SLINT - The Slackware Internationalization Project
 

On the first page (message.txt) the user will see:

===> Installation in other languages: press [F4] <===

On (corresponding) page f4.txt, he or she will have to type a two digit code to choose his or her preferred language (locale + keyboard).

Only French is ready at the moment, but I wish to present already a table with the correspondence code => language
(the code will stay blank until the language be available.)

Assuming that we will concentrate on European languages to begin with (not sure yet how many glyphs I can display on a Linux console), my question is:

Which locales should I include in the table?

Please answer only if:
(1) You are, or personally know someone who would be interested in installing Slackware in another language than US English and/or
(2) You would consider volunteering to translate the messages in your native language or know someone who would.

EDIT Please indicate in your answer:
(a) the locale (of course!) in the form ll[_TT] (as 'de' or 'es' or 'nl_NL' or 'pt_BR')
(b) your kernel keymap
(c) your X keyboard layout (+ variant if appropriate), especially if it differs from the keymap.

FYI the catalog of messages to be translated includes 1007 messages atm and that won't change a lot.

PS we speak about European languages. That of course includes locales like pt_BR.

PPS A POT file is appended *for your information only*. You are *not* expected to translate anything now (see post #3)

PPPS I uploaded a modified POT file because the previous version mentioned that it was in the public domain. I am not competent in rights management but maybe I am not allowed to state that. I apologize if it was a mistake. More generally I will have to check this kind of things with Pat.

I will volunteer to do a dutch translation (nl_NL). I use keyboard mapping "nl.map".

Eric

That was a fast answer indeed, thanks Eric!

For those interested I'll append the POT file to my first message.

To all: don't be scared if you don't know what that is and don't hurry to translate: I'll have to organize things a bit and provide relevant documentation, instructions and procedures first. Don't expect that to be released today, it will be in a few weeks (I will request advises from Pat and some major Slackware contributors before making public anything but the POT file).

Oh, and if you answer please tell as well which kernel keymap + X keyboard layout you use for a given locale.

I volunteer for the italian translation (it.map, it_IT).

Thanks!

I volunteer for the Polish one (pl.map, pl_PL)

Thanks!

I volunteer to beta-test sycamorex's translation :P

I'll do Indonesian (id_ID)

I will volunteer to do a russian translation. Locale is ru_RU.UTF-8, keymap ruwin_ct_sh-UTF-8.map

i think we could set up a pottle server for this.. it should make contribution easier and it can be done by a lot of contributors for each language

Before applying to translate to Pt can someone explain what is required to do the translation?

Thanks to elsesmod, willysr and flank'er.

@Willy: Thanks for your suggestion about pottle. All suggestions are welcome, including tools which could facilitate communications and teamwork, as Pottle (or Transifex, used by Salix).

For now I will record them and in a few days set up some specific means of communication between interested people (ML, wiki, forum, whatever). I'll just be careful not to generate to much administrative work and prevent spam as much as possible (for the records I had to go as far as close inscriptions in a forum I administrate). Advises are welcome here too.

That said I intend to set some rather strict requirements about translation work (more on that later).

About tools: lokalize is included in Slackware and is pretty handy, poedit is good too but is not included (available through slackbuilds.org, though).

Yes, thank you for asking. Here are the requirements.

These requirements will vary according to the roles of the person. Two roles will have to be fulfilled:
(1) translator
(2) translation team leader

Of course the same individual can play both roles and do all the job for a given language, but in any case there should be one and only one team leader per locale (who can change overtime, of course).

Draft requirements for translators:

• Be *really* fluent in the relevant locale
• Understand technical vocabulary used in the POT file appended to the first post of this thread
• Preferably, be able to read and understand simple shell scripts
• Be willing to cooperate with others and accept to have his or her work reviewed by peers, including of course the team leader

Draft requirements for team leaders:

• Be able to use the gettext tools to manage catalogs of messages (I will provide specific documentation, instructions and a custom toolbox to help doing that)
• Be willing to follow the requirements and procedures (which will be finalized with the team leaders)
• Be able to find his/her way in the installer if possible
• Have some experience in shell scripting

Oh, and I almost forgot: translator's job will be to translate messages included the POT file, using a specialized PO editor (lokalize or poedit) or *maybe* a web based editor.

How to communicate?
 

Good news:
(1) the internationalization (and localization in French) is complete for following Slackware editions:
- Slackware-13.37
- Slackware64-13.37
- Slackware-14.0
- Slackware64-14.0
(2) The same messages catalog will be used for all of these and (with a very minor update) for incoming:
- Slackware-14.1
- Slackware64-14.1

To communicate between all interested and avoid the hassle of maintaining an infrastructure for that, I'm considering having the project hosted by sf.net, berlios.de or some other platform but have no experience doing that, so I would appreciate your advises. This would be for a forum, a wiki and a mailing list, as I can take care of hosting the few project files myself.

Volunteers still interested to participate in translation, please confirm that by sending me an email or via a PM.

We'll need testers as well, but I'll call for volunteers for that when communications infrastructure will be ready.

TIA

PS Project's name is "slint" for "SLackware INTernationalization".