2010/12/17 Wolfgang Bornath
<molch.b@googlemail.com>
Hi all,
as proposed during the last i18n team meeting we need to summarize the
various workflows of i18n contributors to be reported to
sysadmin-Team. The aim of this mail discussion is to provide sysadmin
team with 2 or 3 scenarios for the workflow (online and offline).
First we have to keep in mind that at least one translator of each
language has to have commit permission. But in larger groups it may be
better to have not more than 2 or 3 translators with commit
permission, this enforces collaboration. :)
I will start from my personal (though not very large) experience with
Mandriva po translating, give a rough overview of the options for
mageia and then would like your comments, ideas, corrections, etc..
In Mandriva we used to checkout svn (anonymous or with key), worked on
the po file with whatever tool we preferred and then
- committed back (if permitted)
- or presented the file to a local team for proofreading and then to
be committed (the best way)
- or sent the po file to somebody with commit access to be committed
The good part was: you could work with whatever tool you preferred,
you could work wherever you wanted without the need of a net
connection during work.
The bad part was: the risk of conflicts when 2 or more were working on
the same file, nobody knew what others were doing at the same time.
If the team work was really working then only one or some dedicated users had right to commit, so the chance to clash was very little. And probably even unwise distribution of work (more than one person working on same file) was quite rare...
Now we have several possible scenarios.
1. Using Transifex online and offline
Given the fact that transifex is able to use the svn tree, you can
work online in transifex. This is collaboration of several people on
the same file until the file is translated and proofread. Only after
that it will be committed.
If you are offline you can still get the file from tranisfex,
translate it and upload to transifex again. I don't know how this
actually works with Transifex. We will know more about this after
obgr_seneca and somebody else had a look at Transifex and report back.
I've heard Transifex has now online collaboration interface but never used that. From the translator viewpoint Transifex was earlier just some kind of central where you could see which files need working, could download them, translate with tool of your choice and then submit it back uploading translated file (or probably sending it to the person who had commit right - I'm not sure because I was one-man-team :-) )
But if Transifex has now online tool, too, that's better. Only problem may be with rights - probably it'd be not very wise to let have commit all people. Is there possibility that one or two people have commit right, others only suggesting rights or something?
2. Using svn offline
This could be done the same way as described from the Mandriva times.
Mind, that we do not have to use Transifex, it is not a "must". It is
only an option but a good one, so I've heard.
I think it's good to have an alternative - and there may be people who for whatever reason don't trust or don't want to use web-based tools...
3. Tools
If you are working online you can use Transifex, if you work offline
you can use any tool you want (lokalize, poedit, etc.)
Waiting for your comments
--
wobo