Make ships translatable

[zonkmachine]

In the Assassination module the answer to chat question "Where do I find {target}" is always the same and the ending looks a bit off as the string doesn't cater for the ship model, a/an.

The ship is Wave and has registration ID QA-7856.

The quick solution is to assume article 'a' as by chance it fits in with all ship models except AC-33. Now the string is off only one out of 27 times.

The ship is a Wave and has registration ID QA-7856.

[impaktor]

Would "of model" fix it?

"of model AC..."
"of model Wave"

or "of make/", "type"?

[bszlrd]

Out of scope, but how about having a "a" or "an" defined in the ship.jsons, so missions could see which to use? Or I'm overthinking again?

[zonkmachine]

Would "of model" fix it?

"of model AC..." "of model Wave"

or "of make/", "type"?

You would make it grammatically correct but it's not how people speak. It would still be annoying.

Out of scope, but how about having a "a" or "an" defined in the ship.jsons, so missions could see which to use? Or I'm overthinking again?

I think you would need to make the ships translatable somehow but I don't know if that would work in a json file. Maybe have ship terms defined in a lua file, make, synonyms, etc. and that could be easily translatable.

[zonkmachine]

OK, I'll try a simple "ships" json file.

[zonkmachine]

As it turns out the AC33 doesn't seem to show up as a target vehicle. The model seem to be guided by MissionUtils.ShipTemplates.GenericMercenary . I fail to grasp the selection process.

I have made a simple /data/lang/ships/en.json file with modelName as key and it seem to work just fine.

    "ac33": {
        "description": "",
        "message": "an AC-33 Dropstar"
    },
    "bluenose": {
        "description": "",
        "message": "a Bluenose"
    },

[zonkmachine]

This now works but only with new games so it wouldn't be for the next release. I think maybe, especially if the AC-33 isn't even ever selected for assassination targets, that the first one-liner still has the merits of just bringing good and you can add it to the next release. The new fuller version is better in the long run and can be applied to other modules as well.

[zonkmachine]

"a Pumpkinseed Police"

I guess this wouldn't look good in the game.

The ship is a Pumpkinseed Police and has registration id {shipregid}.

Maybe

"a Pumpkinseed police ship" ?
The ship is a Pumpkinseed police ship and has registration id {shipregid}.

[zonkmachine]

[impaktor]

Out of scope, but how about having a "a" or "an" defined in the ship.jsons, so missions could see which to use?

Sounds like an ugly hack that would also only be specific to English.

I'm not convinced the best and simplest work-around is to re-word the context in which it is used, something along the lines of my initial suggestion, but that's just, like, my opinion.

[zonkmachine]

I'm not convinced the best and simplest work-around is to re-word the context in which it is used, something along the lines of my initial suggestion

Unfortunately that creates a language that isn't flowing very well and that's how it's done all over the code. I've tried rephrasing stuff like that and it doesn't work as well as the real deal. On the other hand, I've poked around ways to address it and in precisely every case it runs away in complexity super fast. My wet dream right now is to just pipe the strings, at least some of them, to an external app that can fix them up on the fly with at least the most basic stuff, like a/an or genitive s or whatever is most worth it in other languages.

I think this way of doing it here, by making the ships translatable, is a reasonable way of doing it. Lot's of strings but a simple to understand idea so it should be easy on the translators. It will take some consideration though. You could add more fields for the ships so some of them could have alternative names or nicknames. The AC-33 could be either AC-33 or Dropstar or both.

I think it is also reasonable to merge the original one-line fix for the up coming stable bug fix. It's a small change but that string is on ever single assassination mission and it looks bad.

I approve of this message.

[zonkmachine]

    "ac33": {
        "description": "",
        "message": "an AC-33 Dropstar"
    },

As I understand it, as these are new translations, the strings here would be pushed to all other languages and come out with English articles. That wouldn't be good. Is there a way to do a first push to Transifex with ships.json without articles so the translations will look the same as today and then change the strings in a later commit?

[zonkmachine]

push to Transifex with ships.json without articles

Do all languages at the same time and with the same English translation without article or with a rough automatic translation? This is where we could use Grok right?

[impaktor]

Is there a way to do a first push to Transifex with ships.json without articles so the translations will look the same as today and then change the strings in a later commit?

No, not that I know of.

Do all languages at the same time and with the same English translation without article or with a rough automatic translation? This is where we could use Grok right?

Hm? When you push they get the default English until translated. However, the cron-job that pulls the strings back to master doesn't like to run, so at the moment nothing gets back to master until I kick the machine (which we also do when releasing new version)

[zonkmachine]

When you push they get the default English until translated.

Yes, but the strings are still in the English original. If we merge this, all languages will show ups with the English article. I looked at some language files and it looks like Swedish, Danish, Italian, and French, all could use their ship file with just the current name added. You don't need to be a translator to manage that. If we pushed these file pretranslated, would Transifex accept that?

[zonkmachine]

If we pushed these file pretranslated, would Transifex accept that?

This is what I mean. Last commit sees an example of sv.json but with just the same ship names that the string sees today.

    "ac33": {
        "description": "",
        "message": "AC-33 Dropstar"
    },

[zonkmachine]

OK. Definitely not a quick fix no longer.

Added strings for Search and Rescue too. The variable names are not unison for the modules. Will fix.

[impaktor]

Would like thoughts from @sturnclaw here, on if adding a translation module ship is the best solution (and if it is to be added, would the name be "ships-core" or "ships"?)

(Besides, this will need further hooking up into transifex upon merge, by me)

[zonkmachine]

(Besides, this will need further hooking up into transifex upon merge, by me)

It's a bit like #5852. Did you have to do anything special on merge?
Edit: Got it. You temporarily added a script to parse all translation files in that PR.

[impaktor]

@zonkmachine no, difference is this adds a new module, that needs some configuring on transifex side.

[Mc-Pain]

Where do I find {target}
< [...] The target is using Wave with registration ID QA-7856.

[zonkmachine]

Where do I find {target}
< [...] The target is using Wave with registration ID QA-7856.

Please be more verbose. What am I looking at here?

[Mc-Pain]

Where do I find {target}
< [...] The target is using Wave with registration ID QA-7856.

Please be more verbose. What am I looking at here?

Oops. It was not supposed to be a quote.
It was a suggestion to change answer in order to resolve the issue.

[zonkmachine]

Oops. It was not supposed to be a quote.
It was a suggestion to change answer in order to resolve the issue.

Sorry, English is not my first language. ; )
A - What is that issue?
B - What is the solution?