Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

What they don’t tell you when you translate your app

ericwbailey.design

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

81–90 of 236 posts

Re: What they don’t tell you when you translate your app

#81

Post by lavabiopsy »

travisjungroth wrote: post #14
lou1306 wrote: post #5

> People may prefer the English experience because they expect the translated version to be inferior As an Italian, I can relate so much to this, because translated apps will happily treat verbs as adjectives and vice versa. A couple example: * Flixbus' app translates "Open ticket" to "Biglietto aperto" (treating "open" as an adjective, not as an imperative verb). Correct translation should be "Apri biglietto". Nothi…

I think the issue is many translation databases just hold the English text and then all the translations. So the entry is “Open ticket” and then you just drop in the translation anywhere that phrase shows up. But sometimes “open” is a verb, sometimes a noun. The actual identifier should be something like “Open a ticket (imperative, button)” and then that phrase has translations, including the English “Open ticket”.

This is what the gettext contexts and the pgettext macros are for: https://www.gnu.org/software/gettext/manual/html_node/Contex...

Re: What they don’t tell you when you translate your app

#82

Post by 908B64B197 »

dataflow wrote: post #75
908B64B197 wrote: post #74

One nitpick about localization: If you speak several languages, try setting your device to use one _language_ and keep your locale to US. Now you can spot which developer understands the difference between a language and a locale and which one doesn't (hint: on large enough apps you'll land on pages using the wrong one, ie determines the language using locale). Or the opposite (watch the UI quote you prices in Euro d…

If someone sets the language to (say) French but keeps their locale as English, do you write a thousand as 1,000 or 1.000? What about the reverse case?

Congratulation: You just opened the Pandora box of locale vs language!

My understanding would be that locale should dictate numerical formatting. But one could argue the opposite and also be right.

Re: What they don’t tell you when you translate your app

#84

Post by r00fus »

Pinus wrote: post #54
TrueGeek wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is surprising. You really think someone as big as EasyJet would get that right. We're doing a translation now into Japanese and the translator is actually taking the time to look at screenshots and use the app to see the text in context. It makes a huge difference. As you've pointed out, it's one thing to see the string "open" in a XLF file, it's quite another to realize it's intent. This requires setting up dem…

Heck, Microsoft got it wrong — Swedish versions of Windows used to have a folder called "Vanliga filer" (Ordinary files). This was, of course, the "Common files" folder, but the translator, probably having no context, picked the wrong meaning of "common", and chose a Swedish word which does not have the "shared" meaning.

The problem isn't the translation, per-se, it's that translation isn't tested (or tested thoroughly enough).

Amazing Microsoft can sell a whole other version of Windows and mess something like that up.

Everything that impacts the user experience needs to be tested.

Re: What they don’t tell you when you translate your app

#85

Post by jamespwilliams »

manuel_w wrote: post #65
jan_Inkepa wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't German UI conventions follow the convention of using infinitive verbs for commands normally? ('öffnen' instead of 'öffne'?) [the only exception I know is the adjective "rückgängig" for "undo" ] Though even there your point still stands - they can be easily distinguished from the perfect form ('opened' (geöffnet) vs 'to open' (öffnen) ). So I guess I'm nit-picking a bit.

Native german speaker here. Have no clue about UI conventions nor grammar, but I'd expect either "Öffne Ticket" or "Ticket öffnen". "Öffnen Ticket" is wrong, just as "Ticket öffne". I suppose the Flixbus app was made by native German speakers coding in English language. That would explain why they chose "open ticket" rather than "view ticket" or similar. As some of the parent posts said, you also "open files" here, s…

I’ve noticed a few other German-English anomalies in my time around German people. First is “some-” instead of “any-”. Second is the use of “since”, e.g: “I’ve been working here since 8 years”. Present tense confusion - e.g: “I’m having” instead of “I have” - my understanding is that in German there is only one present tense, whereas English has a few subtly different ones, so it’s not surprising that some confusion ensues. “Driving a bike” is always funny. Saying “with X years” instead of “aged X years”.

In all of those cases it’s still obvious what the person means. And to be clear I don’t mean to pick on anyone here, I just find the language differences interesting. Far be it from me to judge - I can barely speak one language, let alone two.

Re: What they don’t tell you when you translate your app

#86

Post by dataflow »

908B64B197 wrote: post #82
dataflow wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If someone sets the language to (say) French but keeps their locale as English, do you write a thousand as 1,000 or 1.000? What about the reverse case?

Congratulation: You just opened the Pandora box of locale vs language! My understanding would be that locale should dictate numerical formatting. But one could argue the opposite and also be right.

Yeah my understanding is people would classify this as locale too, but it's always seemed weird to me. I guess my question is whether this is about formatting to begin with. Periods mean something different depending on the language, right? It seems less about displaying it differently and more about conveying correct information. But then again, mm/dd/yy and dd/mm/yy are often exposed as a formatting option...

Re: What they don’t tell you when you translate your app

#88

Post by r00fus »

dataflow wrote: post #75
908B64B197 wrote: post #74

One nitpick about localization: If you speak several languages, try setting your device to use one _language_ and keep your locale to US. Now you can spot which developer understands the difference between a language and a locale and which one doesn't (hint: on large enough apps you'll land on pages using the wrong one, ie determines the language using locale). Or the opposite (watch the UI quote you prices in Euro d…

If someone sets the language to (say) French but keeps their locale as English, do you write a thousand as 1,000 or 1.000? What about the reverse case?

Locale would be a country so e.g. UK? Then it'd be just like the US (1,000).

Re: What they don’t tell you when you translate your app

#89

Post by BiteCode_dev »

Not to mention messages are almost impossible to google.

In fact, I used to play all my games in english for the same reason: items, places, starts... When you want to know more, the only good wikis and tutorials are in english.

I used to write a blog in french, it became super popular. Yet, it's a shadow of what you can achieve woth an english audience.

Re: What they don’t tell you when you translate your app

#90

Post by pjscott »

908B64B197 wrote: post #82
dataflow wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If someone sets the language to (say) French but keeps their locale as English, do you write a thousand as 1,000 or 1.000? What about the reverse case?

Congratulation: You just opened the Pandora box of locale vs language! My understanding would be that locale should dictate numerical formatting. But one could argue the opposite and also be right.

I checked the documentation for the ICU Unicode library and Apple's Foundation library, and they both say that numerical formatting is a property of the locale rather than the language. I'd be surprised if other major platforms did otherwise.
Post reply on HN