Translation Support

This topic documents support for topic translations. Look at #See_also for other types of I18N features.

Introduction

The process is documented in UserInterfaceLocalisation. There are several efforts to translate TWiki documentation to languages other than english:

It would be interesting to make possible to show the documentation (mainly TWiki04x01 web topics) in the user's mother language. More generally, it would be even better being able to list available translations for each topic.

TWiki already supports UserInterfaceLocalisation. Now it's time to support topic translations

One initial try in that direction is TopicTranslationsPlugin. Altough it does its job, restricting topic names as it requires isn't a good thing.

Translation Support Specification

• translated topic names (more readable for non-English users)
• clear separation between topic name and language name
• translated topics may go into different webs (languages get easily pluggable through adding webs)
• remember original topics revision number in translated topic (to keep translations in sync)

The best place for that meta data would be a META-field. Since there is no easy way to manipulate meta data (apart from implementing a specialised user interface) I propose the use of FORM-fields in the first stage.

A possible TranslationForm may look like this:

The next stage would be a conversion to something like:

%META:TRANSLATION{origin="Web.OriginalTopic" language="de" revision="13"}%

To show all avaiable languages of a specific topic, WebLeftBar can be augmented with this simple SEARCH:

%SEARCH{
  search="FORM.*name\=.*TWiki.TranslationForm" 
  topic="%INCLUDINGTOPIC%" 
  web="%INCLUDINGWEB%" 
  scope="text" 
  nosummary="on" 
  nototal="on" 
  nosearch="on" 
  type="regex" 
  header="----$n   * <b>Languages</b>" 
  format="$percntSEARCH{ 
    search=\"FORM.*name\=.*TWiki.TranslationForm;FIELD.*name\=.*Origin;value\=.*$formfield(Origin)\" 
    web=\"all\" 
    regex=\"on\" 
    scope=\"text\" 
    nosearch=\"on\" 
    nototal=\"on\" 
    format=\"<a href='$dollartopic'><img src='%PUBURL%/%TWIKIWEB%/TWikiDocGraphics/flag_$dollarformfield(Language).png' width='21' height='14' border='0'></a>\"
  }$percnt"
}%

Example in the Sandbox-Web: Sandbox.EnglishPage1

Since a translation may go into a different web, I propose one web per language

• named TWiki_de, TWiki_es, TWiki_fr and so on (maybe we have to allow underscores in web names for that)
• as long as a topic is not yet translated, referring topics link to the english version as fallback
• there will be a topic named TranslationStatus? in each language web with
  • a list showing translated topics and their revisions (to get the translation in sync to the origin)
  • a list of not yet translated topic.
• language packs can be shipped as zip files
• localized templates refer to the translated topics (if available)

Things to think about

• rewrite the above specification considering storing translation information as meta-data.
• think on the UI for handling topic translations:
  • Creating a translation for an existing topic
  • Telling that the current topic is a translation of some other topic
  • updating translation data, like the revision of the original topic corresponding to the current translation.

See also

• LocalizationFramework
• UserInterfaceInternationalisation
• UserInterfaceLocalisation

-- Contributors: AntonioTerceiro, OliverKrueger, ChristianKohl, CrawfordCurrie, FrancoisGranger, FrancoisGranger, KarlheinzNolte, MarioFrasca, MartinCleaver, PatrickHansmeier, PeterThoeny, RichardDonkin, RichardDonkin, SamHasler, SvenDowideit, WillNorris, ZbigniewKulesza.

Discussion

note: see Bugs:Item1395. Maybe other components could use this infrastructure to pick the right version of topics for certain uses (e.g. NewUserTemplate).

-- AntonioTerceiro - 13 Jan 2006

I did not get the thing with translations going into different webs. But nevertheless - I will start translating some pages from the english original to spanish and link them to SpanishTranslation. In general, a list of the most important topics that have to be translated would be helpful.

-- SebastianKlus - 13 Mar 2008

Now I got the thing with the translations going into different webs And I like this idea as it leaves it up to every administrator to add a TWiki-language web or not.

Apart from that, I propose the use of flags in the translated topic to clearly mark references to topics that have not been translated yet. You can check it out at TWikiWebHome. It is the spanish translation for TWiki.

-- SebastianKlus - 27 Apr 2008

Please refer to TranslationNote to see a possible solution for the previously discussed item.

-- SebastianKlus - 02 May 2008