wgo i18n

["Jens W. Klein" <jens bluedynamics com>]

Before starting to work on the issues around i18n I need to have 
definitive requirements. Btw. The wiki is not in a good state to get a 
picture. But I think I found what I need.

I found some more docs, but took the mentioned posting of Quim Gil 
(26.Oct.2006) as the base.

Plone offers by default:

- Translation of static parts (in templates and code) using GNU Gettext 
(PO/POT-Files) 
- non-western/ RTL (latter using a CSS switch as well)
- automatic session & browser-language negotation (Plone)

LinguaPlone is an Add-On for Plone to translate content. Is does primary 
the following: 
- Translation of all "content" managed by the CMS like text, html, 
  images, files, ...
- It build up parallel content-trees, one for each language, url-parts 
  are included in translation.
- Only one tree is shown (selected language), the others are hidden 
  from navigation and search. 
- Translations are kept together internally using (hidden) references. 
- offers simple UI to manage translations.

also it should be possible to assign editor permission to only one 
content tree or subtree (or single document). I just fear its difficult 
to allow people to create the translated document.

Next lets come to problematic parts:

1) Partial translated content. 

For all static parts this in no problem, but work to be done. For content 
it can be a problem.
For WGO english is the (in LinguaPlone terms called) 'canonical' 
language. As I said LingauPlone work internal with parallel content-trees 
if a user switched to spanish and there are untranslated documents, those 
are not shown. Theres no fallback. Some time ago I build an addon called 
BlueLinguaLink which helps setting proxy-links to the version in the 
canonical language. I'd need to update it to make it work with Plone 3.2 
and latest LinguaPlone. 


2) translation workflow with XML export/ import. 

I dont know any good tool for such a workflow. I think Sasha from 
Valentine talked about an xml-based workflow with translation-offices 
some years ago at a Plone Conference. If this is really needed I can dig 
into this to see if there are solutions around. 


3) "work on translation in non-public environment" 

I'd use working-copy-support to have a live version online and a private 
working version to edit. This is new in Plone 3 and works fine (even if I 
never tested it together with LinguaPlone, what I'll do now).

Can you please comment and add missing features?

regards
-- 
Jens W. Klein - Klein & Partner KEG - BlueDynamics Alliance