TDF Wiki/Multilingual
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This page concerns the Multilingual Wiki content present on the TDF Wiki.
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Information
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Background
This page contains some important hints for wiki editors. Please read this page before adding translated or localized content to the wiki.
Translation issues and incomplete translations
Most of the translatable pages in the wiki are now using Translate extension, which automatically highlights paragraphs with outdated translations. In such pages, we prefer to keep incomplete translations rather than delete them. In case you have questions about the work of others, you can contact fellow translators through the "Email this user" functionality when viewing their user page. If you need broader feedback for any request, suggestion, or idea for a modification, please join the localization mailing list. Thank you on behalf of the localization and Native Language teams!
Content with local focus
Pages are written in their local language only and won't be translated. They are subpages of a page named by the language code in upper case.
Examples:
https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/DE/Team https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/DE/Veranstaltungen ... https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/FR/Documentation/Publications
Content with global focus
Pages are set up in English and are translated to different languages. The translated pages are subpages named by their language code. The translation process is handled by the Translate extension.
Follow these steps to make a page translatable:
- Put content that needs to be translated inside
<translate></translate>blocks - Use Special:MyLanguage prefix when you link to local translatable pages
- Add the language menu block
<languages/> - After saving the page, click the link at the top that says Mark this page for translation
- Check that everything is fine and click the button at the bottom that says Mark this version for translation
After the page is marked for translation, the Translate extension will automatically add markers in the form of <!--T:1--> to denote translatable strings. To become automatically separated into a string, a block of text has to be surrounded by blank lines. To force the separation of strings, you can add more <translate></translate> blocks. Pay attention to bulleted or numbered lists especially.
When you add or change content in the source page, this will appear at the top of the page: This page has changes since it was last marked for translation. Click the link "marked for translation" to bring the translation system up to date following the same process as in the initial marking for translation.
Tips
In an ideal situation, translators should see a minimal amount of wiki markup. Having markup for a table or a template in the translatable string is frustrating and confusing for the translator. Try to leave such markup outside the <translate></translate> blocks.
The page title is made translatable by default, but you can control this with the checkbox "Allow translation of page title" when marking a page for translation. The page title is the first translatable string in the list of strings. In the translation system and interface, the string has a name like "Translations:Faq/General/127/Page display title/ru" while the other string names have numeric identifiers like the "4" in "Translations:Faq/General/127/4/ru".
Sometimes there is a need to give a page a display title that is different from the name in the page path. Note that this is not recommended and should be avoided. In these cases, use the Rename template like so: {{Rename|My new name}}. The template will make sure there are no errors in the translated pages regarding the title.
You can do a partial update of a translation while still leaving the status as outdated by clicking the downward-pointing triangle next to the translation unit name and selecting Show in wiki editor. You will be taken to a separate editing page where you can make your changes and save them while leaving the !!FUZZY!! special word at the start of the text intact.
Sometimes you need to access the English wiki source without the <!--T:1--> markers. This can be done by adding /en at the end of the page path and then editing the source. This will allow you to copy a page structure into a new page (such as Release notes).
When working on a page with many translation blocks, it sometimes happens that you make a mistake with opening or closing translate tags. In a situation like this, the page preview will show all the translate markup alongside the content. Clicking Save changes has a suprisingly useful effect, however: instead of saving, it will display a reduced view of the source text, helping you to find your error.
If you have blocks that only contain a single number, you can use the magic word {{formatnum:1234}} instead of a translate block. The number will automatically be formatted to non-Western styles, when needed. It is best to use the NOSEP parameter for whole numbers to prevent showing thousand separators as they can confuse readers. For decimal numbers it is best not to use NOSEP, because it would skip the localisation of the decimal separator.
Below is an example of a page prepared for translation. Notice the separation of the bulleted list and contents in a table.
{{TopMenu}}
{{Menu}}
{{Menu.Documentation}}
<languages/>
<translate>
== Hello World ==
* We must take the world as we find it
* When we are gone, let the world be flooded
* The world is as fools wish it to be
* It's a small world!
</translate>
<translate>
* Crows are black the world over
* He slipped once and all the world knew about it
* The world is like a market, the one does business and the other does none
* Huge though the world is, I always miss when I hit at it
</translate>
{| class="wikitable"
|-
| <translate>Cell content</translate>
|-
| {{sometemplate|<translate>Text content for a template</translate>}}
|-
| <bdi>{{formatnum:-1.10714871779409}}</bdi>
|-
| {{formatnum:110714871779409|NOSEP}}
|}
[[Special:MyLanguage/Development/Create_a_Hello_World_LibreOffice_extension|<translate>Tutorial on creating a Hello World extension</translate>]]
[[Category:Documentation]]
As table content can be annoying to prepare for translation, a helper script has been created. Use it by copying a wiki article into a local text file and giving the file name as an argument for the script. The file contents will be rewritten in place. The formatnum magic word will be applied for integer, floating point and complex numbers, if they are the only content in a table cell. The script depends on wikitextparser, regex and wcwidth packages. Click Expand to see the script.
#!/usr/bin/env python3
#
# uses the library https://github.com/5j9/wikitextparser
import sys
import wikitextparser as wtp
def is_float_or_complex(value):
try:
float(value)
return True
except:
return False
try:
complex(value)
return True
except:
return False
def wrap_translate(string):
if string.endswith(('}}', '</translate>')) or (len(string) < 2 and not string.isnumeric()):
return string
elif string.isnumeric() or is_float_or_complex(string):
if string.isnumeric():
format_end = '|NOSEP}}'
else:
format_end = '}}'
# Add bdi element so minuses will stay in place with RTL languages
if string[0] == '-':
return ' <bdi>{{formatnum:' + string + format_end + '</bdi> '
else:
return ' {{formatnum:' + string + format_end + ' '
else:
return ' <translate>' + string + '</translate> '
with open(sys.argv[1]) as f:
doc = f.read()
p = wtp.parse(doc)
tables = p.get_tables()
for t in tables:
if t.caption:
caption = t.caption.strip()
if len(caption) > 0:
t.caption = wrap_translate(caption)
for row in t.cells():
for cell in row:
c = cell.value.strip()
if len(c) > 0:
cell.value = wrap_translate(c)
with open(sys.argv[1], 'w') as f:
f.write(p.string)
Migrating old translated content to the current system
In the past, TDF wiki employed a translation process that used templates called OrigLang and Lang. The templates displayed a menu that linked the source page with the translated ones. You can find all the translated content that use the Lang template in this list: Special:WhatLinksHere/Template:Lang. Likewise, you can list the pages with OrigLang template.
Translate extension has a migration tool, which helps in moving already translated content to the new system. If the source and translation blocks match exactly, the migration will be very easy. Otherwise you have to cut and paste strings between the input boxes.
The migration goes as follows:
- After marking a page for translation, wait for some minutes, so the server will have processed the page
- Navigate to Special:PageMigration
- In the input box, input the language path of the page you want to migrate, like: Mypath/Mypage/de for some imaginary German translation
- Click the Import button
- Clean up the contents in the input boxes containing the old translations (for example, remove any useless menu templates)
- In the column with the translations, you can't leave empty or extra input boxes at the end, so delete them by clicking the trashcan icon next to them
- After you cleaned up and put everything in order, click the Save button
Remember that you can always view the old version of a translated page using its View history link and clicking on an old revision.
If you want to view the source of an old revision, copy its link from the history and visit the link after adding this to the end: &action=edit
Sometimes it does not make sense to use the migration tool. Leaving wiki markup outside the translate elements often confuses the tool. In these cases, the suggestions presented by the translation memory can be more useful.
Messages in the Sidebar
To translate the messages ”Get Involved” and ”Support LibreOffice!”, you need to send the translations to one of the wiki administrators. The others are system messages which are translated in upstream MediaWiki.
The translation of the additional Sidebar elements has been set up using the steps in the Translate extension help page for unstructured element translation. The administrators just need to visit Special:Translate/wiki-sidebar in order to translate the messages.
The ”Main Page” and ”Get Involved” links use the Special:MyLanguage prefix, which makes them direct to a translated page, if it is available.