1207218 - [it] Evaluate localization quality audit for mozilla.org

Status: RESOLVED FIXED

(Mozilla Localizations :: it / Italian, defect)

Description

[Francesco Lodolo [:flod]]

Attachment: Mozilla Audit_Feedback form_IT.docx

Hi,
Engagement hired an external agency to evaluate the quality of some of our top locales on mozilla.org

Attached to this bug is a Word version of the report received, and we'd like to know if you find this kind of report useful.

We'd also like to get back to the agency with feedback on the report and the error reported (some of them are not really report, just improvement suggestions that could be debatable). My personal suggestion would be to use Google Doc or a similar rich text format.

Let me know if you have any questions.

Comment 1

[Francesco Lodolo [:flod]]

Note to others. I'm going to open a Google Doc with a first set of notes, will also send a message to the forum later.

Comment 2

[Francesco Lodolo [:flod]]

Added a "comment" to each note, and to the conclusions
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1v8aBT0Pkj8mBNgs8_V5Ifchg4GmU15UnPZKaq3qv3nc

Right now the document is open for comments, let me know your Google account if you want to edit directly.

Thoughts?

A few comments are reasonable and I tried to apply them in r146914.

Comment 3

[Sandro Della Giustina]

I agree with many of the suggestions made in the document, the only with I not agreeing its the suggestions to translate Mozilla Security Blog, it is in english and  it is the name of the blog.

Tomorrow I look at the revision you have made more deeply and I made a further check on all files on mozilla.org for consistency.

Comment 4

[Sara Todaro]

My general thoughts about the audit.
Aside for the most obvious corrections (grammar errors and inconsistincies on the same page), which are to be improved in the future through a more rigorous QA and more thoroug inspection of the final web page, I would say that the most thought-provoking comment is
>the style is often not so “marketing” and especially not adequate for the web. For the online content we can say “the shorter the better”. The sentences are often unnecessary long, with too many verbs or complicated verb forms. I would always use the present tense and the active form of the verbs - if possible, of course. This seems important to me especially in the first call-to-call on the pages: it should captivate the attention, be engaging and concise.
I sometimes feel the same way about some choices of translation.
For the Italian locale it has generally been chosen an impersonal and sober style in line with software localization standards in our Country and substantially different from the en-US user friendly easy going style. This has been, in my opinion, a good choice for the areas of support and technical information, because it fosters an aura of professionalism and high standards, dispelling the notion that since Mozilla is a no-profit organization based on the work of volunteer contributors, it offers somewhat inferior products compared to other big companies.
However I believe a line should be drawn between support/technical instructions and marketing material. In the latter, as the audit suggests, we should be less tied to the source text and make less use of technicisms and complex phrasing to pursue a more snappy, engaging style of communication.
This is no easy feat because of our old, rooted habits. Still, I believe it's worth to try and change our approach a bit in regards to marketing and promotional material. As a mean to change our approach I would suggest that both translator and QA members, after checking consistency and correctness, make a further step and switch their point of view from "localizer" to "normal user", then re-read the text thinking if they would find it appealing as a normal person stumbling on it during navigation.

Another point: about "free" being translated with "indipendente" (independent), I think the intendend meaning is slightly different: the "freedom" in Mozilla is not simply a matter of independence, it also means that anyone is able to copy, change and distribute the software. I think that this important implication is lost in the audit choice "indipendente".

@flod since I'm curious to read your comments, and maybe I may still add something later, I've now asked for permission to access the google doc from my account todaro.sr

Comment 5

[Francesco Lodolo [:flod]]

(In reply to Sara Todaro from comment #4)
> @flod since I'm curious to read your comments, and maybe I may still add
> something later, I've now asked for permission to access the google doc from
> my account todaro.sr

Comment are marked in orange inside the document, you should be able to see them even without edit permissions? Anyhow, you now have permission to edit ;-)

Comment 6

[Francesco Lodolo [:flod]]

(In reply to Francesco Lodolo [:flod] from comment #5)
> Comment are marked in orange inside the document, you should be able to see
> them even without edit permissions? Anyhow, you now have permission to edit
> ;-)

And it wasn't, I put the wrong permissions. Now it should be visible.

Comment 7

[Sara Todaro]

Thanks @flod! I incorporated my above comments in the document, as well as a few lines of evalutation on the usefulness of this audit (which I forgot to explicitly state before -_-' )

Comment 8

[Francesco Lodolo [:flod]]

I think the review is done, feedback available at
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1v8aBT0Pkj8mBNgs8_V5Ifchg4GmU15UnPZKaq3qv3nc