[Localization] The virtue of being fuzzy...

[Xavier Alvarez]

Carlo,

On Monday 03 December 2007 16:09, Carlo Falciola wrote:
CF> Xavier,
CF> I completely agree with you regarding the need of
CF> discussing at least some terms:
CF> my very first candidate is "Mesh Network" also to rule
CF> out if needed not to translate those "critical" terms.

Personally I've translated it as "Red Malla" or "Red en/de Malla" 
which is a bit redundant. When in doubt, I usually hit Wikipedia 
and then follow the links into Spanish...

CF>
CF>
CF> Another topic that I think needs a "global" approach
CF> is "Journal" and even more "keep" related to the
CF> journal itself.

I *strongly* recommend every translator to read the OLPC Human 
Interface Guidelines [1]. That way you will always be better 
prepared to translate the *meaning*.

For example, in the Journal section, it states that: 

"The traditional "open" and "save" model commonly used for files 
will fade into abstraction ... a much more general notion of what 
it means to want to keep things prevails." [2]

For me that implies that whenever I encounter a "save" in the 
original text, it should be translated as a "keep" because the 
intended user experience deprecates the concept of "saving a 
file" (developers don't always follow the HIG ;)


Cheers,
Xavier

[1] http://wiki.laptop.org/go/HIG
[2]  
http://wiki.laptop.org/go/OLPC_Human_Interface_Guidelines/The_Laptop_Experience/The_Journal

CF>
CF> ciao carlo
CF>
CF> Date: Sat, 1 Dec 2007 11:27:00 -0300
CF> From: Xavier Alvarez <xavi.alvarez at gmail.com>
CF> Subject: [Localization] The virtue of being fuzzy...
CF> To: localization at lists.laptop.org
CF> Message-ID:
CF> <200712011127.00646.xavi.alvarez at gmail.com>
CF> Content-Type: text/plain;  charset="us-ascii"
CF>
CF> People,
CF>
CF> I've been noticing that very few translations make use
CF> of the
CF> "fuzzy" tag (if ever).
CF>
CF> I seriously doubt that all the terms have a perfect
CF> corresponding
CF> term and that the translations need no review. I also
CF> think that
CF> we are losing the oportunity to generate a more
CF> collaborative
CF> environment & translator community.
CF>
CF> Remember we all have our own background experiences &
CF> idiomatic
CF> biases... what may seem 'natural' or 'obvious' to you
CF> may not be
CF> the case for a child some kilometers away... :)
CF>
CF> We should probably have a space in the wiki to discuss
CF> terminology
CF> and translation matters, but haven't been able to
CF> think much
CF> about a reasonable way to address the multiple issues
CF> (source
CF> file, source term, target language, alternatives,
CF> errors, bugs,
CF> etc) in a simple way...
CF>
CF>
CF> Comments? Ideas?
CF> Xavier
CF>

-- 
XA
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