[Mageia-discuss] Contributing Howto : need help

[Oliver Burger]

Hoyt Duff <hoytduff at gmail.com> schrieb am 2011-02-10
> The initial paragraph translates as:
> Mandriva Linux is a free operating system.
> ...
> To me, this does not fully explain the use of "free" in the context
> of Mandriva/Magia. This topic (free as in beer/free as in freedom)
> is always one of much debate in any FOSS community.  I propose:
> 
> Mandriva Linux is an operating system based primarily on Open
> Source code and licensed in a way to provide users and developers
> with greater freedom than proprietary, restricted code.  It can be
> modified and improved by its users and members of the community of
> this system. The spirit of this system is summarized in a
> manifesto.
I think that's a problem you get through the translation. I'm quite 
sure Thomas used the french word "libre" which doesn't have the 
distinction in "free as in beer/free as in freedom".
I'm afraid it's only in English and German where you do have that 
double meaning. As far as I know, the french word "libre" can be 
translated in Italian, Spanish and Portuguese in the same way without 
getting any double meaning.

Your workarround isn't reading that nicely. It shows that you were 
trying to work arround something.
I think it's the job of the different translation teams (and we do have 
an English team) to find the right words to describe what they really 
mean.
Perhaps - in English - it would be better to say:

Mandriva Linux is a free and open source operating system. It can be 
freely modified and improved by its users and members of the community 
of this system.

After all the "Free Software Foundation" doesn't call itself 
"Foundation for Software licensed in a way to..."

Oliver