Re: Translations for schema.org?

Good morning everybody,

Adding multi-language support is non-trivial, and the worries Dan has 
voiced about maintaining the translations up to date are very real.

I have written a few functions to mimic Python's standard translations. 
The code is quite simple. If there's an interest, I can edit my code, 
document it, and make it open source.

I've written the code to add modularity: Each item could have it's own 
translation file, and there can also be a shared translation file.

My code also allows "on the fly" translations. Instead of relying on the 
locale settings, you can pass a language string to get the translation.

The default translation is English. If no translation is found, at least 
something decent is returned.

Yours sincerely,
Hans Polak

On 8/11/21 11:52, Richard Wallis wrote:
> Yes thanks for raising this.
>
> There are a few interconnected aspects to this:
>
>     *The Schema.org UI*
>     This could be made multilingual - menu items, labels, home page
>     text, etc.
>     Could add a language selector
>
>     *Documentation*
>     About page, FAQs, Getting Started, Style Guide, Developers,
>     Extensions (Hotels, Auto, etc.), etc.
>     Translated versions could be produced.
>
>     *Term Definitions*
>     As Adolfo noted, language tagged versions of the rdfs:comment
>     value could provided the translations needed.
>     Also, although the term labels should remain English as they map
>     to the term URI value, potentially language specific qualifiers
>     for common terms could be added.
>
>
> There a few ways the above could be achieved technically but all 
> require either development and/or translation efforts.
>
> The UI capability should be achievable, translations of labels a one 
> off task per language. Documentation again a one off task per language 
> - I do share Dan’s concerns about future maintainability.
>
> Language tagged definitions (rdfs:comment) for terms in principle is a 
> simplest task.  However, we currently have approximately 2.3k terms 
> that potentially need translations, for each language.  We could start 
> with ‘common terms’ but where do with draw the line between common and 
> uncommon?
>
> I think it would be great if we could move forward on this.  However, 
> even when the site and the infrastructure behind it has been enabled 
> to facilitate this, there will be needed significant efforts from 
> those enthusiastic to see a version of Schema.org 
> <http://Schema.org> documentation in their language of choice.
>
> One off the wall thought - is something like Google Translate good 
> enough now to provided ‘acceptable’ translations in the context of 
> Schema.org <http://Schema.org> term definitions to provided at least a 
> start?
>
> ~Richard.
>
>
> On 8 Nov 2021 at 07:34:53, Arthur Radulescu <chiefra@gmail.com 
> <mailto:chiefra@gmail.com>> wrote:
>
>     Hi,
>     I can also contribute with the Romanian translation if this
>     project gets started.
>     Please let me know if we can put up some directions on where and
>     how to start doing this.
>     Thanks,
>     Arthur Radulescu
>
>     On Sat, Nov 6, 2021 at 10:08 PM Dan Brickley <danbri@google.com
>     <mailto:danbri@google.com>> wrote:
>
>         On Sat, 6 Nov 2021 at 16:39, Christopher Walz
>         <christopher@seo-vergleich.de
>         <mailto:christopher@seo-vergleich.de>> wrote:
>
>             Hi,
>
>             I have been visiting the schema.org <http://schema.org>
>             site many times in the last years
>             (probably too many times) and sometimes I am still
>             wondering if there
>             are any plans to offer all the information in different
>             languages as
>             well. Is there any intention to tackle this issue?
>
>             Some of my colleagues and friends in web dev, who are less
>             comfortable
>             with the English language, have been mentioning the same
>             thought quite a
>             few times, since they didn't understand every explanation.
>
>             Couldn't we use GitHub to localize languages by the
>             community, since the
>             data is already on there?
>             I'm looking forward to any progress in this direction. Thanks!
>
>
>         Thanks for raising this. It would be great to do a better job
>         for the non-English speaking world here. There are high level
>         documents like the (rather out of date) "quick start guide",
>         the FAQ, the releases page, and blog posts; and then there are
>         hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of definitions. I am
>         cautious of trying to translate everything, and keep
>         everything up to date, ... but that does not mean we shouldn't
>         try to improve things.
>
>         Perhaps we can make a start with some of the high level
>         materials, and with definitions for the most important types,
>         e.g. Event, Person, Place, Organization, LocalBusiness, Offer,
>         ...? Even if we just did those and the properties that link
>         them, it could help non English speakers get a better
>         understanding for the approach.
>
>         Also if there are any particular definitions that your
>         contacts are having trouble with, ... it may be also that
>         English speakers have similar trouble. Definitions could be
>         clarified, and our use of English made more careful and simpler...
>
>         Dan
>
>
>             -- 
>             Christopher Walz
>             Mail: christopher@seo-vergleich.de
>             <mailto:christopher@seo-vergleich.de>
>             https://www.seo-vergleich.de <https://www.seo-vergleich.de>
>
>
>
> -- 
> Richard Wallis
> Founder, Data Liberate
> http://dataliberate.com <http://dataliberate.com>
> Linkedin: http://www.linkedin.com/in/richardwallis 
> <http://www.linkedin.com/in/richardwallis>
> Twitter: @dataliberate @rjw
>