
Currently only three of them are equipped with hints for translation:
→ Home
→ Control Centre
→ Init Systems
I’d suggest you start translating with these, so you get a feeling for the strings and the position and meaning of their entries in this set of resource files. Additionally please feel free to check what I have translated already to German in these three, as an additional reference if in doubt about the actual meaning of an original wording.
All the entries from the other resources of the set are still waiting to be analysed and categorised. (@marcelocripe, since you have like me “sufficient powers” at transifex also, you could add the string instructions to the still waiting resources by simply copying the English instructions over from the already equipped files. As outlined above, this must be done manually, one by one. Identify the position and function of a string in the Webpage, check its instruction set on one of the already equipped pages, and when convinced it matches 1:1, copy the found instruction over. I do that while translating a still unequipped file, you could do it the same way, this way it doesn’t take much extra time. @Wallon: If you feel like, we could need your help in this also, so if you’d like to chime in, just bark up; I guess @anticapitalista would accept you in the transifex maintainers squad of antiX development. If you want that, and @anticapitalista doesn’t object, I’ll send you an invitation. Same for @Masinick Brian. You as a native English speaker have a great advantage above us, since the instructions should be written in English language. You can experiment with the interface on the antiX-community transifex test space first, like Wallon and Marcelo did in the past also, so they do know the ropes already. I’ve given you full access there already, so feel free to check out if or whenever you like.)
From what I have learned by writing the string instructions for the three, there are some general hints I can give you already:
– For all the strings which refer to the left side column register: Make sure these are translated in all antiX 26 FAQ resources the same way, so when clicking later around in the page the display stays consistent.
– Same goes for a couple of other entries; e.g. the site window border header, keep here the first part of it consistent. The entry you have highlighted, Wallon, stems from this very entry type:
antiX-FAQ antiX-FAQ
Not a mistake necessarily. You’ll find similar entries in all these FAQ resources:
antiX-FAQ Control Centre
antiX-FAQ Init Systems
...Thus, the duplication is strict logically in the “home” page of the FAQ, but you don’t have necessarily to translate this literally at all. In German I decided to use a completely different wording for this string, since “antiX FAQ” is mentioned in other places in the page repeatedly already. Here’s what I used instead:
"antiX – Was Sie darüber wissen müssen"
"antiX – Was Sie darüber wissen müssen – Das Kontrollzentrum"
"antiX – Was Sie darüber wissen müssen – Die Initsysteme"
...(translates roughly to: “antiX – what you need to know about it”)
Again, whatever you decide writing here, it is necessary to keep the first part of this entry strictly consistent across all the FAQ translations.
– For having localised screenshots in your language, just re-enact the scenery of each shot on your localised antiX, take the shot, name it the same way it is named in the original, and zip them altogether. Attach this zip file here, then I can include them. (I’m taking the shots for German language currently)
Don’t translate the image paths at transifex; they are relative and I noticed that there is no need to adjust them; consider them (in spite of what I have written originally in their string instructions) as “untranslatable”. (If I can figure a way to block translation for “untranslatable” entries, I’ll do so, but until then please carefully check the string instructions and apply them analogously to the still not equipped resources)
Taking the complexity of the resource file type handling of this resource into account, all needed fixes in English language (I already noticed there are some minor typos in them the original author has overlooked) should be applied at transifex in the en_GB and en_US language “translation” instead of fixing in the html sources and re-uploading them to transifex, if possible in any way: This would corrupt all already translated entries, since TM will fill up, not respecting the requirements outlined in string instructions. Thus you’ll have to check as a translator very carefully each single string you find inserted automatically again manually. Moreover a re-upload will remove again all the string instructions (at least in the past that was that way, not sure whether they have improved that meanwhile to keep them for unchanged strings. Will have to check out over at our transifex test bed in community-contributions)
Instructions for local translation and re-upload of the translated file to transifex instead of using their online editor:
– Download the translation of your language “for translation” (not: “for use” !!!, other than in .po file resources this makes actually a huge difference here.)
– Edit the translatable parts in them, make sure to translate identical worded strings within one html file identically.
– Re-upload to transifex. If you did properly, the file will be accepted and all your new translations will be filled in, as well as the modifications of already translated entries, which get overwritten at transifex then.
Check this procedure out at our translation test bed at community-contributions, where a blind copy of this resource (only “home”) is present for safely learning the needed skills before mangling the productive space at antix-development. Be warned: The procedure transifex provides for offline translation of this file type is pretty error-prone and you can easily end up with corrupting all existing translations of the file in your language when failing (I have seen the position of originally properly translated strings being moved around to other entries of the resource, where they don’t belong to, after upload in the past, so please be extremely carefully with this manoeuvre. I’d suggest not to use offline translating here at all and relying completely on their online editor instead.)
Instructions for checking your translations in situ:
– Download one of the translated or partly translated FAQ resource files in your language from transifex “for use”.
– Copy the complete content of what you find on antiX 26 in the folder /usr/share/antiX/FAQ to a working folder, e.g. in your home directory or wherever else.
– In this working copy replace the respective html file for which you have downloaded your translation (rename the downloaded file accordingly).
– Open this local file in a web browser of your choice. antiX Viewer works fine, but you can as well use Firefox or whatever else.
– Check your result and go back to the transifex online editor, fix what you find not showing up as you’ve expected.
Known issues and doubts:
– All the help videos at the bottom of the “home” page do link to great but many years old videos about completely outdated antiX versions. I reckon, a link to the new antiX help video page, on which the really great videos by Dolphin Oracle are also present, would be worthwhile instead.
– The site states, that flash can be installed from the package installer. Have not checked, sorry, but is this actually true for antiX 26 still? Has somebody tried that actually already?
– Is the statement about the min requirement of 512 MiB + 256 MiB Swap still valid for antiX 26 full?
– The antiX Repo-Manager in Control Centre is not mentioned in the detailed description how to manage repos; instead only Synaptic and manual file edit is described. (I have added that in my German translation to the respective entries, and it could be done in the English “translation” as well the same way.
– The instructions for leaving antiX from within IceWM seems to need change: Clicking on the desktop does for me simply nothing (antiX 26 full 32 bit, Live, runit-mode (default), zzz-IceWM (default) Instead right click → Logoff in top menu level of antiX Main Menu is needed. Should also be fixed at transifex in English “translation”.
Please append here in this thread whatever you find inappropriate in the FAQ, so it can be fixed for English language in the en_GB and en_US “translation” as well (avoiding this way re-uploading the resources to transifex for reasons outlined above).
Happy translating!
Robin
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P.S.:
Let’s get the dictionaries out…
Yes, you are perfectly right. There is some really tricky to translate stuff in it. I also had to ponder long time on some of the translations I’ve already done, before finding a way to express that not sounding like Goblin-language in German… This is why we need to do that translation work for the FAQ at all in the first place. Automatic web translations users can apply on their own on the page do often fail in transporting the meaning completely, additionally leaving out important details from the original if they or their underlying AI can’t make anything of it (or even twist the meaning to the exact opposite of what is found in the original).
Windows is like a submarine. Open a window and serious problems will start.