[Translators-l] Transcom newsletter: The Babylonians #2 (2006/11)

[Aphaia]

A mini-update from Translation subcommittee (former Promotion and
Translation subcommitee, see below also).

The same content is also available on meta,
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Communications_subcommittees/Trans/Newsletter/2006-11

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Welcome to issue 1 of The Babylonian, the WMF translation subcommittee
update from the month of November, 2006.  Thanks to all who cooperated
on the latest translation including Wikimania, Board Election and
Foundation website update.

=== What's up ===
i.  Coming events
ii. Requests ongoing
iii. News
iv. Thank yous

=== Coming events ===
/ * Transcom Open Meeting */
* We Traslation Subcommittee will hold a public meeting on November 5,
22 UTC at our IRC channel, #wikimedia-translation.
** Agenda: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Communications_subcommittees/Trans/meeting
** IRC Channel: irc://irc.freenode.com/wikimedia-translation

=== Requests ongoing ===
/* WMF website: About Wikimedia */
* Original: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/About_Wikimedia
* Now available in: Français
* Requested in: Deutsch, Español, Italiano, 日本語, Русский, 中文 ...
* Workplace: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Translation_requests/WMF/About_Wikimedia
(under construction)
* Description: General information about Wikimedia Foundation. Latest
English version was issued in this month.

/* WMF website: Current staff */
* Original: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Current_staff
* Now working in: Français, Español, 日本語, 中文, Suomi
* Requested for starting in: Deutsch, Italiano, Nederlands, Português,
Русский ...
* Workplace: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Translation_requests/WMF/Current_staff
* Description: Wikimedia Foundation employees. Translation release
date is scheduled on November 1.

/* Meta: [[m:Translation]] */
* Original: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Translation
* Now available in:  English, 日本語
* Requested in: Français, Español, Русский, 中文, Deutsch ...
* Workplace: each language version page. You can reach them from the
top of the original document.
* Description: General introduction for translators who are willing to
help Wikimedia project. It may be helpful for all translators. Lately
the English version was broadly updated.

You can find other requests, new and old, on http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/TR

=== News ===
* [[Transcom]] is launched
*: Translation subcommittee (Transcom) is now caring for Translation
related to Wikimedia Foundation. It is one of five subcommittee of
Communication committee and created in August, split from former
Promotion & Translation subcommittee, which issued the first issue of
this newsletter. Current members are Aphaia (Naoko), Sabine
(User:SabineCretella) and Jd (Jean-Denis).

* [[Translation coordinators per language]]
*: A team of volunteering coordinators is now launched. Translation
Coordinators per language (TCPL) are approved by and expected to work
with Transcom. Instead Transcom, TCPLs, if exists for a given
language, will oversee the translation process in their own
language(s), more deeply involved into their language community. See
further http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/TCPL.

* [[Transbabel]]
*: Transbabel template (formally Translator template in the following
language combinations) helps you to show your interest to the
community. Each template shows a language set of two in ISO 639-3 code
with information about source and destination of your translation; for
example translator eng->fra means a translator who put English into
French language. You can find other translators using it.

* Zocky's machine - "translation request" templates
*: Another innovation. User:Zocky created a support system on meta to
help translation, specially to organize a massive translation request
into numbers. It reduces workload of translation coordinators greatly
and helps translators finding where to work with well designed
"status" feature. Recently it seems to become de facto standard of
translation organizing tool on meta.wikimedia.org. The usage could be
seen at [[Election results 2006]].
(http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Election_results_2006)

* WMF website overhaul
*: Wikimedia Foundation website has not been well maintained at some
pages. A massive overhaul attempt has begun to improve this situation.
 Outdated translation pages were turned into redirect as interim
remedy. We hope to set them up again in a foreseeable future. Also we
are going to provide translations in major languages for all major
contents (See the below, "Core lang list revised).

* Wikimania 2007 website is launched
*: The official website for Wikimania 2007 was launched. Hsiang-Tai
(User:Htchien) will oversee communications for conference, including
translation, in general. No translation requests are found currently.
In past two conferences, requests came in the midst of February. You
are invited to join relevant discussions at wikimania-l at wikimedia.org.

* Transcom activities
*: Besides regular coordination of requests and recruiting people,
Transcom has worked to aim to clarify its work flow and prepare the
condition which will allow us to work as efficiently as possible.
*:
** Core lang list is revised
**: [[Communications subcommittees/Trans/core langs|Core language
list]] is a list of languages whose translations the current Transcom
concentrates its coordination activity. Core lang list is determined
considering several aspects, including the size of speaker populations
and the activity of its Wikimedia project. It is its first revision
since the list was created in April 2006. The major change is addition
of Russian language due to its Wikimedia project activities; Russian
Wikipedia is now over 100,000 articles and Russian language is
spoken/understood in several countries in East Europe and Central
Asia.  The list will be periodically reviewed and revised, if
necessarily.
**:
** Transcom Goals 2006/Q4 and more
**: Transcom has now trimester goals:(goals description). Having goals
aims to make it clear what Transcom is concerned and to help Transcom
work efficiently, to concentrate the biggest needs. In 2007, Transcom
will have goals in two terms: annual and trimester.

=== Thank yous ===
From this June to October, many translation efforts have been made for
disseminating information across the project, hence the world.
Wikimania 2006 websites had contents in over 10 language, including
Azerbaijani and Turkish language, when the conference was opened.
Board Election held in the early of this fall was informed in over 30
languages and its result are still being translated into new languages
weekly even after one month passed. Many editors worked on translation
and some of them motivated other editors to join the task on their
local communities. And the Foundation website: responding to the need
of overhaul, many translators are involved, both veteran editors and
newly participating ones.

As well translators, we Transcom would like to appreciate people who
are working on helpful tools, editors who create new version of
Transbabel, who improve templates used on translated materials.
Specially we would like thank Zocky for his invention, a system of
templates (sometimes called "Zocky's machine") for creating and
maintaining translation platform for a particular topic. He created it
for Wikimania translation and it was proved very helpful for
organizing translation in occasion of Election result release, and now
for Wikimedia:Current_staff translation. Transcom will apply this new
system for other translation gradually.

Thank you for your continuous cooperation, it is always our joy to
work with you!

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Editor(s): Aphaia
E-mail: translation AT wikimedia DOT org
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* This is a newsletter of the Translation subcommittee, aiming to help
translation effort related to the Wikimedia Foundation.  Its content
is released into the public domain.  It is temporarily called The
Babylonian; after the multlilingual nature of sharing and promoting
the projects. Other name ideas are welcome!
* Editors of this newsletter are subcommittee members though,
contributing as individual volunteers and only. This newsletter is not
a publication of the Wikimedia Foundation, and any statement on this
newsletter shouldn't be taken as official statement from the
Foundation. Submissions or notes about related initiatives are welcome
on the talk page:
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Communications_subcommittees/Trans