Translation platform
mariobl opened this issue · comments
I've founded a new project at Zanata where we could manage our translations [1]. I'm not sure if Zanata is the best platform for us, I stumbled upon some things:
After uploading files, the language definition will be removed. I've seen that after downloading a previously uploaded file and opening in Qtlinguist. The programm asks again for the source language, but I've just clicked on "Cancel". Obviously the language definition is not mandatory, but the dialog window itself could be annoying for translators who prefer to use their local translation tools instead of the web interface.
The one and only language which Zanata doesn't support is ca@Valencia. I don't consider this as a really big problem.
After uploading the ts files, all of the strings get marked as "unfinished". This flag can be unset by approving translated strings in the web interface, but probably Zanata doesn't accept uploaded "raw" files edited with Qtlinguist or Virtaal.
There is a project maintainer guide for Zanata [2]. If you agree with using this platform for Glabels, you have to register an account there and I can add you as a maintainer. This would enable the command line access to the files.
[1] https://translate.zanata.org/project/view/Glabels
[2] http://docs.zanata.org/en/release/user-guide/project-maintainer-guide/
Along with the Zanata project creation, I've requested a similar translation project at Weblate. As declared at their website, it may take a while until the framework is established, and I haven't got no feedback yet.
But today I've tested a Weblate project (as a translator). I'm not really happy with the workflow. The translation glossary doesn't find any similar string which could be reused. So I'm forced to type all things again and again. And in general, the workflow is not that I've expected.
Zanata is ... let's say a bit slow. But especially downloading files for translation and upload again works fine. This comes towards the needs of translators who don't like online platforms and prefer to use local tools (so I do). One significant disadvantage is the poor support for *.ts files. Well, it works, but for example, underscores in menu entries – marked with "&" in the translatable strings – are marked as warnings in the web interface. Really strange... This could confuse translators.
Maybe Zanata is nevertheless the preferrable platform. There would be a third way (Transifex) but I'm not sure if it's worth the effort to setup a project there.
By the way, Redhat has chosen for the migration from Transifex to Zanata (for the Fedora based stuff) because Transifex became proprietary. Creating a free project is not really simple anymore, the target are companies which let manage the translation of their proprietary projects. Obviously Zanata is the best choice.
Although command line access to Zanata doesn't work as expected, I would consider this issue as resolved for the time being.