[NTLK] Followup - Spanish translation of pda-soft: Looking for help

[Frank Gruendel]

Mickey suggested...

>	<http://labnol.blogspot.com/2006/11/add-google-translation-flags-to-your.html>

James answered...

> I'm going to go out on a limb here and speculate that, for Mr. Gruendel, good enough....probably
isn't good enough. :)

Hmm, smart thinking. What on earth did you conclude THAT from? It's true, though...

Of course, everyone is entitled to his own definition of "good enough". I just copied the code
snippet they offer into the page I'm currently working on and tried a tranlation from English to
German. For a start, this requires javascript. Getting rid of javascript is one of the reasons why
I'm currently rewriting my site from scratch. It's OK to improve the overall browsing experience for
people who have javascript turned on (although I hardly ever do it). It's definitely NOT OK to
require javascript for seeing the content at all. I want my pages to be available to ALL users, not
only those who choose (or are allowed by admins managing their computers) to have javascript turned
on. I, for one, have it turned off by default. I sometimes turn it on when it can't be helped, but
mostly I avoid sites that leave users without javascript out in the rain.

Apart from that, the translation from English to German was, well, let's say subject to improvement.
When I wasn't rolling on the floor laughing, I was contemplating how long it would take me to close
this page and spend my time elsewhere. Unless my life depended on the info expected to find, I
probably wouldn't make it to the second paragraph. Unfortunately, only those who translate into a
language they speak fluently will see the humorous side. The rest will see something they'll often
have a problem understanding or will even misunderstand.

One thing I haven't mentioned yet is my intention to provide a text-only version of every page on my
site. Eventually I want pda-soft.de to be fully browseable (this word looks so weird that I doubt it
exists...) with a Newton or eMate. Online translation services would prevent this. They require all
kinds of things no Newton browser on this planet can do.

Old Mr. Jack Daniel once said "Whatever we do, we'll do the best we can". This, in my humble
opinion, is one of the best mottoes one can have. Mine is an extended version. The extension is "If
I can't do it good enough myself, I'll have it done or I'll leave it be."

If you think I'm crazy, you are absolutely right. Doug Parker will confirm it. He's one of the list
members to whom I'm indebted most because again and again he voluntarily suffers from my thinking
like Mr. Jack Daniel. Quite often, while being in the process of turning my feeble attempts at
writing in a foreign language into decent English, we discuss the benefits and drawbacks of single
words used in particular contexts for days. If (once it's published) you compare the English version
of the page I'm currently working on to the other pages on my site, you'll see the difference. If
someone on this list deserves a medal, it's him :-)

Cheers

Frank (who never deviates from the subject he's replying to)

-- Newton software and hardware at http://www.pda-soft.de