At 21:21 25.11.2002, Sterling Hughes wrote:
> If this thread was about error messages of a C compiler, I
> would agree that users can be expected to understand English.
> That is a completely different level you are dealing with then.
> However, PHP needs to take beginners into account.
>
> Simply assuming that everyone must understand English
> is arrogant.
>
Whereas assuming that PHP users are too stupid to understand english is
not at all arrogant? :)
> PHP is used by people around the world; it is used by many as
> first computer language who just started out to conquer a new
> area of knowledge. They do not necessarily speak English
> adequatly or are able to make sense of technical English
> terms.
>
fine - provide documentation / translations for what these error codes
mean in the documentation (on a per-translation basis, or in an extra
page listing all the translation). php_error_docref() already does
this I believe (cookie variable, or just click on the link).
php_error_docref() simply points to the function descriptions. But there
could be error descriptions which would then be translated. However most
of us do not describe errors and errors are changing sometimes....
marcus
> This issue came up years ago with a certain operating system.
> If localized error messages are provided, they must be
> presented together with a unique message id. That unique
> token enables people who speak a different language to
> interprete the error code/message and provide support/answers
> as necessary.
Great, I'll look up IE55343 everytime i get a question about an undefined
variable.
What you're missing is that currently to program PHP, you need a reasonable
understanding of english. To my knowledge mandarin does not have the
string length, most everything in the programming world is in english,
therefore, a basic understanding of english becomes a prerequisite.
Educate users to speak the base amount of english required, I18N'ing the
language is just going to lead to headaches from a user perspective
(incorrect translations, slower performance, translations for english
speakers)
and a developer perspective (having to lookup tokens, understanding another
language, getting bug reports with horrible error messages).
The whole i18n thing can be solved by just listing the translations of
the error codes on the doc page, let's do that, instead of bloating the
PHP infrastructure.
-Sterling
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