[markus_GE]

<Admin comment 2020-06-08>
Thread moved here from the private ORTS development forum so it can benefit a wider range of translators who do not necessarily have access to the private forum.

I recently did a major review of the German translation, re-checking almost every translation, changing some, adding a few, etc. I then looked into the statistics at https://translations.launchpad.net/or a few days later, and saw German still has 205 untranslated entries.
I went to investigate this further, and opened each PO file in POedit and wrote down the statistics of each file (shown in the bar at the bottom of the window). I then tried to compile meaningful data from it:

• Altogether, there are 143 untranslated and 120 fuzzy strings in the 7 translation (*.PO) files (as of today, though there were no changes since my last great change, according to the log). That means, something in launchpad´s data in wrong.
• Taking an average values for the "percent translated" shown in POedit, the German translation currently is ~92.6% complete.

That means in detail:

• 4 file are 100% translated, without any "fuzzy" translations pending review. However, these include the updater, ORTS.formats, and ORTS.common, of which no file has more than 50 entries and in Common, most translations are equal to the source string (it´s just unit names / abbreviations, like kg or m² etc.)
• 2 files are nearly completely translated, with no more than 10 strings in total (both files combined) pending review
• 2 files are 71% and 75% translated. However, it is unknown to me if these "percent translated" take "fuzzy" translations as translated or as not translated. In the points mentioned above, this doesn´t make much of a difference, however in the case of the file only translated to about three quarters, the combined amount of more than 110 fuzzy strings could make quite a difference.

Looking into the translation files more closely, and also quickly checking in-program, I found this:

• The core program´s translation is read in most areas I would expect a user to look at frequently - that is, the main menu, the options window, the resume / replay menu, and most (I have not yet checked, if it is all) GUI elements of runactivity.exe
• One feature of runactivity.exe is definitely lacking translations, which is the extended debug HUD pages (the main HUD page is fully translated)
• TrackViewer should be in an acceptable state of translation as per the strings found in the GUI and in the source of the Contrib PO file - however, none of the strings translated in Contrib.PO show up as translated in TrackViewer. That is to say, when TrackViewer is started from the Tools menu of the ORTS main menu (ORTS is set to German), TrackViewer comes up in English, even though the translations are there in the PO file.
• I don´t know to which extent the other Contrib programs are translated. The activity editor doesn´t seem to be ready yet, so we have not put a great effort into translating it. The content manager and data collector seem not to be translatable.
• There seem to be a few duplicate source strings, e.g. in Menu\de.po we have both "Delete of invalid saves" and "Delete all invalid saves in Open Rails". As can be seen, some of these source strings aren´t even correct in English. I have marked such strings as fuzzy throughout the German translation, and added comments regarding duplicate or wrong source strings (among other things). The comments are all kept in English.

Altogether, a bit of work remains to do. My main concern currently are the extended HUD pages, with the cryptic abbreviations used therein. I will post another topic inquiring about such unclear strings in general (not limited to the HUD). TrackViewer also seems to be a problem, though I don´t think, I can solve the problem of it not reading the translation.

Cheers, Markus

[James Ross]

 markus_GE, on 21 April 2015 - 02:03 AM, said:

I went to investigate this further, and opened each PO file in POedit and wrote down the statistics of each file (shown in the bar at the bottom of the window). I then tried to compile meaningful data from it:

• Altogether, there are 143 untranslated and 120 fuzzy strings in the 7 translation (*.PO) files (as of today, though there were no changes since my last great change, according to the log). That means, something in launchpad´s data in wrong.
• Taking an average values for the "percent translated" shown in POedit, the German translation currently is ~92.6% complete.

Launchpad lets you see the numbers for each translation unit and the list of untranslated entries in each unit so it should be clear where you and it are not in agreement.

One possibility is that the po files for German haven't been updated from the pot files recently, and therefore do not have the latest list of original strings. Another is that the po files have retained strings no longer in the pot files (I believe this is a PO Edit option when updating), which Launchpad is not counting in its stats. I don't know what the answer is but the example links I gave above means it should be possible to figure out.

 markus_GE, on 21 April 2015 - 02:03 AM, said:

Altogether, a bit of work remains to do. My main concern currently are the extended HUD pages, with the cryptic abbreviations used therein. I will post another topic inquiring about such unclear strings in general (not limited to the HUD). TrackViewer also seems to be a problem, though I don´t think, I can solve the problem of it not reading the translation.

The Track Viewer issue is probably just it not selecting the locale on startup, or something going wrong when it does.

The contributed programs are meant as a mixture of useful utilities and work-in-progress components, and are not really meant for general use, so translation is definitely an optional extra in terms of coding them IMHO.

The extended HUD is similar, in that it is only intended for developers understanding the program workings and, as such, localisation there is actually a hindrance (I'm not even sure we should be using dynamic units there).

Outside of the extended HUD and contributed apps though, everything should be localisable.

[captain_bazza]

A Cockney rhyming translation would make interesting reading, James?




Cheers Bazza.

[gpz]

 James Ross, on 21 April 2015 - 01:44 PM, said:

The extended HUD is similar, in that it is only intended for developers understanding the program workings and, as such, localisation there is actually a hindrance (I'm not even sure we should be using dynamic units there).

I think it depends on which extended HUD page you are talking about. There are pages that are used only by program developers indeed, but other pages are used also by content creators (e.g. locomotive page), and other pages are used also by players (e.g. braking page). The latter two groups of pages do need full localisation support, while the first group may not. But there is a need for dual metric-imperial unit display just among the pure group of program developers too. So I'm not sure there is a single page, where dynamic units can be omitted, with only metric units displayed.

[James Ross]

 gpz, on 21 April 2015 - 10:17 PM, said:

I think it depends on which extended HUD page you are talking about. There are pages that are used only by program developers indeed, but other pages are used also by content creators (e.g. locomotive page), and other pages are used also by players (e.g. braking page). The latter two groups of pages do need full localisation support, while the first group may not. But there is a need for dual metric-imperial unit display just among the pure group of program developers too. So I'm not sure there is a single page, where dynamic units can be omitted, with only metric units displayed.

Content creators might be the exception, but there should be no reason for normal players to use the extended HUD. The entire design is such that they don't need to use it. Why do they need to use it? I certainly never look at the braking page and I don't want other people to need to look at it except for debugging.

[markus_GE]

 James Ross, on 21 April 2015 - 01:44 PM, said:

Launchpad lets you see the numbers for each translation unit and the list of untranslated entries in each unit so it should be clear where you and it are not in agreement. [...]

I could see the more detailed listing of German translations, but when clicking the second link, I am redirected to a page entitled "Translations licensing by Markus Gelbmann", that has no info whatsoever on the actual translation.

I´ll see later how the facts and figures of the first link compare to my statistics.
<h1></h1>

 James Ross, on 21 April 2015 - 01:44 PM, said:

[...] One possibility is that the po files for German haven't been updated from the pot files recently, and therefore do not have the latest list of original strings. Another is that the po files have retained strings no longer in the pot files (I believe this is a PO Edit option when updating), which Launchpad is not counting in its stats. I don't know what the answer is but the example links I gave above means it should be possible to figure out. [...]

I always update the translation from the POT files before doing any editing. The only difference is, when a file is already 100% translated. I then check the number of strings before doing an update from POT, and after doing the update. If the numbers compare, I discard the "changes done". Maybe I´ll try with saving said "changes".

The PO files definitely have strings, that are duplicate in meaning, but used only in one location in the program, AFAIK (example already mentioned: "Delete of invalid saves" VS "Delete all invalid saves in Open Rails"). I couldn´t find any option to turn off keeping of strings no longer in the POT file, and the POedit help is of no aid here either.

 James Ross, on 21 April 2015 - 01:44 PM, said:

[...] The Track Viewer issue is probably just it not selecting the locale on startup, or something going wrong when it does. [...]

Probably, because the translations are there, I´m 100% sure.

 James Ross, on 21 April 2015 - 01:44 PM, said:

[...] The contributed programs are meant as a mixture of useful utilities and work-in-progress components, and are not really meant for general use, so translation is definitely an optional extra in terms of coding them IMHO. [...]

Since TrackViewer is currently the only way to create paths for ORTS without the MSTS tools, I´d deem it an important part of ORTS, as without it, neither activities nor timetables can be created (without MSTS, anyway). That´s an IMHO, of course. It´s up to those who know how to code, to fix it or not, depending on how important this is found to be.

 James Ross, on 21 April 2015 - 01:44 PM, said:

[...] The extended HUD is similar, in that it is only intended for developers understanding the program workings and, as such, localisation there is actually a hindrance (I'm not even sure we should be using dynamic units there). [...]

OK, so do you recommend leaving the extended HUD untranslated? I´d think, at least the locomotive, train and brake pages are quite likely to be used by players.

 James Ross, on 21 April 2015 - 01:44 PM, said:

[...] Outside of the extended HUD and contributed apps though, everything should be localisable. [...]

No problems there, other than one or the other string which´s meaning is not entirely clear.


Altogether, after reading your post and replying to it, I think I should first try to clear the dis-accordance between the launchpad translation stats and the POedit stats. That should get the German translation rid of at least a few strings, and thus should make it easier to find proper meanings for the remaining strings.

Cheers, Markus

[markus_GE]

 James Ross, on 22 April 2015 - 12:29 AM, said:

Content creators might be the exception, but there should be no reason for normal players to use the extended HUD. The entire design is such that they don't need to use it. Why do they need to use it? I certainly never look at the braking page and I don't want other people to need to look at it except for debugging.

Sorry for the late reply, I started my above post before you added yours, but didn´t finish it until 4 hours later - night duty had taken it´s toll on me.

I use the brake HUD when shunting / switching, as there currently is no indication of brake hose and angle cock state available elsewhere - a very important use, IMHO.

Cheers, Markus

[James Ross]

 markus_GE, on 22 April 2015 - 03:51 AM, said:

I could see the more detailed listing of German translations, but when clicking the second link, I am redirected to a page entitled "Translations licensing by Markus Gelbmann", that has no info whatsoever on the actual translation.

Hmm, maybe it needs project admin permissions because we don't allow people to translate from within Launchpad itself. If you have any questions on the per-unit numbers I'm happy to try and figure out the differences myself.

I'll also have a look for the orphaned strings.

 markus_GE, on 22 April 2015 - 03:51 AM, said:

Since TrackViewer is currently the only way to create paths for ORTS without the MSTS tools, I´d deem it an important part of ORTS, as without it, neither activities nor timetables can be created (without MSTS, anyway). That´s an IMHO, of course. It´s up to those who know how to code, to fix it or not, depending on how important this is found to be.

Yeah, this is a low priority. Contributed programs can be localisable but it's not a requirement.

Just the other day I did set the order of the units in Launchpad to be priority order, with "contrib" last as you'd expect. Not so useful for German as you've done such a good job but should help other localisers prioritise.

 markus_GE, on 22 April 2015 - 04:42 AM, said:

I use the brake HUD when shunting / switching, as there currently is no indication of brake hose and angle cock state available elsewhere - a very important use, IMHO.

Okay, would you mind reporting a bug with text and a screenshot highlighting the things you're using when shunting / switching? If we can avoid people needing the extended HUD, we should. :sign_sorry:

[markus_GE]

An update: I found POedit´s functionality to "Purge deleted translations" and applied that to every German PO file, after updating all of them from the POT files. I kept (saved) all of the changes done.

Here is a table comparing the counts from POedit right after the update with those from launchpad (I did not commit the changes, though). The figures don´t seem to have become more correct:



So what now?

Cheers, Markus

This post has been edited by markus_GE: 22 April 2015 - 06:07 AM
Reason for edit:: Add better table

[James Ross]

 markus_GE, on 22 April 2015 - 05:56 AM, said:

Here is a table comparing the counts from POedit right after the update with those from launchpad (I did not commit the changes, though). The figures don´t seem to have become more correct:

I don't think Launchpad's "Need review" is showing the fuzzy items; it looks to me like it is identifying strings where the translated value has changed and it is expecting someone to approve the change. It makes more sense when translations are done through Launchpad, I think, but I'll confirm what's going on when I get a chance and approve them if I can.

I will try and figure out the large difference in untranslated strings for "RunActivity" though.