[Freeciv] request for freeciv-i18n mailing list

[Reinier Post <rp@xxxxxxxxxx>]

  Dear arch.freeciv.org owner,

[Cc: the freeciv mailing list]

Freeciv translators and myself (co-webmaster) have been discussing
the need to discuss technical translation issues with Freeciv.

Three sets of Freeciv documents exist that require translation:

  1) the user-visible text in the Freeciv source code
  2) the text in the doc/ subdirectory of the Freeciv source distribution
  3) the www.freeciv.org website

Some of the possible topics:

  1) for the Freeciv code, gettext is used, so every new translator
     needs to learn how it works and how it is applied in Freeciv
  2) for the doc/ files, some conventions have been discussed on freeciv-dev
     regarding how to organise everything
  3) for the website, there are some conventions that help signal the need
     to update a translation, and there are some unresolved issues, mainly
     that of compound documents such as the homepage, downloads page, projects
     page, screenshots pages, etc., where the units of translation are
     items on the page rather than the page as a whole; these pages are
     difficult to translate at the moment

There are over 10 active translators.  Every month or two a new translator
appears, with an offer to start a translation or update an existing one.

Sometimes, the issues above are discussed on freeciv-dev, but that is a
high-volume list, and most translators are not involved in Freeciv development.
So it would be good to have a separate forum specifically for translation 
issues.

New translators would also be helped if they have a mailing list with advice
on how to set up CVS access for Freeciv translation.  The information on the
website is not very well organised.

I have taken a poll with the current translators and the majority prefers
to have a single mailing list at arch.freeciv.org for 1, 2 and 3 combined.
If the volume becomes a problem, a second list can always be created.

The list would not be intended to discuss Freeciv nations:
they belong to freeciv-data.

I'm not sure if the list should accept attachments.
The other lists have moderators now, I think, to decide on questionable
postings; perhaps one of the translators will moderate this list.

  Thank you in advance,

-- 
Reinier Post