Talk:Tech/News/Manual

MyLanguage whenever possible

I would prefer "[[mw:Special:MyLanguage/MediaWiki 1.22/wmf8|1.22wmf8]]" over the current "[[mw:MediaWiki 1.22/wmf8|1.22wmf8]]". Agree? PiRSquared17 (talk) 18:36, 13 July 2013 (UTC)

I didn't realise that these pages were actively translated, so that's why I placed the regular link. It doesn't seem like the current version receives any translations at the moment, but the previous one did, so I guess it won't hurt if we link to a language-dependant page, especially for people that read the newsletter some time after it goes public. odder (talk) 18:42, 13 July 2013 (UTC)

Actually, if you look at the difference between mw:MediaWiki_1.22/wmf9/pl and mw:MediaWiki_1.22/wmf9, the translation is much less useful. Hmm... PiRSquared17 (talk) 18:48, 13 July 2013 (UTC)

Ah well, you're right. I should've checked that myself instead of blindly trusting your judgement :-) Reverted my changes. odder (talk) 18:59, 13 July 2013 (UTC)

Maybe the best solution would be to make the MediaWiki.org content fully translatable, but I don't have time for that. Hence why I started this section, asking for comments, instead of doing it myself. :P PiRSquared17 (talk) 19:11, 13 July 2013 (UTC)

Then I guess this might not be the best page for a discussion like this, since neither myself nor Guillaume are involved in the creation of these pages; as far as I see, most of them are created by Sam. odder (talk) 19:14, 13 July 2013 (UTC)

currentcontentlanguage

"Replace any code that automatically creates dates with month and day written with characters and numbers in the English text." I notice this isn't being done, with the result that we on the Dutch Wikipedia see an English text with the dates rendered in Dutch. Please make sure to replace {CURRENTCONTENTLANGUAGE} before publishing. Tech News isn't translated into Dutch (we can all understand English perfectly fine), but we don't like to read texts that are part English and part Dutch. Woodcutterty (talk) 18:22, 24 July 2017 (UTC)

Ping User:Trizek (WMF) and User:Quiddity (WMF) too – don't forget this step when you distribute the newsletter.

It looks even worse in non-Latin scripts than in Dutch. Worst case, you go from LTR to RTL and then to LTR again. /Johan (WMF) (talk) 10:24, 25 July 2017 (UTC)

(My trick for trying to avoid forgetting this is to include mai.wikipedia.org in my test list. Easier to spot the missing step with a non-Latin script.) /Johan (WMF) (talk) 10:47, 25 July 2017 (UTC)

@Johan (WMF): I think it’s no longer needed since we use {{TRANSLATIONLANGUAGE}}. Probably you should try not replacing it next time and remove this item from the to do list if it works, just to make your life easier. —Tacsipacsi (talk) 22:01, 4 November 2020 (UTC)

Tacsipacsi: Thanks! I stopped doing so a few weeks ago and it seems to be working fine, yes. /Johan (WMF) (talk) 02:28, 5 November 2020 (UTC)

@Johan (WMF): Now I’ve checked the diff once again, and found out that in the previous line, it instructs you to copy the text to a text editor. I think that can be removed as well, as probably its whole purpose was to allow “substing” the dates. —Tacsipacsi (talk) 15:14, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

Glitches when using MyLanguage

This was occurred some time already. Is that possible to apply the MyLanguage before saving with the entire context? Because the entire content was sent to the one which triggers with the AbuseFilter then a Tag was tagged in with the revision. (Please see w::yue:Special:Diff/1225118 and w:yue:special:Diff/1223326 for example, those are tagged with the tag "Mandarin Wikipedia Terms") Shinjiman (talk) 03:51, 18 September 2018 (UTC)

The introduction and broken link to tr memory

@Quiddity (WMF), It's so painful that I need to reopen old issue and c&p the same old This is somesome and you should tell others... dialog. Why not embedded small script so that as what we do with page menu, and provide fixed set of message automatically fills in? No, not search translation memory each time as it should, but make it into a template; I was once advised to fill some code, but, non-sense that 20 language editions are pressed to repeat a task any bot can do.

IMHO It's at the top of the newsletter, and not necessarily needs a tech savvy to translate, which means tech person could find it harder to literally put into native language; for a novice translator, who normally start working from the top of translation window, is it not frightening / giving sense of shame for those unsure of their en skill; language gap is a trap if not comprehend the staring part of s document, they through away interest to write translation ; we can forget that it's harder to maintain enthusiasm if one is sure very few "peers" reside on their wiki; but still, please support those eager to inform their community about a resource, tied their hands with many request for translation, our NEWS letter is too good to miss. Let's act inclusively. --Omotecho (talk) 05:53, 27 February 2022 (UTC)

@Omotecho I agree, and we've requested changes to make some kind of improvement possible here. See phab:T272102 and phab:T288372 for some ongoing discussions about 2 possibilities. But both of those require programming, so all I can do is continue to regularly advocate for teams/devs to spend time on them (which I am doing).

I'm not a bot-operator, but that does seem like a reasonable 3rd suggestion (to create a bot that prefills the {{SALT}} wherever possible each week). I will ping @Tacsipacsi in case you have any insights into whether this would be a good option to pursue, at least as a short-term solution? I guess the next step would be to request help at Tech.

Thanks all, Quiddity (WMF) (talk) 20:24, 28 February 2022 (UTC)

@Quiddity (WMF), hi, I should confess that the idea of a bot is my ranting, pardon me. I am blushing to the rear of my head. Gomennasai. orz

Really, you offered me exactly how things have been supported among our community, and I can't thank you enough showing me the big picture. So the idea sounds simple, but it asks for programming, hmm.

If a bot patches up/mends to c&p that invitation hatnote each month for us humans, great! I imagine which would be cheap resource-wise, or does it mean some bot handler will have one more task to watch over? Does it sound feasible? If other translator would oppose and wish to c&p that invitation on each issue, I will discuss.

It's very supportive if somebody hosts such task writing/running a bot of this kind. I can input my personal view whenever you need it, allow it lay and low-tech and earthy. Gosh there are many things to learn and I like it making me feel young! -- Omotecho (talk) 23:55, 28 February 2022 (UTC)

@Quiddity (WMF): A bot doesn’t seem to be really the best solution here: we can’t run the bot beforehand, because we don’t know what languages will have manual translation a certain week (I don’t think just prefilling each language is a good idea, IMO half-English, half-translated messages are the worst); and we don’t want to run it afterwards, as a translator just having been finished the manual work might still see the untranslated text when they check whether everything’s okay. A gadget looks like a better solution: it runs exactly when the translator works, it may modify Special:Translate to disable/skip translation units that it can handle on its own (so that the user is aware of its existence), and it’s trivial to make it opt-out. The only drawbacks I can think of are that it may be quite complicated to create, which may not be worth it for a temporary solution, and my usual argument that the more convenient we make this with temporary hacks, the less likely it is that the real solution comes in the near future. —Tacsipacsi (talk) 01:42, 2 March 2022 (UTC)