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Install the Babel extension on nds.wikipedia.org
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Description

Please activate Extension:Babel (http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:Babel) on nds.Wikipedia. Link to request on the project: http://nds.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Ik_bruuk_H%C3%BClp#Extension:Babel (Please don't mind the low response rate on the request, it is a small project and nobody opposing basically means support).

Thank you
Slomox
Marcus Buck


Version: unspecified
Severity: enhancement

Details

Reference
bz14207

Event Timeline

bzimport raised the priority of this task from to Low.Nov 21 2014, 10:08 PM
bzimport set Reference to bz14207.
bzimport added a subscriber: Unknown Object (MLST).

jeluf wrote:

Brion,

is this extension ready for production use?

Not sure I understand...

Is this just a fancy userbox template?

robert wrote:

(In reply to comment #2)

Not sure I understand...

Is this just a fancy userbox template?

In essence, yes; but it's primary purpose was to cut down on the number of templates needed -- especially on massively-multi-lingual wikis. Currently you need several tens of thousands of templates to accomodate all languages and levels, and they all need to be maintained individually or with a bot (this is undesirable). It was primarily developed for a non-Wikimedia wiki, but could probably be used on Wikimedia ones with a little optimization (I'd be more than willing to do this if you point out possible resource-heavy areas in the code). Also the extension allows translations to be pooled in one location rather than being distributed across different wikis, making the system more cohesive.

There's got to be a far more efficient way to do that, with, like, one template...

{{babel|en}}
{{babel|fr|2}}

etc.

Have a switch for language names & level styles, and you're set.

What more is needed?

robert wrote:

(In reply to comment #4)

There's got to be a far more efficient way to do that, with, like, one
template...

{{babel|en}}
{{babel|fr|2}}

etc.

Have a switch for language names & level styles, and you're set.

What more is needed?

Well, how would one provide translations for that method in a convenient way?

Regardless of implementation details, the primary audience of the extension was not Wikimedia, I have indicated my willingness to attempt to optimize it for use on Wikimedia wikis (if people want to, which appears to be the case) -- but I'm not too concerned either way.

To clarify, the extension itself provides several features:

  • Ability to specify any language from either ISO 639-1 or ISO 639-3 standards.
  • Ability to specify any level of abbility from 0 through 5 and N (native).
  • Translation of all messages in all languages as much as possible, this means that individual wikis don't have to spend time and effort importing them all.
  • Gender support in languages that support them.
  • Several levels of fallback so something relevant is always displayed, even when a full translation is not present.
  • Loads an existing template from the wiki, if available.

There is also a possibility of script specification (e.g. Cyrl etc.) being added in the future.

I understand how there are other methods of doing this, but this method works for the wiki that the extension was made for, and there is clearly some level of desire for it by other people.

The syntax of the international babel system at the moment is: {{Babel|en|fr-2}}. The wikis have one template for every level of every language. That means 146 templates on nds.Wikipedia (our coverage of languages is very incomplete), and around 1000 templates on de.Wikipedia. The number on en.Wikipedia exceeds 1000, I guess. Even, if you create a system with only one template per language and not for every single level, that will mean about 6000 templates on every wiki in the long run.

A single template wouldn't be that useful, I guess, cause that would mean updating thousands of user pages (or even millions on large wikis) every time someone corrects an spelling error in any of the translations.

Even if it would be technically possible to create a super-template with a 1000-entry switch and 1000 subswitches with the 7 levels used on thousands of user pages (if it shall be complete with all existing languages there will be a (at least) 6000-entry switch used on maybe millions of user pages), that still would mean to maintain the translations on every single project. A spelling error has to be corrected in every single of our 768 Wikimedia projects existing at the moment with the current system, but it had to be corrected only once with the extension (if it would be implemented on all projects).

Maybe your concern is about "just a fancy userbox template". It is not "just" some fancy and useless user page stuff. The smaller the wiki, the bigger the share of foreign users. nds speakers are a minority of the registered users on nds.Wikipedia. Specifying the languages you speak is not just "colorful boxes", but really is important to the work on the project. I guess, "This user loves chocolate"-boxes are not possible with the extension ;-)

robert wrote:

(In reply to comment #7)

but really is important to the work on the project. I guess, "This user loves
chocolate"-boxes are not possible with the extension ;-)

Technicaly this is possible, but the template must be manually created on the target wiki; so, not by default.

ayg wrote:

Does this do anything that bug 4547 wouldn't? Assuming that the feature were fixed up so it were actually usable on Wikimedia (see dependency).

Yes. It has i18n, which the templates do not have.

As well as automatic creation of categories.

ayg wrote:

(In reply to comment #10)

Yes. It has i18n, which the templates do not have.

You mean it will display the boxes in the interface language? That would seem to be a good thing that templates can't do, maybe. Currently Babel templates display in the language that they're referring to, however, plus a language code/number combination that should be pretty comprehensible. I don't know if that advantage is enough to justify a whole special-purpose extension.

(In reply to comment #11)

As well as automatic creation of categories.

Seems like something a bot or simple server-side script could do as easily, since it's just a one-time thing on creation of the wiki. A slight improvement, but again, doesn't seem like much.

Not up to me, though.

Assigning to Roan, mainly because he already has a few other Babel installation requests assigned.

(In reply to comment #13)

Assigning to Roan, mainly because he already has a few other Babel installation
requests assigned.

Unassigning, removing shell. There is nothing to be done by a shell just yet, the extension has to be reviewed first.

So what *is* the correct component? Moving to and from "Site requests" and "Extension setup" isn't helping anyone but the mail server...

Extension setup: New extensions to get installed or enabled. Just like 'Site request' but more specific.

Site requests: Requests for config changes for the sites hosted by the Wikimedia Foundation.

Setting back to "Extension setup". Removed keyword "need-review" because that is being done in bug 15308.

robert wrote:

Closing as WONTFIX, this will be obsoleted by the planned "structured profiles" feature (which is arguably a better implementation of the concept).

robert wrote:

Jumped the gun, sorry.

  • This bug has been marked as a duplicate of bug 29647 ***