Node.js Internationalization Proposal

[obensource]

Hi there!

On behalf of the Node.js Community Committee, I’d like to thank you for your group’s contributions to this awesome project! 👏👏👏

I’m reaching out as a member of our new Internationalization Working Group, and we’d like to get in touch with you about our proposal around Internationalization for Node.js!

Our proposed changes would modify the structure of the working model that your group, and all Node.js Localization groups currently observe. The primary difference being that we’d like to introduce a new translation platform to streamline the translation process and setup automated integration of localization into the Node.js project.

If you haven’t seen it already, we’d greatly appreciate if you could please take a moment to review our new proposal and comment in this issue to let us know if you have any thoughts, questions, or objections to it.

We’d love to hear from you by February 14th, during our consensus seeking period for this proposal. If we’re not able to hear from you in that time, we’ll consider that your opinion of the effort is positive, and press on with it.

Moving ahead, the i18n Working Group is so thrilled to stay in touch with you and make the translation of Node.js’ content into your language a success!

We’re excited to be in touch again soon, and thank you for working with us!

[fhemberger]

@obensource Hi Ben, the German translation group is practically dead. Last translation effort was made two years ago.

[obensource]

@fhemberger no problem! Thank you for letting me know!

Do you perceive that there will be any interest in translating Node.js into German given the new process proposal?

We'd like to understand your needs regarding this. We've heard other groups say that they'd only really like to see some of the general content from nodejs.org translated into their language, however translating the docs would be unnecessary since their community has acclimated to referencing them in English. Do you feel the same way?

Even though the last effort was 2 years ago, if we rallied interest in gathering a German translation base–would that be helpful?

Thank you in advance for your advice regarding this. Cheers! 🍻

[fhemberger]

@obensource sorry for the late reply: Regarding the docs I feel the same way.

Personally I don't need a German version of the website either. Others might disagree, but given the lack of interest in helping with the translation, I just don't see the point at the moment. Besides, English is the first foreign language you learn in school in Germany, usually starting at 5th grade (sometimes even earlier). Unfortunately, ziz doesn't help us wiz ze funny akzent. 😀

So for now I'd suggest to not invest any time for a German translation of the docs and see if there's any demand for the rest of the site after the relaunch.

[juliangruber]

I share your reasoning @fhemberger, I even prefer reading english documentation, as a German. However, it still adds mental overhead for new learners of Node.js so there is most definitely value in having a German version too.

It would be great to have one, but given the good education here it's not easy for me either to justify investing the time and energy.