https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=404286
--- Comment #34 from r.ro...@outlook.com --- (In reply to NSLW from comment #33) > (In reply to r.rozne from comment #30) > > I stumbled over here after seeing angry comments from people on Nate's blog > > and feel I have a couple things to say. > > > > One, as a native Polish speaker (and sorta a purist like our translator > > here) who only actually tried using KDE in Polish after the change to > > "Zaniechaj" (my day-to-day machine is set to English), my reaction to seeing > > this for the first time was: "Oh, how cute. I like it." > > You used Polish translation in KDE before the change to "Zaniechaj" and > after the change > you tried (struggled) to use it? No, I had never used KDE *in Polish* before the change occurred is what I meant. I had only tried KDE in English before. I'm a person learned in both linguistics and computers, so I didn't have any problems. But here's the thing, I, like you, am a learned person. In my experience, the typical user gets confused a *lot* when presented with different wording than they've been seeing for years (Windows, Android, modern Apple platforms). > > > On the other hand, I > > don't think idiosyncrasies like this one are exactly good, for example when > > someone unfamiliar with KDE tries supporting a user over the phone… Has > > anyone considered this? In software translation, you don't want "cute" or > > "where's the 'Anuluj' button" to be the first reaction. > > I want to get you right: an expert unfamiliar with KDE tries to help a novice > also unfamiliar with KDE on how to achieve something in KDE. He does so by > phone conversation. > The key here should be presence of "Anuluj" button otherwise there would be > searching for it. In this scenario, neither the expert, nor the user are even aware they're running KDE. The user is agitated and puts pressure on the "so-called expert" to solve their problem at all costs. The expert may assume things because of that. > Here is how I consider the situation, I understood: > First, I think that "Zaniechaj" equals "Anuluj" so that's not like the > meaning has changed. In English > you could also say "Dove" and "Pigeon" and AFAIK that would mean exactly the > same. No confusion here. Well, on paper it hasn't. However, some people don't know the formal definition of "Anuluj". I don't have a real-life example for that, but I do have one for the word "Edycja" (Edit). My grandmother was recently confused by this word, because she was used to seeing it in a web app, where clicking it opened a separate screen that showed more details about something than could be seen normally, in addition to making them editable. So, she told, she thought it means something like "show more details". Then, she encountered it in a situation, where tapping the "Edytuj" button didn't show more stuff, leaving her tapping over and over, looking for more stuff. Encountering the same word in a different place, where the *apparent effect* (to them) is different, may leave them confused. Likewise, users may not associate "Anuluj" and "Zaniechaj" with the same concept. Is Microsoft to blame for this? > Second, I think that the expert has much bigger challenges in helping than > to find "Anuluj" button, because he is in general unfamiliar with KDE . > > Third, If the expert asks "where's 'Anuluj' button" then he could also ask > "where's 'Start' button" which is equally important. Should we then > instantiate Start button in KDE as well? I think not. > Given that the Start button hasn't been labeled since Vista, I think the average user calls any button in the bottom-left corner of the screen a "Start" button. Even then, there's the resort of "the button in the bottom-left corner" (and if that fails, try the upper-left and the upper-right - that can happen on Windows, too). Not so much with our "Anuluj" button, given that different OS' put "OK" and "Anuluj" in different order. > > > Two, Apple had not commissioned a Polish translation of Mac OS before > > Leopard. However, "Polonizator" fan translations did exist. Hence, it wasn't > > that Apple 'softened', it was that fan translators were purists, too. At > > least *they* could argue that there was no existing translation and no > > prevailing standard (unless you count Windows 95, which was still fairly new > > at the time these translations started - the oldest one I could find was for > > Mac OS 9), either. > > MacOS was translated since 1986. > Please read and interview with translators > https://www.computerworld.pl/wywiad/Kwasne-jablka-do-szarlotki,320100.html > Their opinion on Window translation is that it was: ugly, illogic, > inconsistent. > That might be the same time at which someone made decision to be > incompatible with > MacOS and choose "Anuluj" instead of "Poniechaj". > Huh, that's the first time I've heard of this… Have you ever seen it? Where? Only other trace I've found was an archived Allegro listing. I think I would enjoy seeing it. > > In this case, we have both a long history of KDE using > > "Anuluj" *and* others using *Anuluj* virtually all around us, including > > notable applications people run on KDE, like Firefox. > > I see that Firefox and Chrome use native KDE dialogs with "Zaniechaj" in > them. Try running a JavaScript that uses window.confirm(). Or closing a window with multiple tabs open. I'm not talking about Open/Save/Print dialogs here, they should and are properly integrated. > I also see that you're refering to the majority, similary to Przemysław > Formela. > Please read answer I gave to him, so that I mustn't duplicate content > https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=404286#c31 In this case, I would argue that the language isn't "changing", it "has changed" already. 20 years of continuous usage is quite enough. > > Three, while I can get behind encouraging use of "purer language", I cannot > > applaud the decision to change a common UI element without soliciting > > opinions beforehand. > > I get impression that you're not proud of how things changed. > Would you solicit opinions beforehand, so that everyone would agree on the > change? Since this is a fundamental change that would set us apart? Definitely. However, reading this thread, as well as the relevant thread in the mailing list archives (Sourceforge…), I get the feeling that none of us know how should that be done. I feel this might be a problem with the way l10n at KDE is structured altogether, so you could say this merits a separate discussion. -- You are receiving this mail because: You are watching all bug changes.
