Help:Contents/Translation Rules
We welcome any help with translating things on the wiki. However, please be sure to follow the rules we have regarding minimum levels of fluency.
Note that there are two separate things people can translate on the wiki: small pieces of unused text, images, etc. that are a piece of a larger article; and translating the entire article itself. While the rules we have for doing both are largely the same, adding a translation to an article requires no special preparation. However, when translating an entire page via the available translation plugin, some preparation of the article is needed before work can begin.
Contents
General Guidelines
Fluency
Please only translate into languages you speak natively, or have a native degree of fluency in. Don't use Google Translate or other automated translators. When you do so, the preceding two sentences come out looking something like the following: "One only native speakers in the conversion of native is fluent, has a degree. Google translate or does not use other automated translation." Do not use OCR tools unless you are capable of going through their output and checking it against the original source for accuracy, since they are not accurate enough to produce reliable results on their own.
For translating from other languages, you should have a level of fluency high enough to understand the material in question. Be careful when "fixing" or "improving" existing translations; they may have been deliberately worded the way they were so as to reflect the original source. When in doubt, ask!
Grammar/Spelling
Use proper grammar, spelling, and punctuation at all times. Do your best to check over your writing before you save the page!
Translating Content for Articles
Transcribing Text
If you are not fluent enough to transcribe text from an image, please post said image and mark it with {{needstranslation|lang=ja|Reason}} for Japanese text. Replace "lang=ja" with whatever language code may apply if the source text is in a different language (e.g. "lang=ko" for Korean, "lang=fr" for French, etc.) Replace "Reason" with something descriptive like "Debug options need to be translated" or "Kanji in lower-right corner of image needs to be translated".
Translating Text
Likewise, if you are not fluent enough to translate text, post it to the article in question and mark it with {{needstranslation|lang=ja|Reason}}, following the above rules. Do not replace the original text that was extracted from the game; instead, show both the original text as well as the translation of that text. This also goes for image translations.
Formatting Tables for Translators to Use
Whenever possible, please add the text you wish to be translated to a table, leaving one side of it blank where the translation will be placed. This allows our translators to focus their effort on translating the text in question, rather than spending additional time on formatting the text to fit well on the page.
Two sample tables are provided below, but contributors are encouraged to adapt and expand these to suit the task at hand:
| Code: |
{|class="wikitable"
!Japanese
!Translation
|-
|Japanese text goes here
|(Leave this side blank for translators to fill in)
|-
|Japanese text goes here
|
|-
|Japanese text goes here
|
|}
|
| Code: |
{|class="wikitable"
!Japanese
|-
|Japanese text goes here
|-
!Translation
|-
|(Blank for translators to fill in)
|}
|
Translating Entire Pages
We're currently translating some of the main pages of TCRF (including the help page, templates, sidebars, and front page) into multiple languages. Though we are just starting out, some articles are also marked to be translated as well. If you would like to help, please contact GlitterBerri or counterDiving.
Read these guidelines before you start translating.
Required Reading
Before attempting to use the wiki's translation options, please read through the Translate extension's documentation.
Required reading for translators are, at the bare minimum, the translation tutorial and best practices pages.
Translation administrators also are required to read the page translation example.
Categories
Don't translate the publisher and developer names for consistency across languages. Make sure the system names included in the Bob match up with those in the existing category.
{{subpage}} Translation
When translating the {{subpage}} template, DO NOT translate the title (the text between the first and second | marks). Instead, add a |tr= onto the end (before the }}) with the translated title. {{subpage|Unused text|tr=Texto sin usar}} becomes:
 | Texto sin usar |
But would link to Help:Contents/Translation Rules/Unused text (when used on translated pages).
Placeholder Translations
Any translation made solely to translate the article headers is highly discouraged, as it can be considered the equivalent of a placeholder page. These can be deleted if nothing more than the headers is translated after one week.
Documentation
The documentation area in the translation tool allows you to add notes as to the context of a certain section or text within said section. Note that the documentation you write here is global (it shows up for all languages in the translation tool), so if you mention something about a specific language's translation, it will also be visible when translating to another.
User Page Language Template
To help aid communication between users that speak multiple languages, a template can be added to your user page to display your language proficiencies. Detailed usage instructions can be found on the Babel extension page.
We encourage all users who have any degree of second language ability to add the above template to their user page. A simple example is as follows {{#babel: en-N | ja-3 }}
Templates
Instead of translating the title of the template, use {{template/lang}}, where template is the name of the English language template and lang is the language to be used.
Current Translators
These people listed below have listed themselves as being a translator on the wiki. Please feel free to leave a message for them asking for their help, but also be aware that their time may be limited and that they may not be able to respond to all requests in a timely manner. They are volunteers, just like everyone else at the wiki.
1468z - Italian
Bast - Upkeep & Maintenance, Japanese
BreakingBenny - Swedish
Comboy - Japanese
Centaurio - Polish
counterDiving - Spanish
Edness - Latvian
Espyo - European Portuguese
Enrospv - Spanish
Gamma - Spanish
GarfLarf - French
GlitterBerri - Japanese
Gordon CMB - Russian
inductor - Japanese
inetidkm - Korean
Laenthor - French
LuigiBlood - French
Luna - Polish, French (if you absolutely have to)
Mugg1991 - German
Paul Jensen - Japanese
Sky Yoshi - Japanese
SMWHackedHACK - Brazilian Portuguese
TempleofDreams - Brazilian Portuguese
Ticamus - French
WaluigiBSOD - Italian
Yoxiz - French
zerojay - French
Pages In Need of Translation
An up-to-date list of pages tagged for translation can be found at Category:Articles needing translation. Additionally, articles simply in need of proofreading or of simply having their translations checked can be found at Category:Articles needing proofread.
