ELL: Q: What minority language software would you like to see?

Mon Oct 1 09:45:35 UTC 2001

I arrive late to the discussion. Someone forwarded me Chuck´s initial msg, then I subscribed and read the posts in the archives...

I am particularly interested in web application l10n and website l10n. I work on that at Code & Syntax, a Basque company, http://www.codesyntax.com

We work with a free web application server, ZOPE, that we use to create websites and we are trying to do i18n within Zope, so we can build multilingual resources.

We are Basque and we are working with a Catalan-speaking computer genius... This guy has created a framework to create multilingual websites and web applications, and mostly we are users and bug-checkers with it, so merits belong to him (Juan David Ibañez Palomar, http://sourceforge.net/projects/lleu/ ).

The Localizer framework is quite complex, and its becoming more and more complete. It has a content-negotiation utility, so browsers with a given language preference get the correct language version directly. It also has a framework to manage different content for language versions, and a very interesting tool to manage interface strings and messages. It can also handle issues like date formats, and processing functionalities that may vary from locale to locale.

How does it work. Well, here is a simple application we have built: the zOpen Directory.
Intro: http://www.codesyntax.com/Services/Zopendir
Demo: http://www.codesyntax.com/zOpenDirectory

This lets you integrate a whole directory-search engine in your website. It just parses the content from a remote open directory (ODP, http://dmoz.org) and recreates it in your site.

As content is remote, we don´t care about content localization. We cared about interface messages. And we built a 7-language version.

The tool is ready for adding languages. Localizer has an import-export feature so I can send a file to a translator or native speaker of a given language (no need to be computer-savvy), then get it back and just install it.

Let´s make a try, if anyone wishes: I have put a .doc document with the strings needed for zOpen Directory (including english and spanish strings, so you can have an idea about string translations).

Download the file from http://www.codesyntax.com/Luistxo/ell_locale.doc  . If anyone sends me back the file in a given language (fill the empty column), I will just add it to the demo site, and, there it will be, a localised website...

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The strings involved in this zOpen Directory product are plain and simple, yet Localizer also works with variable strings like

Hallados %(results)d elementos tras haber buscado <b>%(all)s</b>
Searched for  <b>%(all)s</b>  and found %(results)d elements
<b>%(all)s</b> bilatuz aurkitutako elementuak: %(results)d

Tricky issues like localized date formats can be handled also. You can see date-handling at our company site www.codesyntax.com

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Now, zOpen Directory is not the product I would develop for a native american languages, for instance. It´s useful in Basque cause it can serve Basque content, but there is no Hualapai content on the ODP (dmoz.org).

Yet, there is another tool we are working with right now: Squishdot (http://www.squishdot.org). This is a weblog machine, much like Slashcode (the tool behind http://www.slashdot.org), Scoop (the one behind http://www.kuro5hin.org), or PHP-Nuke. Squishdot is just the weblog for Zope. Some sites made with it:
http://dot.kde.org
http://www.locombia.org/
http://www.terminalcity.com

I think that a localized weblog in a minority language makes much sense. Why? A weblog is a utility where users create content. It´s a tool with creativity potential. It can be a discussion forum or a news site or a Q&A´s website... It´s a proactive tool. And for minority languages, I think that as important is to have specific software as having actual content in the language. A weblog it´s a tool where content just adds up: any contribution is stored (and retrievable by search).

And, unlike harddisk software, web applications are continuously upgradable and universal: just need one copy on a server and it´s accesible from anywhere with an Internet connection.

A localized weblog can also be a tool for learners, as with Localizer you can have the whole interface in one language or another, just clicking in the language bar. So, you can switch language versions to see, at any moment, how Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday are in the 'other' language...

So, we are going to do full i18n on Squishdot and produce, at least, a localized Basque version of the weblog. Anyone else wishes to see a weblog in his/her native language? We are ready to cooperate.

Disclaimer: we don´t know very much about charsets. Not a problem with Basque as we lack diacritics. We have particularly more ideas about other l10n issues like lematization, specific search strategies, complex plural patterns and counting, and things like that which affect Basque more directly.

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| Luistxo Fernandez - Code & Syntax - LFernandez at codesyntax.com
|
| New Product: zOpen Directory
| http://www.codesyntax.com/Services/Zopendir

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