German localization of iDempiere

[blacklevel]

Hello,

currently I am working on improving the German localization of [A|i]Dempiere. What I try to contribute is

(1) improved SKR04 chart of accounts

(2) streamline and complete the German translation

(3) integrate the existing Datev-Export functionality (the Metas stuff)

I would be grateful for some guidance on how to proceed. I guess (1) should be easy. I just complete the COA file and post it here for review, like I did in this thread: http://red1.org/adempiere/viewtopic.php?f=31&t=1693

(2) is not as simple. Currently, I am using the ADempiere Translation Project (http://www.adempiere.com/index.php/TranslationProject) as basis. That should work well along with the 361 branch (https://bitbucket.org/CarlosRuiz_globalqss/adempiere361) because ADempiere 3.60LTS seems to be the current basis for the Tranlation Project.

I have already put some 2000+ translations there into the launchpad repo (https://translations.launchpad.net/aderp/trunk/+lang/de). It is still very far, far from being complete, correct, consistent or even mildly acceptable (I am referring only to my own personal contributions, of course). However, I will do my best to improve this as much as possible over the next months.

Is there a preferred method to get this into iDempiere? Do you guys already/still use the Translation Project as the source for the current translations? As a fork, iDempiere probably already has a delta of elements which only exist in ADempiere 3.7+ or iDempiere 1.x. Is that a problem? As I currently understand it, the Translation Project assumes that ADempiere's current en_US "translation" should be used as source for all elements that need to be translated. If that is so, then, it is probably a bad idea to introduce "foreign" terminology which only exists in iDempiere into the translation project.

Any thoughts?

With (3) I have not even started yet. Primarily because I am unsure of how to approach this. Since the Datev Export is specific for Germany, does it really make sense to merge it into the iDempiere core? Instead, would it make more sense to put it into a plugin, extension or something of that sort which can be installed/uninstalled by the end user?

Another reason for why I have not started yet is that I know I will be way over my head with this. But I am the curious type, hopefully no too old to learn new tricks.

Cheers

Michael

[redhuan d. oon]

I assumed you must have contacted both Thomases at the http://wiki.idempiere.org ? They are both German speaking in Germany and earlier this year i worked with T. Bayen on the best translation from Jens Pfeifer.

[redhuan d. oon]

Also about Datev plugin, i believed Joerg Viola has done exactly that. Please check out http://www.adempiere.com/images/2/20/Adempiere-Equinox.pdf
 and background reading here http://www.adempiere.com/ADempiere/Equinox_Integration_2

On Wednesday, 31 October 2012 17:52:42 UTC+8, blacklevel wrote:

[blacklevel]

Actually, no, I haven't. Since I failed to find any suitable contact information I was hoping to get in touch with the right people here in this group.

Regarding the translation effort: I am very interested in providing/merging my work for the iDempiere project. Right now I merge all my translation efforts to the Adempiere translation project, because I that seemed to be the proper way to (a) make it available to the largest group of interested people (b) launchpad makes it easy to collaborate on a translation and (c) I did not know how else to proceed.

In the meantime I have worked on the German translation on several thousand items. I have reached the point where I need to make a decision. The translations on launchpad do not cover all elements which iDempiere currently has. Even Carlos' ADempiere 3.61_globalqss Branch is not covered entirely. Now, I could bring in the missing translations into the launchpad project. But I have no idea if that makes sense on a technical (or even political) level, or is even welcome by any party involved.

Another option would be to directly work on the iDempiere translation. How are the translation efforts handled in iDempiere technically? I mean do you have a special process or procedure which should be followed?

[blacklevel]

Oh, that is interesting, thanks a lot. Do you know if the OSGi version of the Datev plugin is publicly available or is it proprietary code?

[redhuan d. oon]

I have emailed both Thomases and copy you in the email. Also i wrote Joerg Viola about Datev.
About coding plugin it takes a good reading study but it is very interesting if you know some Java. I strongly recommend you to join in. And i like to welcome you to our project. :)

On Wednesday, 31 October 2012 17:52:42 UTC+8, blacklevel wrote:

[blacklevel]

Thank you, Redhuan, that is very much appreciated. I will give my best, hoping that it will be useful for the project and its community, and see what the future brings.

Cheers

Michael

[Thomas Bayen]

Hello Michael,

Thomas Thiessen and I are working on the german wiki at
http://wiki.idempiere.org/de/ and on the german translation. We would
be happy to discuss your thoughts.

I am not a friend of the launchpad translation. It helps with creating
very fast very much translations. But it is bad for the subtleties
that arise from the context. Very often it is difficult to find the
right business term. I personally prefer the evenos translation.

We wanted to define a procedure to "repair" wrong terms while working
with iDempiere (in the situation where you see the context) and to
upload them to a common place to share it with others. I would like
you to join our effort.

I am also interested in your chart of acounts. Did you realize that
there are many new rules regarding to "E-Bilanz" beginning with 2013?

Thomas

2012/11/5, blacklevel <michael.h...@gmail.com>:

[Thomas Bayen]

BTW: Some months ago I collected all sources of translations in the
old wiki: http://www.adempiere.com/German_Language_Pack


2012/11/5, Thomas Bayen <thomas...@googlemail.com>:

[blacklevel]

Hi Thomas,

thank you that is great news. I'd be more than happy to merge my efforts with yours if you find them useful.

Regarding launchpad for the translation I can see where you are coming from... and agree. :) That is why I do not use the Launchpad webinterface for the actual translation. Instead I use Lokalize (http://userbase.kde.org/Lokalize - in case you don't know it) to work on the .po files. This tool has great features to locate and fix inconsistent usage of terminology. To generate the XML I use tool4po.py, which also works well.

I do this in iterations. After each iteration I import the current state of translations into [a|i]dempiere and check the results. It is exactly as you wrote: if the context is not exactly correct, the translated text can be anything ranging from ambiguous up to being completely wrong.

Right now I am pretty much in the middle of it, which means still a long way to go. From the translation file I use all iDemepiere specifics are still missing. Even stuff which exists in the ADempiere 3.61_globalqss branch is not available. The reason for this is that I do not know what the Adempiere translation team on launchpad thinks about introducing iDempiere specific translations into their repository. I have asked the mailinglist a couple of days ago but have not received an answer yet.

Before Redhuan mentioned it here in this discussion I was unaware that there are translations available other than those in the official repos and the one on launchpad. Is there a chance to take a look at the current state of your improved "evenos translation"? I would like to get a feel for of how much it differs from what you have right now. For now you can access my "almost most recent" translations on Launchpad. Usually they lag a day or so behind. If you like I could also send you my most current state of translation via Email or post them someplace convenient.

Regarding the Chart of Accounts: that is also still unfinished, but it should not be too much work to finish it. What I am doing is to align the SKR04 variant with the official 2012 version provided online as PDF by Datev. Currently I am struggling with the Account-Editor which refuses to let me change the hierarchy. It looks as if the hierarchical structure can only be modified using libreoffice or a text editor.

Cheers

Michael

[redhuan d. oon]

I am asking this on behalf of Russian translator, Aleksandr Ryabikov who wants iDempiere ready with all new fields translated into Russian when i arrive on April 10th.

Question: Does your translation cover the ZK UI new terms or fields? Is this a matter of using the old way of filling in some window or xml (from my memory of working with Thomas Bayen in Krefeld.)

[blacklevel]

Our translation (or at least the version from my end) is based on the XML export generated from "Translation Export/Import". As such it should cover everything, including ZK. In theory. In practice it means that sometimes things are not translated. I.e. the translation of the new ZK Info Windows started working just recently after something was fixed in the code. There are still some stubborn elements (but very few) which refuse to translate.

I also should mention that I have not been able to work on the translation for a few weeks. So maybe the latest version could have some recent changes in ZK missing.

I hope that answers your question.