545935 - wrong german translation for 'compact folder'

Status: RESOLVED WONTFIX

(Mozilla Localizations :: de / German, defect)

Description

[Samuel Müller]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 6.0; de; rv:1.9.1.7) Gecko/20091221 Firefox/3.5.7 (.NET CLR 3.5.30729)
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 6.0; de; rv:1.9.1.7) Gecko/20100111 Lightning/1.0b1 Thunderbird/3.0.1

in german localized builds the term 'compact folder' is translated 'Ordner komprimieren', which is wrong. translated back to english it means 'compress folder'.
i know that there is no direct translation of the verb 'to compact' into german, we should find a term that comes as close as possible.
i did not compact my folders for years, because i thought thunderbird would *compress* them. i'm sure that there are hundreds of other people not compacting their folders for the same reason.

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1. open file menu or options --> advanced --> network & disk space
2. 
3.

Comment 1

[Alex Ihrig [:Thunderbird_Mail_DE]]

The term "Ordner komprimieren" was discussed many times in the past including a discussion in German support forums. And we had Thunderbird releases using the term "Ordner bereinigen". This term led to the same problems at least.

The term "Ordner komprimieren" is used in other applications like Outlook, too.

I suggest to not close this bug, but I don't have an idea how to solve it. IMHO, the primary problem is, that users don't read documentation.

Comment 2

[Alex Ihrig [:Thunderbird_Mail_DE]]

> I suggest to not close this bug, but I don't have an idea how to solve it.
> IMHO, the primary problem is, that users don't read documentation.

I believe we can't find an existing term in our language, which is describing this typical computer function.

Comment 3

[Alex Ihrig [:Thunderbird_Mail_DE]]

Some suggestions:
- bereinigen
- aufräumen
- ausmisten
- zusammenfassen
- entschlacken
- Speicherplatz freigeben
- konsolidieren
- defragmentieren

Some forum discussions:

http://www.thunderbird-mail.de/forum/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=36150&start=0&hilit=komprimieren

http://www.thunderbird-mail.de/forum/viewtopic.php?f=31&t=25586&start=0&hilit=komprimieren+bereinigen

Comment 4

[Simon Bünzli]

(In reply to comment #3)
IMHO, all of these suggestions sound either more like dataloss or are even less obvious than "komprimieren". And per the first cited discussion, even Windows' defragmentation tool calls this "komprimieren". WONTFIX?

The proper solution would of course be to completely drop this item and just automatically compact the folders whenever at least (half a) MB can be reclaimed. Then users would just get the expected behavior (mailboxes not needing more space than for the emails they still contain) without the confusion. That's a different bug, though...

Comment 5

[Samuel Müller]

(In reply to comment #4)
> The proper solution would of course be to completely drop this item and just
> automatically compact the folders whenever at least (half a) MB can be
> reclaimed. Then users would just get the expected behavior (mailboxes not
> needing more space than for the emails they still contain) without the
> confusion. That's a different bug, though...
agreed! compating is a maintenance action that a piece of software should do automatically to keet itself running. in addition to the folder size i would also compact the folders on a regular basis.

Comment 6

[Robert Kaiser]

1) I don't see us finding a better translation, I believe there is no "correct" one, esp. as people can easily misunderstand "compacting" for something like "compressing" even in US English.

2) That this ideally shouldn't be there may be mostly true but is not topic of a localization bug, look into the MailNews Core product for a common bug about this.

Comment 7

[Simon Bünzli]

For reference: Removing the menu item is bug 286888 for Thunderbird (and WONTFIX'd bug 229034 for SeaMonkey).

Comment 8

[Bruno Baumgartner]

Hi 
I would suggest the following term:

«Endlöschung»

This would be very certain by what it means. However, I admit this term is a bit debatable, as it is very near to that unfamous «Endlösung» during the Nazi-time.

Comment 9

[Bruno Baumgartner]

(In reply to comment #8)
> Hi 
> I would suggest the following term:
> 
> «Endlöschung»
> 
> This would be very certain by what it means. However, I admit this term is a
> bit debatable, as it is very near to that unfamous «Endlösung» during the
> Nazi-time.

I just had the idea for «Schlusslöschung» or «Definitivlöschung»

Comment 10

[Robert Kaiser]

If you want to change that whole meaning of the expression to say "Really delete" or so, please first get the en-US version to accept such a meaning change.

In the German localization, we need to concentrate on translating the word "to compact", and not to inventing a new phrase that describes what the function does in a different slightly wrong way.

Comment 11

[Bruno Baumgartner]

Sorry Robert, you are wrong. Firstly american slang is not the navel language of the world. I am well aware, that in German the meaning of the word «komprimieren» is ment to pack some fixed content smaller, resp. pressing weight on the content. But in any case NOT to delete anything.

The English word «compact» means after Collins English Dictionary and Thesaurus, ed 2001: 1 closely packed together, 2 neatly fitted into a restricted space, 3. concise, brief, 4 well constructed, solid, firm, 5 composed (of), 6.to pack closely together, compress, 7. to form by pressing together (sediment) 8. in Metallurgy: to compress (a metal powder) to form a stable product, 9. designed to be carried in a womens handbag (!, comment by me), 10. US+Can, a small and economical car. Exactly the same definitions like in German. Non of these definitions are in any way related to taking away or reducing content.

Your definition is comparable to the following situation: little Austria uses the word «Karfiol» instead of «Blumenkohl» (cauliflower) and wants now to dictate to the rest of the german speaking world, «Karfiol» is the correct word.

Your idea «really delete» could well be used with: «echt löschen», or, if a space is not wanted with «echtlöschen». The German langauage has seen far worse mutilations then this one. Starting with «Handy» for «mobile phone».

Comment 12

[Robert Kaiser]

(In reply to comment #11)
> Your definition is comparable to the following situation: little Austria uses
> the word «Karfiol» instead of «Blumenkohl» (cauliflower) and wants now to
> dictate to the rest of the german speaking world, «Karfiol» is the correct
> word.

It is. ;-)

But apart from that, US English is the original and normative language for Mozilla, just per definition, not because it would be right or wrong.

Comment 13

[Alex Ihrig [:Thunderbird_Mail_DE]]

If the origin of "Compact folders" comes from database storage/maintenance  operations, we could concentrate on localizing "to pack":

http://de.pons.eu/dict/search/results/?q=to+pack&in=&l=deen

Comment 14

[Nomis101]

The thing is, at the moment you find a lot of FAQ sites explaining what "Ordner komprimieren" means in Thunderbird. And if you rename it, it is hard for somebody to find informations for this function. I agree that you can misunderstood "komprimieren". You first have to read the wiki to know that it is really important to compact your folders: http://kb.mozillazine.org/Compacting_folders
So, whats about renaming it into "Ordner verlustfrei komprimieren" to clarify that there is no dataloss and make a tooltip for mouseover to explain what "komprimieren" means in this context?
And I also agree that the best thing would be to compact automatically without an UI (like most other email clients do), but thats not the point in this bug.

Comment 15

[Sebastian Hengst [:aryx] (needinfo me if it's about an intermittent or backout)]

Closing with the arguments from comment 6. In an ideal world, this will go away with the switch to the maildir storage format where this isn't necessary.