I am disappointingly monolingual, but looking for ways to encourage more translation on the Crowdin platform for missing languages (one thought is to hire some student help). Is there a rough estimate of how many words are included in each of the platforms (web and app text)? That’d really help estimate the size of the task.
Thank you!
There are currently 39,031 words to translate on the web and 7,422 words on mobile (and for completeness, 5,500 words for Seek on mobile). I know you’re aware of the depth and complexity of iNaturalist (especially on the web), so it’s important to consider that it is helpful if the person translating has some (or a lot of) familiarity with iNaturalist.
Perhaps some active translators can weigh in on the scope of the task as well. I recall @mutolisp saying that a couple of years ago he spent about 10 straight days translating all of web and mobile into traditional Chinese (did I recall correctly?).
Much of the translation can be handled by someone with good vocabulary and no special background, but you will definitely need specialized help / someone to explain translations for the more technical stuff – like curation/taxonomy, some biology terms, and API. Context is provided in most places it’s not obvious, but you will likely save a lot of time by hiring someone who actually uses the platform, both on the web and phone – or at least is willing to make an account and spend some time exploring.
There’s also a number of more obscure/hidden pages that need translations that are pretty niche and your average user might have no idea what they are or how they function.
As I understand [forumtopic] well you should start with translating the Glossary. In the past I saw changed translations in the Web making a difference between Web, Seek and the mobile Apps.
Comment (not in the Glossary) is translated e.g in 4 different ways accross the different projects.
Maybe this Glossary shows quick how special technical terms for iNaturalist as Data Quality Assessment , RG, Casual, Verifiable,geoprivacy, open, priviate should be translated. I agree with Carrie that familiarity with iNaturalist is necessary for translating these terms. If you do not have it trial and error was with the old translation system also succesfull.
Goefie translated 50% of the website in a month but it took me three months to translate the rest. So translating all of web and mobile into traditional Chinese should cost me definitely more then 10 days…
Thank you @carrieseltzer , @astra_the_dragon and @optilete - all tremendously helpful words of advice and experience. Yes, it makes a lot of sense to involve someone who knows or wants to get to know the platforms - not just iNat but also crowdin which looks like a little learning curve of its own. Much respect to @optilete for your dedication to developing the language version!
Hmm, as an identifier it’d be nice to be able to flick between different language versions for https://www.inaturalist.org/pages/responses#human , but that’s a bit off-topic for this thread.
(Sorry for late reply) Actually, I spent around ten days translating iOS and Android platforms into traditional Chinese (Taiwan). I remember the web platform was almost translated. Before I started to translate, I took around 1–2 weeks playing the mobile app and try to upload, identify observations, create projects on iNat web platform, and it really helps me to translate smoothly because I’m already familiar with the context.
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