Inconsistent terminology in Wikibase messages
Closed, ResolvedPublic
Actions

Assigned To

None

Authored By

	• bzimport
	Feb 25 2013, 5:27 PM

Description

Author: mange01

Description:
Regarding the Wikibase message definition file:
http://wikidata-docs.wikimedia.de/testcoverage/phpcoverage/20130208/extensions_Wikibase_repo_Wikibase.i18n.php.html

Problems

The word "title" should not be confused with "label", in the wikibase-label-input-help-message. The English help message says "Enter the title of this data set in English". In other languages this message seems to use words for "title" or "name". This text occurs if you try to edit a label, and click on the question mark. The user interface does not show that the field is called label.

Sometimes the messages talk about "data set", sometimes "entity". I think we should reduce the number of terms that an ordinary user would come in contact with, and stick to one of them. "Entity" seems to be more common in the project, but on the other hand it has been confused with "item" in Wikidata, since in other ontologies (e.g. GND), an entity is a data base representation of a real world concept.

Suggestions
Change this message into "Enter the title of this entity in $1" in various languages. And stick either to "entity" or "data set" in all messages.

This issue is also discussed at
http://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata_talk:Glossary#Labels_called_titles

Version: unspecified
Severity: major
Whiteboard: u=dev c=frontend p=0

Details

Reference: bz45363

Related Objects
Search...

Status	Assigned	Task
Resolved	None	T47363 Inconsistent terminology in Wikibase messages
Resolved	None	T49317 Create clear vocabulary for technical terms for usage throughout ui messages and as reference for translators
Resolved	None	T64778 aggregate list of non user-friendly messages on Wikidata

Event Timeline

• bzimport raised the priority of this task from to High.Nov 22 2014, 1:23 AM

• bzimport added a project: MediaWiki-extensions-WikibaseRepository.

• bzimport set Reference to bz45363.

• bzimport added a subscriber: Unknown Object (MLST).

• bzimport created this task.Feb 25 2013, 5:27 PM

mange01 wrote:

More inconsistency:

Stick to one of the terms "datatype", "data type" or "value type". Avoid "value\'s data value type".
Stick to one of the terms "snack type", "value type" or "type".

This also relates to bug 47317 which I just created. For cleaning up existing messages and making them more consistent, we should perhaps define a simpler terminology, better understandable for the average user.

It would be nice if the different languages could be checked to see if the messages in fact adhere to the naming set forth in
https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:Glossary
for those languages.

I'm not sure this one really creates problems, but the label even if it sometimes take the role of the title it is not a real title in mediawiki-sense. That means you can not link on the label as the system is now.

The entity should be the thing out there in the real world. The item is the thing as it is described in the repo. This is two different aspects and make it possible to talk about the entity and its described properties.

There are even more now, property type has become common. There is one type of property I think, but it can consist of value objects with various types. There are other types involved, so this needs some careful though. Perhaps it is easier to be slightly unspecific and only talk about the data type for the property.

This one is difficult as those are in fact different.

Change 142997 had a related patch set uploaded by Thiemo Mättig (WMDE):
Update some poor English messages in Repo

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/142997

Change 142997 merged by jenkins-bot:
Update some poor English messages in Repo