Translations of Zarr core project website

[steppi]

Hi Zarr team,

With support from the CZI Scientific Python Community and Communications Infrastructure grant, Quansight Labs is able to offer assistance with developing and publishing translations of the brochure websites for the Scientific Python Core Project. You may have seen that translations into some languages are already available for https://numpy.org/, with a version switcher in the top right corner; we're offering to help core projects integrate something similar into their websites. Our aim is to accomplish this in a way that requires minimal effort from the core project maintainers.

I've been tasked with setting up the software infrastructure for translations, and am posting issues today to ask core project teams if they would like to participate. I've published an FAQ here: https://scientific-python-translations.github.io/faq/, with more information. Please take a look and let me know if you have any questions. If you decide to participate, I can begin setting up the translation infrastructure, which will require no work or input from maintainer teams (See here in the FAQ for more details on the process).

[MSanKeys963]

Hi @steppi, thanks for opening the issue.

Continuing our conversation from the Scientific Python Developer 2024 Summit, I think having the Zarr homepage translated into other languages is a good proposal.

Currently, the zarr.dev is running on Jekyll. AFAIR this wouldn't pose any issues for the translation development team, right?

I think we should first define the scope of the translation.

The homepage of zarr.dev does not have much text in it. Would it be possible to include subpages for zarr.dev too?

What languages would be involved?

I'm curious to know what @steppi and others think about which other languages we should include besides English. Perhaps, Español?

What work is expected from the project maintainers?

Personally, I'm in favour of adding the translations to our website repository. I'm curious to see what others think and whether we should consider the other approach. @steppi, among all of the project's websites, which one is the most favourable way to manage the translations?

[steppi]

Thanks for the response @MSanKeys963. I'll try my best to answer your questions.

Currently, the zarr.dev is running on Jekyll. AFAIR this wouldn't pose any issues for the translation development team, right?

Yes, working with Jekyll will be straightforward. Markdown files are well supported by Crowdin, the translation management platform we're using, and solutions for a language switcher already exist.

The homepage of zarr.dev does not have much text in it. Would it be possible to include subpages for zarr.dev too?

Yes, I'd recommend including subpages. Check out what has been translated for numpy.org. It's not just the landing page, but subpages as well. What we consider out of scope is technical documentation. I've checked that every single markdown file in https://github.com/zarr-developers/zarr-developers.github.io plus the _config.yml yields around half of the content to translate as what was done for numpy.org.

I'm curious to know what @steppi and others think about which other languages we should include besides English. Perhaps, Español?

Currently numpy.org has had translations published in Japanese and Portuguese. Translations for Korean have been completed and are awaiting review. I think at least these three languages, since they have active translators. Translations for Simplified Chinese and Spanish are partially completed. For other languages, it's a matter of whether there are interested translators, and whether the number of non-English speakers who speak a given language is large enough to justify the effort.

Personally, I'm in favour of adding the translations to our website repository. I'm curious to see what others think and whether we should consider the other approach. @steppi, among all of the project's websites, which one is the most favourable way to manage the translations?

I think it will be more straightforward to add them directly to your website repository, but we're willing to work with projects who would prefer to have them hosted elsewhere and pulled down at build time.

[melissawm]

Hi all 👋🏻

I wanted to check again if we have a response on this. We are ready to open the projects for translation and I want to make sure we only include projects that are explicitly willing to participate 😄

[d-v-b]

Hi @melissawm, I don't think anyone on the Zarr team is opposed to translations for the core project web site. But I would not start such an effort until we have some v3 documentation up, and we have not even started writing that yet 😭 .

[MSanKeys963]

Thanks for responding, @steppi, and the ping @melissawm. I apologise for my late response and for dropping the ball on this.

Yes, working with Jekyll will be straightforward. Markdown files are well supported by Crowdin, the translation management platform we're using, and solutions for a language switcher already exist.

👍🏻

Yes, I'd recommend including subpages. Check out what has been translated for numpy.org. It's not just the landing page, but subpages as well. What we consider out of scope is technical documentation. I've checked that every single markdown file in https://github.com/zarr-developers/zarr-developers.github.io plus the _config.yml yields around half of the content to translate as what was done for numpy.org.

That's great! Seems like we can go ahead with this.

Currently numpy.org has had translations published in Japanese and Portuguese. Translations for Korean have been completed and are awaiting review. I think at least these three languages, since they have active translators. Translations for Simplified Chinese and Spanish are partially completed. For other languages, it's a matter of whether there are interested translators, and whether the number of non-English speakers who speak a given language is large enough to justify the effort.

Japanese and Portuguese sound good to me. I was wondering whether the Spanish translations are completed by now. Looking at analytics.google.com and talking to several users of Zarr over the years, I think Spanish translations would help us.

I think it will be more straightforward to add them directly to your website repository, but we're willing to work with projects who would prefer to have them hosted elsewhere and pulled down at build time.

I'd also favour the translations added to our website too.

[MSanKeys963]

But I would not start such an effort until we have some v3 documentation up, and we have not even started writing that yet 😭 .

@d-v-b, the translations for the brochure website are not part of the effort. I wonder why you think we should hold up the effort until V3 documentation is complete.

[d-v-b]

my mistake, I thought the technical documentation was in-scope. If the technical docs are not getting translated, then I don't see why the v3 release should be a blocker.

[MSanKeys963]

Thanks, @d-v-b!
@zarr-developers/python-core-devs - any thoughts?

[melissawm]

Hello, folks!

We are happy to announce that we are setting up infrastructure for multiple project’s websites to be translated. It would be great to have Zarr on board.

You can read more in this blog post: Blog - Translations for Scientific Python projects 1

We also have some documentation at https://scientific-python-translations.github.io/

If you are interested in joining this effort, feel free to engage in ⁠the #translation channel of the Scientific Python Discord server where we can give you more info.

See you there! 🚀

[joshmoore]

@steppi @melissawm--

Thanks both. This sounds amazing! (and apologies for the slow response. I blame a very relaxing vacation 😉) I'm certainly supportive of this. I've joined the Discord channel but a caveat that I only check in periodically. See you there.