Community-driven Translation of Software and E-Content
Education Without Borders 2007
Asgeir Frimannsson <[email protected]>
My Background
• Internationalised from Birth• Passionate about Open Source Software• 2 years of localisation-related research at QUT– Red Hat Honours Scholarship in Software
Internationalisation 2004-2005
• 2nd Year of a PhD looking at Translation Reuse in Community-driven Localisation
The role of Language
• A strong binding factor for a culture and people• Example: The European Union– 23 official languages– EUR 1.1 billion annually in translation & interpreting
services (2005)– 1% of annual budget(!)
“If you talk to a man in a language he understands, that goes to his head. If you talk to him in his language, that goes to his heart”
- Nelson Mandela -
[Source: http://europa.eu/languages/en/document/59]
The role of Language
• Children Learn faster when taught in their mother tongue (Mehrotra, 1998, quoted in Brock-Utne, 2001)
• Technology is a key factor to the survival of a language (Crystal, 2000:143)
• “Digitally Endangered Languages” (Bailey, 2006)
– Languages with little or no presence in technology
Localisation & Translation
• Localisation: The process of modifying a product to a specific language, culture and region– Cultural Adjustments (e.g. colours, images,
etiquette)– Political Adjustments– Legal Adjustments
• The major component is Translation of textual content
Open Source Software
• Software that is free to modify and redistribute
• Developed by a global community of contributors– Strong Commercial Support
• Greatest Hits:– Mozilla Firefox– OpenOffice.org– Linux Distributions
Open Source Software
• Great for developing nations!– Can be used on cheaper, old hardware– No licensing costs– Very Customizable
[Source: http://www.gobiernodecanarias.org/medusa/]
Community-driven Translation
“The process through which a community may contribute their language and cultural knowledge to enable localisation of a product to their region and language”
• Originated in the translation of open source software
• Now practiced by some large vendors– Microsoft, Google
The Community• Native Language Speakers• A representative in a local community that sees a
need.– Often not the typical User of the Product
• Participants– Governments– Universities– Non-Government Organisations– Resourceful Individuals– Localisation Service Providers(!)
The Evolution
• Translation initially performed by developers– Tightly integrated with the development process– Limited tool support
• Open Source Software has since enjoyed tremendous success– Translation driven by end-users and vendors– Work being done to make the translation process
more user friendly– Translator-friendly tools
Example: Rosetta and Pootle
• Web-based translation systems– Allows contributors to translate open source
applications using their web browser
http://translations.launchpad.net/ http://www.wordforge.org
Current Limitations
• Translation is a ridiculously technical task– Steep Learning Curve– Better tool support needed
• Operating System Support for New Languages– Fonts, Input Methods, Keyboard Layouts– Date and Number formats
• A few people do a lot of the work– Burnouts
Community-driven Translation
• The Internet is enabling creativity, communication and sharing like never before– YouTube, Flickr, MySpace, Blogs, Wikis– Easy to Learn, Easy to Use, Easy to Share– According to Time Magazine, [You] are the person
of the year• Can we channel this innovation to the benefit
of community-driven translation?– Software, Educational Material, Web content
[2.0]