To comment on the following update, log in, then open the issue: http://www.openoffice.org/issues/show_bug.cgi?id=80789 Issue #|80789 Summary|Use XLIFF as translation format for OpenOffice.org Component|l10n Version|current Platform|All URL|http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/xliff/documents/x |liff-specification.htm OS/Version|All Status|NEW Status whiteboard| Keywords| Resolution| Issue type|DEFECT Priority|P3 Subcomponent|code Assigned to|pjanik Reported by|clytie
------- Additional comments from [EMAIL PROTECTED] Fri Aug 17 13:26:24 +0000 2007 ------- XLIFF is the standard for professional translation, and will become the standard for free-software translation. It is XML for translators: a standard created specifically for localization. XLIFF has powerful metadata capabilities that both simplify and support localization. Compared even to PO format, XLIFF has major advantages. It is exactly what we need to manage the complex background of an OpenOffice.org translation file. XLIFF is extremely easy to manipulate. All the professional editors handle it, but you can also translate it in a text editor if you like. My translation editor, LocFactoryEditor for OSX, is based on XLIFF. Pootle already converts to and from XLIFF. Pootling, the Wordforge offline editor, will be based on XLIFF. The XLIFF Tools project and XLIFF RoundTrip Tool are other free XLIFF tools available. http://xliff-tools.freedesktop.org/wiki/Projects/xlifftool http://sourceforge.net/projects/xliffroundtrip The SDF format is cumbersome, fragile and has absolutely no metadata capability. I translate for over 20 other projects, and I've never seen such a useless format. Every single string in the current file retains a date of "2002-02-02 02:02:02" which appears to have no utility whatsoever. The SDF file stores no localization metadata. We can't store dates of translation or update, or names of translators working on the file, much less character sets, plural expressions, contextual information, alternative translations or translation memory keys. PO does some of this quite well. XLIFF does it all, much better. Optional conversion to PO format has brought us more translators, more contribution. However, having to convert back to SDF not only dumps all our PO metadata, it's a barrier to participation. People just don't have time to mess around like that. We want to be able to use translation memory, to be able to track modifications, to be able to handle plural cases for different languages. We want a professional translation format. SDF is a problem, not a solution. XLIFF is the standard for professional translators. The sooner we adopt it, the sooner we will have more professional translators donating time to OpenOffice.org. XLIFF is efficient and robust, maximizing the effect of input data. The sooner we adopt it, the more work we can get done in the same amount of time. XLIFF is an open standard. If OpenOffice.org supports OpenDocument, it should certainly support XLIFF. I formally request that the OpenOffice.org project change translation format to XLIFF. I want to be able to do my job properly. Clytie Siddall, Vietnamese Free-Software Translation Team. --------------------------------------------------------------------- Please do not reply to this automatically generated notification from Issue Tracker. Please log onto the website and enter your comments. http://qa.openoffice.org/issue_handling/project_issues.html#notification --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
