Naming of extensions and plugins in the Add-ons Manager
Blair McBride
Manager, I was told that some locales have no clear distinction between
the words "extension" and "plugin". This can make it difficult to
localize the Add-ons Manager, and also confuses users. I believe the
specific example I was given was Taiwanese.
So, my question is: How many locales have trouble with this? And what
suggestions do people have to make it better?
Because the Add-ons Manager has been redesigned for Firefox 4, we may be
able to make changes to the terminology. For example, early in the
design process, the extensions category was named "Features". Are
"features" and "plugins" recognizably different in these locales?
- Blair
Sander Lepik
it's almost impossible to translate features into Estonian, so please try to avoid that word :)
--
All the best,
Sander
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flod
> Because the Add-ons Manager has been redesigned for Firefox 4, we may
> be able to make changes to the terminology. For example, early in the
> design process, the extensions category was named "Features". Are
> "features" and "plugins" recognizably different in these locales?
that nomenclature (and the clear distinction between plugins and
extensions was introduced in the EM with Firefox 3, so several years ago).
Besides, I don't even want to think about translating documentation and
web content where feature sometimes means "feature" and some other times
means "plugin" (consider that every product has a "Features" subsection...).
Francesco
Khaled Hosny
> At the Mozilla Summit, while I was demonstrating the new Add-ons
> Manager, I was told that some locales have no clear distinction
> between the words "extension" and "plugin". This can make it
> difficult to localize the Add-ons Manager, and also confuses users.
> I believe the specific example I was given was Taiwanese.
>
> So, my question is: How many locales have trouble with this? And
> what suggestions do people have to make it better?
>
> may be able to make changes to the terminology. For example, early
> in the design process, the extensions category was named "Features".
> Are "features" and "plugins" recognizably different in these
> locales?
I think features is a very generic word to use here, at least when
translated into Arabic. The differentiation between extension,
plug-in and add-on was not trivial, we ended with three distinct words
that are still clear on the meaning.
Regards,
Khaled
--
Khaled Hosny
Arabic localiser and member of Arabeyes.org team
Free font developer
Bob Chao
It's true that people usually misunderstand / mix the two words "extension"
and "plugin" in Taiwan (actually, I'm the guy who talked about this to you
:) ,) and the translated terms are both means something "additional."
People can hardly recognize the two words, but after a few discussion in
MozTW, I think the translation might not the only reason, it's mostly due to
the nature of the two things -- they are all "add-ons."
If we change the wording to "feature," that "might" be good since we can
translate the word to something not related to "additional," but it would be
better if we tunes the UI to have people work with Firefox without knowing
the difference between them -- say, combine the two list in to one, with
filter that can show "feature/extension" or "plugin" only -- don't really
know how to solve the problem.
~Bob
--
Bob Chao (Chao Po-chiang)
Community Liaison
MozTW http://moztw.org
Aleksej
I don't know about locales, but at least some users often call
extensions "plugins" -- most likely not because they confuse Extensions
and Plugins, but because they call all Add-ons "plugins" (because many
other programs only have plugins). Maybe the bug that the Esperanto
locale currently calls Add-ons with the same word as Plugins is an
example of that.
Most of the languages whose translations I can "read" (i.e. using words
similar to Russian, English or Esperanto words) seem to translate the
words for "Add-ons", "Extensions", "Plugins", "Themes" literally.
But is it there a meaningful translation for "Features" in many
languages, and is there any way to distinguish between Firefox's own
internal features and features-extensions without making it even more
confusing considering that there are add-ons and plugins?
Ricardo Palomares Martínez
> At the Mozilla Summit, while I was demonstrating the new Add-ons
> Manager, I was told that some locales have no clear distinction between
> the words "extension" and "plugin". This can make it difficult to
> localize the Add-ons Manager, and also confuses users. I believe the
> specific example I was given was Taiwanese.
>
> So, my question is: How many locales have trouble with this? And what
> suggestions do people have to make it better?
FWIW, most, if not all, Spanish variants use "Extensiones" for
"Extensions" and keep the english term "Plugins" in their translation.
> Because the Add-ons Manager has been redesigned for Firefox 4, we may be
> able to make changes to the terminology. For example, early in the
> design process, the extensions category was named "Features". Are
> "features" and "plugins" recognizably different in these locales?
"Features" translate into Spanish into "Características" or
"Funcionalidades". Both words mean "specific or distinctive properties
of a bigger item" (where "bigger item" would be the Mozilla
application itself, like Firefox). So, I don't think Spanish people
would associate "Feature" to something you download and apply to your
application, but to something that comes with the application itself.
I sincerely think that "Extension" is the best word to use, since
we're talking about add-ons that extend the capabilities of the
application in some way (either by adding new ones or by
enhancing/modifying existing ones).
HTH
Robert Kaiser
> Most of the languages whose translations I can "read" (i.e. using words
> similar to Russian, English or Esperanto words) seem to translate the
> words for "Add-ons", "Extensions", "Plugins", "Themes" literally.
"Extensions" is the only word of those we actually do translate in
German, all the others stay in their original as English loan words.
Robert Kaiser
--
Note that any statements of mine - no matter how passionate - are never
meant to be offensive but very often as food for thought or possible
arguments that we as a community needs answers to. And most of the time,
I even appreciate irony and fun! :)
Aleksej
> Most of the languages whose translations I can "read" (i.e. using words
> similar to Russian, English or Esperanto words) seem to translate the
> words for "Add-ons", "Extensions", "Plugins", "Themes" literally.
For Plugins, a word derived from their English name is often used.
Pavel Franc
In Czech we have nice and different translations for plugins,
extensions, themes and their superset addons. However, we don't have any
word for features.
Pavel Franc
Mozila.cz
Tim Babych
> Blair McBride escribió:
> "Features" translate into Spanish into "Características" or
> "Funcionalidades". Both words mean "specific or distinctive properties
> of a bigger item" (where "bigger item" would be the Mozilla
> application itself, like Firefox). So, I don't think Spanish people
> would associate "Feature" to something you download and apply to your
> application, but to something that comes with the application itself.
Huh, interesting. Exactly the same situation is in Ukrainian, we have
difficulty with translating "Feature" too and use similar to yours
palliatives.
On topic: both Extension and Plugin translations are settled in
Ukrainian translation and all if fine, no need to change.
Aki Laaksovirta
> we're talking about add-ons that extend the capabilities of the
> application in some way (either by adding new ones or by
> enhancing/modifying existing ones).
My opinion is the same: the word for "something you download into your existing application" should stay as "Extension", because it is concrete, and people are used to concrete things in this materialistic era. I think that "Feature" in that sense is a little too abstract, and may even make some people feel scary about downloading them.
Michael Lefevre
> 16.07.10 16:07, Ricardo Palomares Martínez написав(ла):
>> Blair McBride escribió:
>> "Features" translate into Spanish into "Características" or
>> "Funcionalidades". Both words mean "specific or distinctive properties
>> of a bigger item" (where "bigger item" would be the Mozilla
>> application itself, like Firefox). So, I don't think Spanish people
>> would associate "Feature" to something you download and apply to your
>> application, but to something that comes with the application itself.
>
> Huh, interesting. Exactly the same situation is in Ukrainian, we have
> difficulty with translating "Feature" too and use similar to yours
> palliatives.
As there are a few comments saying this for other languages, I thought I
might mention that the same is true in English as well. A feature is "A
distinguishing characteristic of a software item (e.g., performance,
portability, or functionality)". English speakers would not associate
"feature" to something you download and add either.
The Firefox 3.5 release notes, for example, described as "features"
things like the improved JavaScript performance, better privacy controls
and improvements to the layout engine.
So the proposal for calling new things "Features" is, I think, talking
about redefining the word in a Mozilla context. "Características" would
be a good translation I think. The original question is just whether
there are enough alternative words in other languages so "plugins",
"extensions" and "features" could be translated into different terms.
Michael
Eduard Gamonal
Just to provide more information:
in Catalan we have the three translations:
* feature: característica (same meaning as in Spanish and English)
* plug-in: connector (connector comes from "connectar" -verb- , whose
translation is "to plug (in)")
* extension: extensió
we still have a fourth word. In menu Tools > Extensions we have translated
"Extensions" as "complements" (ca), which means "parts to be added to
something to make it complete". This way the menu entry is more generic and
includes both plugins and extensions.
From my point of view, using "features" to mean "plugin" or "extension"
would be confusing. "features" is too abstract.
Edu
Michael Wolf
> Hi,
> Just to provide more information:
> in Catalan we have the three translations:
> * feature: característica (same meaning as in Spanish and English)
> * plug-in: connector (connector comes from "connectar" -verb- , whose
> translation is "to plug (in)")
> * extension: extensió
>
> we still have a fourth word. In menu Tools> Extensions we have translated
> "Extensions" as "complements" (ca), which means "parts to be added to
> something to make it complete". This way the menu entry is more generic and
> includes both plugins and extensions.
>
> From my point of view, using "features" to mean "plugin" or "extension"
> would be confusing. "features" is too abstract.
I use for Upper Sorbian:
* feature: funkcija
* plug-in: tykač (translation of English *plug*
* extension: rozšěrjenje, from verb *rožšěrić* "extend"
* add-on: přidatk, from verb *přidać* "add"
I think "feature" is not suitable because it is too generic. This word
doesn't include the connotation of "additionality". Also a basic program
release has already features. For me "plug-in" is difficult to translate
because the generic meaning of this word doesn't give an association to
the special meaning. It's a word you can't translate word-by-word, as
e.g. "bug" as well.
I think the difference between "extension" and "plug-in" is that
"extensions" make available addional features especially programmed for
a specific software. A "plug-in" enables using features of external
program features that are not limited to certain programs. It's
difficult for me to find a clear definition and that's the problem for
the most users as well: They don't see a clear difference between
extension, plug-in and add-on.
Regards,
Michael
Michael Wolf
> In Czech we have nice and different translations for plugins,
> extensions, themes and their superset addons. However, we don't have any
> word for features.
"Funkce"?
S pozdravem,
Michael
Blair McBride
To summarize: "extensions"/"plugins" isn't ideal, but there doesn't seem
to be any obviously better words, and using "features" would make it
even more confusing for many locales.
One possible solution (also discussed at the summit), would be for the
Add-ons Manager to include a small snippet of text that describes what
an extension is, or what a plugin is. This would be shown when you're
viewing the list of a particular type (it could also be a tooltip of
each item in the list of categories).
For example: http://grab.by/grabs/23b27f066139eaf7328db9cbdc4f3cba.png
(I haven't figured out the right wording yet.)
If anyone else has any input, please continue to reply, or even email me
directly.
- Blair
On 16/07/2010 12:49 p.m., Blair McBride wrote:
> At the Mozilla Summit, while I was demonstrating the new Add-ons
> Manager, I was told that some locales have no clear distinction between
> the words "extension" and "plugin". This can make it difficult to
> localize the Add-ons Manager, and also confuses users. I believe the
> specific example I was given was Taiwanese.
>
> So, my question is: How many locales have trouble with this? And what
> suggestions do people have to make it better?
>
> Because the Add-ons Manager has been redesigned for Firefox 4, we may be
> able to make changes to the terminology. For example, early in the
> design process, the extensions category was named "Features". Are
> "features" and "plugins" recognizably different in these locales?
>
> - Blair
flod
> One possible solution (also discussed at the summit), would be for the
> Add-ons Manager to include a small snippet of text that describes what
> an extension is, or what a plugin is. This would be shown when you're
> viewing the list of a particular type (it could also be a tooltip of
> each item in the list of categories).
http://support.mozilla.com/en-US/kb/Using%20extensions%20with%20Firefox#What_are_extensions_
http://support.mozilla.com/en-US/kb/Using+plugins+with+Firefox+#What_are_plugins_
Maybe a simple link to those pages? Personally I don't think that an
explanation is really needed in the Extension Manager.
Francesco
Rimas Kudelis
Hi,
well, we translated add-ons, extensions and plugins into three different
words for Lithuanian. However, I personally think that even if I
shuffled those words, nothing would change because essentially their
meanings are really close to each other. In my opinion, this distinction
between plugins and extensions is really technical and quite vague.
Don't we have extensions that ship with binary files? We do! (Lightning)
Don't we have extensions that add new "content type" support? We do!
(WML) And now we actually have two new add-on categories: Personas and
Jetpacks, but for some reason we don't try to make distinction between
them and Themes/Extensions respectively.
IMHO, we should really consider merging lists of extensions and plug-ins
into one list, and just drop the distinction. In fact, I don't think
non-technical users know what that distinction is, and I don't really
see a point in introducing it to them.
Rimas
Axel Hecht
I happen to disagree here. I think it's important that supporters can
understand what they're asked to fix. Even if that's ending up as a "do
you really mean plug-in or add-on?" question to begin with, it helps.
Axel
Blair McBride
> And now we actually have two new add-on categories: Personas and
> Jetpacks, but for some reason we don't try to make distinction between
> them and Themes/Extensions respectively.
To clarify: Firefox makes no distinction between jetpacks and normal
extensions. In fact, jetpacks are just normal extensions - but they're
built using the jetpack SDK, and support restartless installs (but
normal extensions can do this too).
Personas (renamed to either Wallpapers, or Backgrounds, or something
else) are in the Themes category, together with traditional themes. That
category will have a special selector (rather than a list) that will
make the difference understandable. Here's an (early) mockup:
https://wiki.mozilla.org/images/9/9e/Personas_and_wallpapers_mocks_with_previews_at_top.png
> IMHO, we should really consider merging lists of extensions and plug-ins
> into one list, and just drop the distinction. In fact, I don't think
> non-technical users know what that distinction is, and I don't really
> see a point in introducing it to them.
I'll get back to you on this.
- Blair
Julen
>
> Personas (renamed to either Wallpapers, or Backgrounds, or something
> else) are in the Themes category, together with traditional themes. That
> category will have a special selector (rather than a list) that will
> make the difference understandable. Here's an (early) mockup:
> https://wiki.mozilla.org/images/9/9e/Personas_and_wallpapers_mocks_with_previews_at_top.png
Just a couple of comments:
+1 for the renaming of Personas.
As in Spanish "persona" means "person" (and therefore "personas" is the
plural form), it's very hard to use this brand name for Spanish
languages and for languages that are geographically in contact with Spanish.
On the other hand, looking at the screenshots I see a flag icon is used
as a metaphor for languages. While this may be correct in some cases,
there are plenty of languages that are not covered by a flag and don't
even represent a country.
Also, using foo or bar flags may not be ideal as it may raise political
confrontations.
For reference, this was also discussed on the Tango! (Freedesktop) and
Ubuntu BTSs:
https://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=6278
https://bugs.launchpad.net/tango-icon-theme/+bug/40480
Julen.
Khaled Hosny
I second both suggestions, finding a good Arabic translation for
"persona" that captures the same spirit is very hard, and we are not
very satisfied about the current word.
Also, there is no flag that would be representative for Arabic (which is
the official language of 20+ countries), so find a more natural way is
highly preferred.
Michael Wolf
> I second both suggestions, finding a good Arabic translation for
> "persona" that captures the same spirit is very hard, and we are not
> very satisfied about the current word.
Yes, for Upper Sorbian as well and I think for all languages other than
English. It's a word that doesn't have any relation to its function, as
plug-in and bug and this new jetpack. Until now I didn't know that
"jetpack" exists and it is even ambiguous: it describes a special
interface for add-ons and also an add-on that is created by that
interface. Who had the idea about this terrible new term? And this new
word will confuse the most users. Add-on, plug-in, theme, jetpack,
language pack, persona... Who can get it?
> Also, there is no flag that would be representative for Arabic (which is
> the official language of 20+ countries), so find a more natural way is
> highly preferred.
Though Sorbs have a flag, I think it's better to use the language code
resp. locale if the language is a regional variety.
Regards
Michael
Michael Wolf
> Personas (renamed to either Wallpapers, or Backgrounds, or something
> else) are in the Themes category, together with traditional themes. That
> category will have a special selector (rather than a list) that will
> make the difference understandable. Here's an (early) mockup:
> https://wiki.mozilla.org/images/9/9e/Personas_and_wallpapers_mocks_with_previews_at_top.png
What's the difference between "Themes" and "Appearance"? The image shows
the tab Appearance and the content is about themes.
Regards,
Michael
Blair McBride
> On the other hand, looking at the screenshots I see a flag icon is used
> as a metaphor for languages. While this may be correct in some cases,
> there are plenty of languages that are not covered by a flag and don't
> even represent a country.
> Also, using foo or bar flags may not be ideal as it may raise political
> confrontations.
Yea, sorry - please disregard any use of flags anywhere in those
mockups. That part of the mockup was just a reused part from an even
earlier mockup. Flags will NOT be used.
- Blair
Blair McBride
> What's the difference between "Themes" and "Appearance"? The image shows
> the tab Appearance and the content is about themes.
No difference. That mockup is also meant to show that you'll be able to
select both normal themes, and wallpapers (personas). Though the
wallpapers are mostly hidden there. I thought we had a better image
showing that, but I can't find it now.
Nightlies have that category labeled as "Themes", while many mockups
show it as "Appearance". It'll most likely change to be "Appearance",
but I don't think its completely finalized yet.
- Blair
Tim Chien (MozTW)
Have the team ever considered combining the plug-in and extension
list? We all know that users don't read, they skim and click, so
"small snippet of text" won't help, whatever how small it is.
One more reason to combine the list is because they don't pose
significant difference to user, nor the user are required to know the
difference in order to work with the thing correctly.
As of naming, we could alway redefine the word already in use, instead
of introducing new word. I remember some time ago the term "browsing
history" was extend from simply entires of visited sites to everything
browser remembered.
BR,
Tim
On Mon, Jul 19, 2010 at 4:52 PM, Blair McBride <bmcb...@mozilla.com> wrote:
> Thanks for all the information everyone - I learned a lot from this thread.
>
> To summarize: "extensions"/"plugins" isn't ideal, but there doesn't seem to
> be any obviously better words, and using "features" would make it even more
> confusing for many locales.
>
> One possible solution (also discussed at the summit), would be for the
> Add-ons Manager to include a small snippet of text that describes what an
> extension is, or what a plugin is. This would be shown when you're viewing
> the list of a particular type (it could also be a tooltip of each item in
> the list of categories).
>
> For example: http://grab.by/grabs/23b27f066139eaf7328db9cbdc4f3cba.png
> (I haven't figured out the right wording yet.)
>
> If anyone else has any input, please continue to reply, or even email me
> directly.
>
> - Blair
>
>
>
> On 16/07/2010 12:49 p.m., Blair McBride wrote:
>>
>> At the Mozilla Summit, while I was demonstrating the new Add-ons
>> Manager, I was told that some locales have no clear distinction between
>> the words "extension" and "plugin". This can make it difficult to
>> localize the Add-ons Manager, and also confuses users. I believe the
>> specific example I was given was Taiwanese.
>>
>> So, my question is: How many locales have trouble with this? And what
>> suggestions do people have to make it better?
>>
>> Because the Add-ons Manager has been redesigned for Firefox 4, we may be
>> able to make changes to the terminology. For example, early in the
>> design process, the extensions category was named "Features". Are
>> "features" and "plugins" recognizably different in these locales?
>>
>> - Blair
>
Blair McBride
> Have the team ever considered combining the plug-in and extension
> list?
We discussed it earlier today, after it was brought up earlier in this
thread (by Rimas). We didn't come to any real conclusion, but we also
didn't come up with any good reason not to do this. I've posted a thread
in dev-apps-firefox, asking for wider input:
http://groups.google.com/group/mozilla.dev.apps.firefox/browse_thread/thread/34fcea068df9212b#
I'd be great if you could re-post your thoughts there.
Thanks,
- Blair
Blair McBride
> IMHO, we should really consider merging lists of extensions and plug-ins
> into one list, and just drop the distinction. In fact, I don't think
> non-technical users know what that distinction is, and I don't really
> see a point in introducing it to them.
I bought this up with the team. We didn't come to any real conclusion,
Rimas Kudelis
Or we could use flags that the munchkins were carrying during the
summit... :)
Rimas
Rimas Kudelis
> al., 2010.eko uztren 19a 22:46(e)an, Blair McBride(e)k idatzi zuen:
>>
>> Personas (renamed to either Wallpapers, or Backgrounds, or something
>> else) are in the Themes category, together with traditional themes. That
>> category will have a special selector (rather than a list) that will
>> make the difference understandable. Here's an (early) mockup:
>> https://wiki.mozilla.org/images/9/9e/Personas_and_wallpapers_mocks_with_previews_at_top.png
>>
>
> Just a couple of comments:
>
> +1 for the renaming of Personas.
> As in Spanish "persona" means "person" (and therefore "personas" is the
> plural form), it's very hard to use this brand name for Spanish
> languages and for languages that are geographically in contact with
> Spanish.
You could have renamed them to something else. For example, I used a
translation of term "masks" instead of Personas wherever I needed to
translate this word (which is only on web pages anyway).
Wallpapers are fine too, though I guess I would have to resort to
"background image" for that particular term, so I will probably prefer
to keep the Masks metaphor.
Rimas
Marcelo Poli
> al., 2010.eko uztren 19a 22:46(e)an, Blair McBride(e)k idatzi zuen:
>
>
> +1 for the renaming of Personas.
> As in Spanish "persona" means "person" (and therefore "personas" is the
> plural form), it's very hard to use this brand name for Spanish
> languages and for languages that are geographically in contact with
> Spanish.
>
"Thunderbird" with the correct pronunciation) and is used as a trademark.
But, if Personas is renamed as wallpapers without a brand, it's ok.
flod
> +1 for the renaming of Personas.
> As in Spanish "persona" means "person" (and therefore "personas" is
> the plural form), it's very hard to use this brand name for Spanish
> languages and for languages that are geographically in contact with
> Spanish.
"personas" sounds just like Spanish ;-)
That's why we ended up translating it as "theme Personas/themes
Personas", considering "Personas" as the name of the feature.
Francesco
Julen
> El 19/07/10 18:37, Julen escribió:
>> al., 2010.eko uztren 19a 22:46(e)an, Blair McBride(e)k idatzi zuen:
>>
>> Just a couple of comments:
>>
>> +1 for the renaming of Personas.
>> As in Spanish "persona" means "person" (and therefore "personas" is the
>> plural form), it's very hard to use this brand name for Spanish
>> languages and for languages that are geographically in contact with
>> Spanish.
>>
> I disagree. In Argentina "Personas" is easy to say (no one says
> "Thunderbird" with the correct pronunciation) and is used as a trademark.
Sure it's easy to pronounce Personas, but IMHO you don't get sentences
that sound natural, e.g. "Instalar una Persona" or "Descargar una
Persona", that may seem to refer to a physical person.
Julen.
Robert Kaiser
> On the other hand, looking at the screenshots I see a flag icon is used
> as a metaphor for languages. While this may be correct in some cases,
> there are plenty of languages that are not covered by a flag and don't
> even represent a country.
As a side note, this is even true for the most-used localization,
German, which is used in three major countries and probably a number of
other regions. Austrians and Swiss people can be offended by having a
flag of Germany represent the common language of most of their countries.
Robert Kaiser
--
Note that any statements of mine - no matter how passionate - are never
meant to be offensive but very often as food for thought or possible
arguments that we as a community needs answers to. And most of the time,
I even appreciate irony and fun! :)
Eduard Gamonal
> As in Spanish "persona" means "person" (and therefore "personas" is the
>>> plural form), it's very hard to use this brand name for Spanish
>>> languages and for languages that are geographically in contact with
>>> Spanish.
>>>
>>> I disagree. In Argentina "Personas" is easy to say (no one says
>> "Thunderbird" with the correct pronunciation) and is used as a trademark.
>>
>
> Sure it's easy to pronounce Personas, but IMHO you don't get sentences that
> sound natural, e.g. "Instalar una Persona" or "Descargar una Persona", that
> may seem to refer to a physical person.
>
>
same situation for Catalan: it's easy to pronounce but doesn't make much
sense. In addition, it may make our localisation look as if it were
low-quality or even a subset of the Spanish, even if it's an English word
that means "somebody in a novel", or as if we had made a huge mistake.
"persona" is also a word in Catalan. The plural is "PersonEs", not
"personAs". Making mistakes in the usage of plural forms is common among
people with very basic knowledge of our language, but hopefully that is not
us :P