Translation

[pixx1]

Hi there!

I am currently translating into German and have noticed that terms are mixed, to give one example:
The word "feature" is sometimes taken directly and sometimes translated as "object". Both terms are used in "real life", but I think you have to choose one variant. This leads to confusion, which is not necessary.

To keep it short, I think it is very important to have a small set of rules how QField, QFieldSync and QField Documentation should be translated. Of course, the best way is to follow the terminology of QGIS. Until now I could not find anything here. Did I miss something?

Is anyone else interested in this as well? I am open for discussions!

Greetings
pixx1

[m-kuhn]

Good idea, thanks for raising this.
Using the QGIS rules as guidelines sounds good, a link to that and more rules could live in a readme in this repository, or do you see a better approach?

[pixx1]

Great :)
I would take two approaches.

1. Readme
   A readme file would be great, as you could link to this file in Transifex from all three projects. All the basic stuff could go in there.

2. Glossary
   The glossary of Transifex should be filled with technical terms. Especially here I would strongly orientate on the word choice of QGIS.The translators will then also be warned if a word is translated incorrectly/inappropriately.

QGIS translation instructions are not very distinctive, but they contain a few important points:
https://docs.qgis.org/testing/en/docs/documentation_guidelines/do_translations.html#summary-rules-for-translation
I would just write a little guide in the next days and post it here. Since German is my native language, I would focus on that.If there are other special features in other languages, they can be easily added. :)

[m-kuhn]

Danke

[suricactus]

Hey @pixx1, let me share my experience with Bulgarian translations. I have faced exactly the same problem.

Even though QGIS in Bulgarian is far from translated, whatever is already present certainly needs a bit of coordination. What I found to be the best approach so far is to create a list translations of the terms in your language.

I coordinate these efforts with a few university teachers. Most of the translators are already using these terms, which is nice. QField is fully translated according these rules. Here is an example of our effort:
https://github.com/geographybg/awesome-gis/blob/main/i18n.md

[pixx1]

Hi!
@suricactus thanks for sharing your experience!

Things are still going on. I took a look at the current translations and based on his I created a draft. I also thought about the readme file again, maybe an entry in the wiki is better, because you can have sub pages and extend the document better there.
I saw that the QField project already has a wiki, maybe we can put it in there and link to it from the individual translation projects.

Translation Guide - Draft

This is a short guide how to translate QField, the QField documentation and QFieldSync in a consistent way. If something is missing, especially in the “language specific rules” chapter, please let us know.

Terms

How to translate technical terms is defined in the transifex glossary (ex. QField Documentation Glossary)

• The translations are based on the QGIS translations.
• The same applies to the UI terms. (save, load, ...)
• Please add missing terms and give examples in the notes :)
• acronyms should be translated (CRS -> KBS)

Phrasing/Wording

Stick to the original text as much as possible when translating without compromising readability/clarity. If something is difficult, raise a discussion.

Misc

• Only translate texts where you know the context.
• If you don’t understand the text or something is unclear, leave a comment in transifex
• As long as the demo projects have not (yet?) been translated, the names will stay in English.

Language specific rules

Language specific rules go here.

German

• It should be used the informal form. (duzen)