pidgin.pot for 2.x.y branch - strings 174 & 175

Sun May 25 13:36:36 EDT 2014

On Sun, May 25, 2014 at 11:08 AM, Javier Fernández-Sanguino Peña <
jfs at debian.org> wrote:

> First of all please let me start by saying this: I don't oppose to
> something
> working on an alternative Spanish locale.  If you want to do it, go for it.
>
> However, my experience with translation in Free Software projects (which
> started in 2001) and working with many colleagues from Latin America is
> that
> it is typically best to have a "neutral" translation into Spanish (i.e.
> 'es')
> than to have many divergent locales (i.e. 'es_ES', 'es_AR', 'es_MX').
>
> I have been coordinating the Debian Spanish Translation Project for more
> than
> 10 years now. The project translator's (from different countries) have
> agreed
> to a common base we can all understand and relate to.
>

I'm afraid I disagree with this.

As I said before, localization is the future of translations. There's not
just one "Worldwide English", one "Worldwide French" & one "Worldwide
Spanish" for everyone. Even German has its own "divergent locales" for
Germany, Austria, Swiss, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, etc. Difference there
are really a few, but there are.

Go to Australia and ask people to talk as if they were in Los Ángeles, go
to Great Britain and ask people to talk in a New York fashion.

So what's the sense of "worldwidecovering" a language and ignore real
differences between them?

OK, let's forget about other languages and let's focus on Spanish now. A
"neutral" Spanish's never gonna work in Argentina. As I said before, we
have a different way of conjugating verbs and we use a few different
personal pronouns. This is a purely "Argentine version" of Spanish language
and it's heavily used down here but it's also used in Uruguay, Paraguay,
Southeast Brazil and partially used in Bolivia and Chile. This is
known as español
rioplatense <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rioplatense_Spanish>.

In my opinion, have a "neutral", simplified language is not *typically
best*but typically faster and typically easier, especially if we're
talking
about huge pieces of software, like an OS. I prefer the long, hard way
instead.

> At any case, if a derivative locale is created, I would suggest to base it
> off the existing one and manage it as a "differences" file rather than a
> completely new translation.
>

Thanks but I think I don't need this. If I would have believed that the
current Spanish translation of Pidgin was good enough, I'd hardly have
thought about beginning a new locale by myself. I told Richard in private I
can't believe nobody hasn't complaint about this translation but coming to
think now, I think it's being like this because most Pidgin users in
Spanish don't realize about some mistranslations, or are too lazy to report
a bug. :P Or perhaps they can't even write in English — most people in
Latin America can't speak English and as a matter of fact, you realize my
English is far away from being perfect when trying to explain things. :D

> That way:
>   - bug fixes are shared
>

You should ask someone to review the Spanish translation instead.

>   - translations that can be shared *are* shared, preventing duplicate work
>

Since it's my own effort, I prefer to take this by my own. I won't be
duplicating anyone else's work, except a little bit for Pidgin's
translation/localizations managers.

>   - the public benefitting reviewing the translation (all Spanish speakers
> as opposed
>     to
>

Sorry, didn't understand this one, as this sentence isn't complete, I think.

> But this is just an opinion, you can manage it however you see it fit.
>

Sure! Thank you for sharing your thoughts anyway.

> On Sat, May 24, 2014 at 08:34:45AM -0300, TSK! | KNTRO (MindBuildingx/1.75
> Greenwich) (Darktech/4.75 Gibraltar kompliant) wrote:
> > Basically there's 2 reasons: First, the Pidgin's *es* locale is a mess,
> no
> > offense. Secondly, *es_AR* is very different from any other Spanish
> locale.
>
> Well, for someone that has been translating this program for *12* years,
> it's hard to take no offense when you say something "is a mess" and don't
> produce arguments to support it.
>

Are you the head behind the Spanish translation? If yes, hey, nice to meet
ya!

I do apologize if I offended you but you have to know that's my true
opinion — I'm brutally honest. :P

I repeat: this Spanish translation does needs a deep review. I know
everybody hates doing this since it takes too much time and results may be
so damn small than no one finds differences after hours of hard work, but
it's precisely here where things can be enhanced, i.e., in the smallest
things. Probably these small things have grown through those 12 years and
now it's one uniform mess. Probably this translation's be done by some
people with different styles and no solid guideline. I just don't know.

Anyway, I won't go into details here not now. But once I finish the
*es_AR*locale, you're gonna know these details. My target is to get
this locale
done within the next 30 days so you probably get these details from me
after the World Cup ends. ;)

> I would like to know where you believe the problem is:
>
>  - is it because the content out of date? Yes, it might be.  I do not keep
>    the content fully up-to-date with all new developments, I usually wait
> for
>    a "string freeze" to happen and then work on that target.
>

Nah, that's not a big issue. Especially Pidgin's Spanish translation right
now, which has just a few untranslated strings. You can solve that in less
than an hour.

>   - is the content incorrect/improper/wrong? I have not received bug
> reports
>    (either direclty or by those being reoprted through Pidgin's bug
> tracker)
>    so I am inclined to think it's not the case.
>

It is actually. But as I said above, people may be lazy about reporting
bugs. Or they don't know how to.

Regardless of what road you want to take (start a translation from scratch,
> or use the existing Spanish translation) I would really appreciate if you
> send me the things that, in the existing Spanish (es) translation are
> wrong.
>

I promise you I will. You got my word on this. ;) Then you can consider
whether it worth updating strings or if it doesn't.

Just tell me how do you prefer to receive this: one big email to the
translators' mailing list or small emails sent to you only?

Best,
-- 
*TSK! | KNTRO (MindBuildingx/1.75 Greenwich) (Darktech/4.75 Gibraltar
kompliant)*
*Ante la necesidad vulgar de una moraleja, puedo decir que siempre es
preferible el que mata por despecho al que mata por ideología. Los meros
criminales pueden arrepentirse, los que matan en nombre de unas
convicciones son irredimibles. Un malandra es menos peligroso que un
fanático.*
*— Alejandro Dolina.*
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