Re: Arabeyes Translation Teams.

["Djihed Afifi" <djihedlists at googlemail dot com>]

I'm very delighted by the responses so far :-) keep the ideas flowing.

First, I wanna make it dead clear that I in no way intend to stab at
any Arabeyes member, past or present members. I'm humbly trying to
voice my opinion out of a desire to get things working. Obviously, I'm
the least knowledgeable of you guys and some of you thrill me with the
work you have done.


> I agree. We may have been keeping the level of entry a little too high
> for most translators, but it was not intentional. We still have a lack
> of enough translation standards, and not having this set of rules to
> follow makes it harder for any newcomer who has just started
> translating.
>
> Having said that, I think we should note that we get around 1 new
> translator signing up each week. And the system duly sends a welcome
> message with an explanation of the first steps that should be made to
> become a translator. The very first step, the zeroth step if you will,
> is that a translator should at least make a post on a mailing list
> with a simple introduction of himself.
>
> The vast majority do not make that first step. I am not sure why or if
> there is some kind of repellent to newcomers that is inherent in the
> joining process.

It's clear maths: More obstacles = more people turned away, whatever
the obstacle is. Statistics has it that the average page viewing time
by a newcomer is no more than a few seconds: After that, whether they
return or not depends on their impression. If people make the first
step by reaching out with their hand, we should make the system
friendly enough to let them feel they are already involved.

> Although I would have disagreed with in the past maybe it is time for
> a change. So, if no one has any objections, lets go about seeing HOW
> we can review the translation process.

We have many options here. First of all, squashing or squeezing the
many layers before getting a task assigned to a new comer. Let them
learn as they experience. Eventually, they will pick up skills left
and right.

Secondly, by considering tools that make it inherently easier to contribute, eg:
1) Pootle and the whole web translation initiative
2) We should probably consider repackaging poedit with the Arabic
technical dictionary being shipped by default. Same for KBabel
etc...


> I agree, and as far as I know, RTFM was never the attitude of anyone
> here on Arabeyes, at least not intentionally. We always welcomed any
> questions and we always will, ISA.

Again, I wanna make it clear that I was in no way referring to anybody
with my remarks. I wanted to make it clear that we, as a small
community, should show a friendly side to newcomers. I owe so much to
those who helped me at my start, like Youssef Chahibi, and Nadim.


> No worries. We do _not_ have a lack of new people signing up. We have
> maybe a lack of people signing up and then following through. We could
> try a bit of hand-holding at first to make the most of every new
> sign-up.

Abdulaziz, I would like to express my delight with your citing of past
experiences. They are very valuable, please fill us in whenever you
notice something that has been discussed/tried before.


Djihed