[ESW Wiki] Update of "its0505ReqAttrAndTrans" by YvesSavourel

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The following page has been changed by YvesSavourel:
http://esw.w3.org/topic/its0505ReqAttrAndTrans


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  = Attribute and Translatable Text =
  
+ === Summary ===
+ 
+ Whenever possible, a schema should ensure that translatable text is stored in elements rather than attributes.
+ 
+ === Challenge/Issue ===
+ 
+ If translatable text is provided as an attribute value rather than element content, the following problems may arise:
+ 
+  * It is difficult to apply to the text of the attribute value meta-information such as no-translate flags, designer's notes, etc.
+ 
+  * The difficulty to attach unique identifiers to translatable attribute text makes it more complicated to use ID-based leveraging tools.
+ 
+  * Translatable attributes can create problems when they are prepared for localization because they can occur within the content of a translatable element, breaking it into different parts, and possibly altering the sentence structure.
+ 
+  * The language selection mechanism applies to the content of the element where it is declared, including its attribute values. If the text in an attribute is in a different language than the text of the element content, one cannot set the language for both correctly.
+ 
+  * In some languages bidirectional markers may be needed to provide a correct display. Tags cannot be used within an attribute value. One can use Unicode control characters instead, but this is not recommended (see the W3C Note and Unicode Technical Report [http://www.w3.org/TR/unicode-xml/ Unicode in XML & Other Markup Languages]).
+ 
+ 
+ Example 1:
+ 
+ In this example the no-translate flag applies to the content of the element, but not to the title text. The title text may benefit from id-based leveraging, but has no ID. The xml:lang tag, after translation, will only be relevant for the element content, not the title text. 
+ 
+ {{{<extract id="0517.1447" translate="no" xml:lang="en"
+  title="Ambiguous linguistic construct.">The man hit the boy 
+ with the stick in the bathroom.</extract>}}}
+ 
+ 
+ Example 2:
+ 
+ In this example part of the alt-text value should be left untranslated (the name of the picture), but it is difficult to see how that would be expressed so that a machine translation tool would exhibit the correct behavior.
+ 
+ {{{<image id="0517.1716"
+  alt-text="Catalog number 123: The Fish Wife"
+  source="fishwife.png" />}}}
+ 
+ 
+ Example 3:
+ 
+ In this example many translation tools would see the value of the alt attribute as embedded inside the sentence where the image is inserted, making the translation difficult.
+ 
+ {{{<para>Click the button 
+ <image source="startnow.png" alt="Start Now!" /> to register
+ now.</para>}}}
+ 
+ Segmentation:
+ 
+ {{{"Click the button [code]Start Now![code] to register now."}}}
+

Received on Sunday, 29 May 2005 23:46:01 UTC