[Bugs] #3698 Pippy UNSP: Pippy has translation issues

[Sugar Labs Bugs]

#3698: Pippy has translation issues
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    Reporter:  manuq                      |          Owner:  dirakx     
        Type:  defect                     |         Status:  new        
    Priority:  Unspecified by Maintainer  |      Milestone:  0.96       
   Component:  Pippy                      |        Version:  Unspecified
    Severity:  Unspecified                |       Keywords:  12.1.0     
Distribution:  Unspecified                |   Status_field:  Unconfirmed
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Comment(by cjl):

 My recommendation for the ultimately necessary long-term re-working of the
 i18n of the toolbar and tooltip strings for Pippy would include
 eliminating the accelerators (keyboard shortcuts) entirely.

 I also happen to think that the Sugar HIG should specifically recommend
 against using accelerators for two reasons.

 1) Accelerators are special characters (usually underscore "_" or
 ampersand "&" prepended to (or embedded in) words that theoretically allow
 the following character to be used as a keyboard shortcut (usually when
 combined with the 'Alt" key).  IMHO, no Sugar activity should have a pull-
 down menu so complex that keyboard shortcuts are needed to make it usable.

 2) The simple fact is that localizers generally do not get L10n of
 accelerators correct in the vast majority of cases.  I have formed this
 opinion in part by looking extensively at AbiWord L10n across many
 languages because AbiWord relies heavily on the "&" accelerator.

 Pippy is a shining example of poor i18n and improper use of the
 accelerator as a keyboard shortcut, in that the accelerator-loaded strings
 are not continuous with a "hint" string describing how to use the
 accelerator.  This violates the i18n principle of making all relevant
 information appear within a single string. Even in *Spanish* (the most
 common second language of Sugar users and developers) the Pippy toolbar
 accelerators have been improperly localized.


 Allow me to point out the specific problem by pasting the relevant section
 of the Pippy PO file:

 #: pippy_app.py:138 pippy_app.py:141
 msgid "_Run!"
 msgstr "¡_Empieza!"

 #: pippy_app.py:139
 msgid "<alt>r"
 msgstr "<alt>r"

 The above should be localized as <alt>e to match _E in "¡_Empieza!".  But
 how is a localizer supposed to know that from the PO file?

 #: pippy_app.py:152 pippy_app.py:158
 msgid "_Stop"
 msgstr "_Parar"

 #: pippy_app.py:153
 msgid "<alt>s"
 msgstr "<alt>s"

 The above should be localized as <alt>p to match _P in "_Parar".  But how
 is a localizer supposed to know that from the PO file?

 #: pippy_app.py:167 pippy_app.py:173
 msgid "_Clear"
 msgstr "_Limpiar"

 #: pippy_app.py:168
 msgid "<alt>c"
 msgstr "<alt>c"

 The above should be localized as <alt>l to match _L in "_Limpiar".  But
 how is a localizer supposed to know that from the PO file?

 When many accelerators are used in a given pull-down menu, it is
 practically impossible to avoid accelerator collisions (hypothetical
 example: _Edit and _Delete become _Editar and _Eliminar).  One particular
 upstream project has reached the point where there are nearly as many
 accelerators in a single pulldown menu as there are letters in the Latin
 alphabet, let alone other alphabets).

 Furthermore, although I cannot point to a specific example, I have
 lingering reservations about whether using "Alt" character combinations
 would ever be advisable on an XO laptop keyboard given the density of the
 key mappings the large number of potential keyboards/scripts we would like
 to be able to support. I have unconfirmed concerns about the possibility
 of this resulting in unexpected consequences depending on the keyboard
 layout and mapping. I think it could take a lot of exploration, that I am
 not personally prepared to do, to confirm or deny the possibility that
 this could result in unexpected behavior on some hypothetical (or future)
 keyboard layout/mapping configuration.

 Just my dos centavos, YMMV.

-- 
Ticket URL: <http://bugs.sugarlabs.org/ticket/3698#comment:14>
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