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Both "better" and "needs improvement"???

Posted by ricks99 on Thu 15 of May, 2008 20:12 GMT United States
I'm having some problems with understanding the notion of how Tiki tracks better/worse translation sets. Referencing this page:
http://twbasics.keycontent.org/tiki-index.php?page=TikiWiki%20for%20Smarties

  • How/why is the German version listed as both better and needs improvement?


What I did:
  1. The EN page was updated with the "urgent" option selected.
  2. Updated the ES page as a COMPLETE translation.
  3. Updated the DE page as a PARTIAL translation.

Notice that the DE and PT pages have the "content out of date" notice, as expected.

How, then, can DE be a better version of anything?
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Posted by alain_desilets on Fri 16 of May, 2008 12:07 GMT
> I'm having some problems with understanding the notion of how Tiki tracks better/worse translation sets. Referencing this page:
> http://twbasics.keycontent.org/tiki-index.php?page=TikiWiki%20for%20Smarties
>
> * How/why is the German version listed as both better and needs improvement?

Yes, this can look a bit weird when you first encounter it.

Basically, it means that DE includes an edit that has not been propagated to EN, and vice versa, EN has an edit that has not been propagated to DE.

Alain
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Posted by ricks99 on Fri 16 of May, 2008 13:48 GMT United States
>
> Yes, this can look a bit weird when you first encounter it.
>
> Basically, it means that DE includes an edit that has not been propagated to EN, and vice versa, EN has an edit that has not been propagated to DE.
>

I wonder if there's a better way to show this to an end-user. To me, better translation implies that it is more complete (that is, better carries with it the connotation that users should be viewing it instead). But in this case, it simply means that DE has something that EN does not (and vice-versa).

I'm concerned that an end-user will come to the EN page and click to the DE page (after being told that it is better). Then click back to the EN page (again, being told that it is better). Then click back to the DE page (again, being told that it is better), etc....

Perhaps there really need to be four conditions shown in the Translation Module:
  • Better: Page A contains things that Page B does not.
  • Needs improvement: Page B is missing things that Page A has.
  • Equivalent: Page A is identical to Page B.
  • Out-of-sync: Page A contains things that Page B does not; Page B contains thing that Page A does not.

Additionally, if I define a base/master language (for example, all pages written in EN first, then translated to other languages), I'd expect that pages in EN should never be shown as "needs improvement" when compared to other languages.

-R
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Posted by alain_desilets on Fri 16 of May, 2008 17:26 GMT
> Perhaps there really need to be four conditions shown in the Translation Module:
> *Better: Page A contains things that Page B does not.
> *Needs improvement: Page B is missing things that Page A has.
> *Equivalent: Page A is identical to Page B.
> *Out-of-sync: Page A contains things that Page B does not; Page B contains thing that Page A does not.

Good point. I will create a todo on the CLWE iteration plan along those lines.

> Additionally, if I define a base/master language (for example, all pages written in EN first, then translated to other languages), I'd expect that pages in EN should never be shown as "needs improvement" when compared to other languages.

If you define a master language, say English, what do you expect to happen if a user clicks on the Edit button to modify the content of a French page? Do you expect the system to tell the user that he can only TRANSLATE content to French and that original edits should be done in English?

Alain
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Posted by ricks99 on Fri 16 of May, 2008 19:11 GMT United States
> > Additionally, if I define a base/master language (for example, all pages written in EN first, then translated to other languages), I'd expect that pages in EN should never be shown as "needs improvement" when compared to other languages.
>
> If you define a master language, say English, what do you expect to happen if a user clicks on the Edit button to modify the content of a French page? Do you expect the system to tell the user that he can only TRANSLATE content to French and that original edits should be done in English?
>

Or maybe if I have defined a site "master" language, then only pages in that langauge should have a EDIT button.

Or maybe it is a user-education issues... I (and my users) need to become accustom to the idea that "translation" is different then "edit."

The problem I've encountered is the following scenario.
  1. UserA updates an EN page.
  2. UserB (author of the ES page) receives a notification via the "watch translation feature".
  3. UserB edits the ES page, translating the new EN information (as was received in the email notification).
    But UserB should have selected the "Update Translation from EN" button instead.
I now have a situation in which the system thinks that the edits are different. As the admin:
  • I now have to go to both EN and ES page and click "Update from..."
  • Make no edits, and click COMPLETE TRANSLATION for both pages.
Now everything is in sync.
An admin "dashboard' where I manually change translation status would be very helpful here!

Maybe what is needed:
At step #3, above, when UserB attempts to Edit the ES page, there is some sort of notice that tells him:
Warning: You are adding new content to a page that is already out-of-sync. If you are adding new content that does not exist in other languages, please continue. If you are translating content that was added to another language (that is, bring this language up-to-date) you should use the TRANSLATE function instead.


Am I the only one having this issue? Maybe it is just me... :)
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Posted by Xavi on Mon 19 of May, 2008 08:51 GMT Catalan Countries

> Am I the only one having this issue? Maybe it is just me... :)

Thanks Rick for reporting this so well. Many other people found out that usability issue, but afaik, you are the first to publicly describe a way to improve it!

+1 for your suggestion
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Posted by alain_desilets on Tue 20 of May, 2008 14:08 GMT
> Am I the only one having this issue? Maybe it is just me... :)

I made that same mistake miself, and I am one of the co-designers of the system! So for sure, it's an indication of a problem.

Another possible solution in this kind of situation would be for the edit dialog to display both the Save and Save Translation and Save Partial Translation buttons.

Alain
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Posted by rick (not registered) on Tue 20 of May, 2008 15:27 GMT
> > Am I the only one having this issue? Maybe it is just me... :)
>
> I made that same mistake miself, and I am one of the co-designers of the system! So for sure, it's an indication of a problem.
>
> Another possible solution in this kind of situation would be for the edit dialog to display both the Save and Save Translation and Save Partial Translation buttons.
>

Still kind of confusing (at least for me): 3 different "save" buttons? I think it would be better to show only the buttons that are necessary at the time, depending on what the user is trying to do.

Maybe there should be an intermediary dialog? Consider this workflows:
  1. User navigates to the ES page (which is listed as "needs improvement" and clicks Edit (there is no longer a "translate" button).
  2. A dialog box appears, asking: Do you want to:
    • Translate content that was added to the EN version?
      Use this option to update ES to match EN.
    • Add new content in ES.
      This will cause the EN version to be out-of-sync.

or

  1. User navigates to the ES page (which is listed as "needs improvement" and clicks Update from EN version.
  2. The Edit dialog appears with a note:
    • Use this page to translate content that was added to the EN version?
      Adding new content will cause the EN version to be out-of-sync.
  3. Present only COMPLETE TRANSLATION and PARTIAL TRANSLATION buttons.
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Posted by alain_desilets on Tue 20 of May, 2008 17:11 GMT
> Still kind of confusing (at least for me): 3 different "save"
> buttons? I think it would be better to show only the buttons that are
> necessary at the time, depending on what the user is trying to do.

Yes, I know. The problem is that the system has no way of knowing for sure what the intent of the user is. In the case of a master language, then maybe we could make things simpler, because it's clear that the user should only be allowed to Translate to ES. So there should never be an Edit button on an ES page. But even there, you end up with some issues, because the ES user may not realize that he is not allowed to create original edits in ES and may look for the Edit button, or even worse, use the Translate button to create original edits.

But in cases where you want to allow the user to edit both EN and ES, and to translate from either direction, then it's hard to avoid having multiple buttons that the user can employ to specify his exact intention.

I have been trying for years to avoid this kind of issue and haven't found an elegant solution yet. I have some thoughts about how automatic senttence alignment might help, but it's still very preliminary.


>
> Maybe there should be an intermediary dialog? Consider this workflows:
> # User navigates to the ES page (which is listed as "needs improvement" and clicks Edit (there is no longer a "translate" button).
> # A dialog box appears, asking: Do you want to:
> **Translate content that was added to the EN version?
Use this option to update ES to match EN.
> **Add new content in ES.
This will cause the EN version to be out-of-sync.

This would help make things clearer, but it would have the disadvantage of introducing an additional hurdle for people who are only intersted in creating original content (which is probably 90% of wiki users). It's hard to find a solution to this problem that does not get in the way of plain authors.
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Posted by Seb on Sat 31 of May, 2008 17:11 GMT
In the case where you want to enforce a master language, you can still put the Edit button on other language pages; just make it so that when the user clicks Edit he is told something along those lines:

"English has been selected as the master language for this; do you wish to edit the English page? (You will then be able to translate your change)"
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