NUPP Translation

NUPP is an open, freedom-respecting system that belongs to everyone in the world, so it’s great to have it in as many languages as possible. All translations are done by volunteers who contact us and offer their help; people like yourself!

If you don’t see the manual in your favorite language and would like to contribute its translation, please read this page first to understand the amount of work and the process, and then contact us to make arrangements. Please do not start translating before contacting info@omimo.org because other volunteers may already be working on the same language.

On this page, you will find

License

When you contribute a translation, you agree to license it with a Creative Commons Attribution license (CC BY 4.0), similar to the English version of the website, and that it will be managed by OMIMO. The attribution will be OMIMO, and with your consent, your name can be added to the bottom of the inner pages as the translator.

Approach

Some people use machine translation (e.g., Google Translator) to translate everything into the target language and then review the output and make adjustments. Please don’t do that! It never results in a good enough text that the audience deserves.

Amount of work

The translatable content of NUPP is about 6,200 words, equivalent to about 12 pages of standard text. This is usually different from the number of pages in the downloadable PDF because of the layout of pages, repeated content such as list of activities and digram, etc.

Please note that the PDF and other downloadable versions of the manual should not be used for translations. The translation package is available toward the end of this guide.

The general approach

You don’t have to stick to the words and sentences in NUPP; the only important thing is the meaning behind the words. So, feel free to use any construct in the target language that can convey the meaning in a simple and clear way. If you have any doubts about the meaning of something, let us know, and we can explain it to you.

Translating key phrases

There may be several ways to translate a key phrase. Usually, the more common translation in the target language is preferred. If you’re unsure how to translate a key phrase, check the existing technical texts in your target language.

For example, suppose you’re wondering how to translate “wisdom of the crowd”. In that case, you can open its English page in Wikipedia and then use the languages section on the sidebar of Wikipedia to open the same page in your target language (if it exists) and see how it’s translated:

Key phrases

This is a list of key phrases in NUPP:

It’s a good idea to translate the key phrases at the beginning and use them as a reference throughout the work. This is especially important if more than one volunteer is working on a translation, as it keeps the output consistent.

Some of the key phrases may be in common with other OMIMO modules (e.g., “peer review” and “minimalist”). Needless to say, the translations of all modules should be compatible with each other. Therefore, it’s always a good idea to check if other modules are already translated into your target language, and if so, how the common key phrases are translated.

Translating phrases from other modules

Sometimes, one module refers to phrases from another module; e.g., P3.express refers to the NUPP principles. In such cases, check the other module to see if it’s already translated to your target language, and if so, use the exact same phrase from that translation to keep them consistent.

The diagram

The diagrams are generated automatically from the content you translate, and you don’t need to do anything special or extra for translating them.

Translation packages

The following are the latest source files of the existing NUPP languages:

You can use any language as your primary source and create the files for the target language. You may be able to use a second or third language for inspiration as well.

Please do not change the file names, as they are used to address the files in the system.

Future adjustments

You can always adjust your translation in the future, but don’t rush into delivering your translation with questionable quality just because you can adjust it in the future.

When you need to make adjustments, please don’t use your original files, because the files you’ve sent us may have had technical problems, and our team has fixed those problems. Instead, do one of the following two:

The content of the translation packages

The translation packages contain multiple files that include everything for presenting the main content (e.g., the manual) as well as the user interface of the website in the target language.

The are two types of files in translation packages:

The plain text files

The “txt” files are in fact “markdown” format, but their extensions are changed from “md” to “txt” to make it easier for non-technical people to open them. These plain text files have a few syntactical elements you need to be aware of:

For hyperlinks, the visible text may need to be translated. The internal links shouldn’t change, as they automatically adapt to the target language. For external links, if the external page is available in the target language (e.g., in Wikipedia or NUPP), please change the link to the translated page.

Remember that paragraphs are separated by one or more blank lines. If you start a new line without leaving a blank line before it, it will be merged into the previous paragraph.

Software for editing text files

If you insist, you can open the plain text files in a word processor in an office suite like LibreOffice, Microsoft Office, or Google’s Office. However, the best way is to use a text editor. The following are some examples you can use, all free and open source:

You can enable spell checking in those text editors as well.

Software for editing office files

Some modules have extra example files in office format that should be opened with word processors and spreadsheets. You can work with them with all major office suits, but it’s best to install and use LibreOffice for maximum compatibility. LibreOffice is free and open source.