Hi Peter, GTP members, GTP Coordination Team and Slovak translation team members,
I am prepared to answer all questions regarding this issue. I think the GTP Coordination Team should decide first whether the [email protected] mailing list is the proper forum for such discussion, because I am not sure all of the GTP members are interested. Please let me know. Thanks. On Wed, May 12, 2010 at 09:30:01PM +0200, Peter Mraz wrote: > Hi all, > I have been advised to write an email to this mailing list to help us > resolve the problems of the Slovak translation team. > > > Due to reasons listed below our team is unhappy with approach and behaviour > of current coordinator of team. Recently, I have volunteered for new > coordinator by sending email to gnome-sk-list outlining how I would like to > change the way team works [8]. I have also asked members of our team to > express their opinion on whether they would like to change coordinator. > Throughout past three weeks 6 members of our team have voted for myself and > 3 members have voted against the change of coordinator (more less all active > members of team have voted and expressed their opinions). Marcel has > discussed this with me in quite a length, however he did not decided to > accept wish of majority of the team and resign. > > Therefore I would like to ask you to help us resolve this situation, as > current coordinator does not want to give up his position. Please see our > reasoning below. > > (I do acknowledge that most of the references provided here are in Slovak, > however at least members of Czech team should be able to understand them and > verify if necessary). > > > We observe the declining trend in the amount of Gnome translated to Slovak: > > Gnome 2.20 – 70% > > Gnome 2.22 – 59% > > Gnome 2.24 – 56% > > Gnome 2.26 – 52% > > Gnome 2.28 – 48% > > Gnome 2.30 - 46% > This happens while there is a quite active team and currently there are 25 > modules to be committed and most of them are in this state from Feb/Mar. > (I'm convinced that there would even more activity if things would be moving > quicker). > > > I see the problem in that the coordinator of the Slovak team, Marcel, > focuses solely on perfection and nothing else. While I understand that > quality is important, the translation procedure should be organized in such > a way that strive for quality is not the factor which decreases the coverage > of the translated Gnome. On his side there is no will for any compromise, > even though majority of the team voted for change on this[1] and would like > to see more translations being committed. He has very little or no wish to > try to get more modules translated, unless they are 100% perfect. He has > recently said that he had not ignored the wish of the majority of the team, > but he had not accepted it, providing only this explanation: "What you wish > for is nice, however wishes might not always come true, even if the majority > wishes it." [2]. > In past year he committed 26 modules (some of them more than once), half of > these modules were modules translated by him. Between June 2009 and February > 2010 he committed only 2 modules (24.9.2009 damned-lies, 10.11.2009 > swfdec-gnome). Two-thirds of commits were done since February 2010, after a > proposal to change the coordinator and after a lot of members asked for a > change in the work flow. > Marcel checks everything after each reviewer and until he checks it whole > (including string which are currently translated) and all of his comments > are addressed he does not commit the module. > > He also insists on numerous bureaucratic procedures which are not necessary: > > - > > Every new member must sent a registration email with very strict > formatting rules, and unless he/she does it, he/she is not accepted to the > Slovak team. Even if one provides all information required and he/she > fulfills all the prerequisites, he/she would not be accepted as a team > member, if the registration email has an extra line, or a line is broken by > an email client etc. This causes issues with almost every new member trying > to join the team. Marcel considers this as some kind of test! (The only > explanation why the email must be in this format was that Marcel wrote a > script to check whether the registration email is correctly formatted and > another script to get some statistics on team performance). > - > > Until recently, Marcel insisted on using only one's full name, as it is > written in the birth certificate !! After a long discussions [9] at > gnome-sk-list, he has allowed members to use other forms of one's name > (e.g. > Joe if your full name is John), however one still cannot use his/her > nickname!! [10] (It was even pointed to in the mailing list that this is > against a Slovak law which gives the right to use any name or nickname to > publish one's work). > - > > Marcel also does not accept translations of modules unless one promises > to look after the module in the future. There was a case of somebody out of > the team submitting translation of dia, and Marcel refused to include it > unless that person would join the team and would look after the module. > - > > Recently, Marcel proposed a new system to accept and change rules > governing Slovak Gnome translation team. His first draft of the procedures > can be found here [3]. It is extremely lengthy and written in obscure > language and the chance is that nobody will be willing to read it at all. > - > > He refuses to allow anybody else except for him to commit translations > without specifying sane reasons. The only given reason was "the time has > not > come yet" and also "there will be transparent rules created when I will get > more time, which is not now"[4]. No rules were published up till now. > > > Marcel by himself decides who should translate which module and refuses to > give up modules which he has assigned to himself in the past, even though he > has not worked on them for a long time. Here, [5], [6], are few examples > from recent past where Marcel refused to allow other members of the team to > translate module, but he did not updated them by himself. If one wants to > start translating a module, he/she must first request it by an email and > only when he checks that it is not one of the modules he would like to > translate in the future by himself, he then assigns it to translator. > > It should also be noted that the few improvements, which happened in the > past months, happened only after lengthy discussions, a proposal to change > the coordinator and pressure from other members of the team. There already > were problems with that in the past, and he only started replying once there > was discussion about his replacement [7]. > > Further, I know two former members of the Slovak team who had quit because > of the behavior of the coordinator. > > > I hope that you will be able to help us to resolve this. > > > Kind regards > > > [1] http://mail.gnome.org/archives/gnome-sk-list/2010-March/msg00252.html > [2] http://mail.gnome.org/archives/gnome-sk-list/2010-May/msg00002.html > > [3] http://mail.gnome.org/archives/gnome-sk-list/2010-April/msg00096.html > [4] http://mail.gnome.org/archives/gnome-sk-list/2010-March/msg00247.html > > [5] http://mail.gnome.org/archives/gnome-sk-list/2010-January/msg00046.html > > [6] http://mail.gnome.org/archives/gnome-sk-list/2010-January/msg00073.html > [7] http://mail.gnome.org/archives/gnome-i18n/2007-November/msg00038.html > > [8] http://mail.gnome.org/archives/gnome-sk-list/2010-April/msg00081.html > > [9] http://mail.gnome.org/archives/gnome-sk-list/2010-February/msg00166.html > > [10] > http://mail.gnome.org/archives/gnome-sk-list/2010-February/msg00346.html -- +-------------------------------------------+ | Marcel Telka e-mail: [email protected] | | homepage: http://telka.sk/ | | jabber: [email protected] | +-------------------------------------------+ _______________________________________________ gnome-i18n mailing list [email protected] http://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/gnome-i18n
