Re: [Talk-bd] Discussion: Issues with name localization for Bangladesh
Hello Frederik Ramm, Thanks for your mail. Answer of your question here: 1. Everyone said what language is used in Bangladesh. Like all other countries (whose language fonts are as complex as ours), like the OSM common practice, I would like to give the primary name for Bangladesh in Bangla. Although all devices support Bangla but some apps do not have Bangla fonts so they cannot render Bangla (not only in Bangla but also in other languages). It is possible to fix this by telling the developers of those apps. But using English to fix this rendering problem will not be the right solution, even if it is temporary for a period of 5 years. 2. I don't know 3. Yes, we say brother or sister. Such as Iqbal vai (brother). Thanks for query. Hope it will help you to take the right decision. Bye for now. *---* *With Best RegardsMd. Iqbal Hossain* | *Assistant Engineer**| * *Premier University, **Chittagong.*| *Cell :* +8801621628468, +8801884069142| *Office : Cell: 01313044516, **01313044517**| * *Telephone : *031-656917 (Ext.-101,105)| *E-mail* *:* i*qsrb...@gmail.com* , iqbalhoss...@puc.ac.bd| *Skype : Iqbaldider*| *Office: **Premier University, Administrative Building#1, * 1/A, O.R. Nizam Road, Prabartak Circle,Panchlaish, Chittagong.| [image: fb link] <https://www.facebook.com/md.iqbal.hossain.puc.eee> [image: https://bn.wikipedia.org] <https://bn.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E0%A6%AC%E0%A7%8D%E0%A6%AF%E0%A6%AC%E0%A6%B9%E0%A6%BE%E0%A6%B0%E0%A6%95%E0%A6%BE%E0%A6%B0%E0%A7%80:IqbalHossain> On Sat, Nov 23, 2019 at 9:53 AM wrote: > Send Talk-bd mailing list submissions to > talk-bd@openstreetmap.org > > To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit > https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-bd > or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to > talk-bd-requ...@openstreetmap.org > > You can reach the person managing the list at > talk-bd-ow...@openstreetmap.org > > When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific > than "Re: Contents of Talk-bd digest..." > > > Today's Topics: > >1. Re: Discussion: Issues with name localization for Bangladesh > (Frederik Ramm) >2. Re: Discussion: Issues with name localization for Bangladesh > (Aftabuzzaman Ullah) >3. Re: Discussion: Issues with name localization for Bangladesh > (Tasauf A Baki Billah) > > > -- > > Message: 1 > Date: Sat, 23 Nov 2019 00:05:41 +0100 > From: Frederik Ramm > To: talk-bd@openstreetmap.org > Subject: Re: [Talk-bd] Discussion: Issues with name localization for > Bangladesh > Message-ID: <1cc84ddc-67c1-c098-2a18-a3f0ef78f...@remote.org> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8 > > Hello everyone, > > the Data Working Group has been made aware of this discussion. I am from > Germany and I have very little knowledge about Bangladesh, so I would > initially like to ask three basic questions that will help me understand > the situation: > > 1. What is the status of English in everyday life in Bangladesh? Can > everyone who uses the Internet also communicate in written English, or > would a requirement of "please write your changeset comment in English" > exclude certain parts of the population? Also, what about signage - will > signs with street names or city names contain Bangla, English, or both > names? > > For comparison, here in Germany, while nowadays most kids learn English > at school, a significant portion of people who are 50 years or older > would not be able to communicate in English unless they had higher > education. > > 2. What is the relationship between the "OpenStreetMap Bangladesh > Foundation" and the mapper community in Bangladesh? How many mappers are > members in the OSMBDF? How can mappers join the organisation, and how do > they democratically influence what the OSMBDF does? I checked the web > site but I found no information about that. > > 3. A general question about mailing list etiquette. Is it usual, in > mailing list discussions in Bangladesh, to refer to other participants > with their last name? If you were to reply to my post with "Dear Mr > Ramm", would that be (a) normal, (b) an expression of respect, or (c) an > expression of "you are not part of my group so I will not use your first > name"? > > Bye > Frederik > > -- > Frederik Ramm ## eMail frede...@remote.org ## N49°00'09" E008°23'33" > > > > -- > > Message: 2 > Date: Sat, 23 Nov 2019 02:01:49 + > From: Aftabuzzaman Ullah > To: Frederik Ramm > Cc: talk-bd@openstreetma
Re: [Talk-bd] Discussion: Issues with name localization for Bangladesh
Hello Sajjad, I already said when i was new editor i made mistake & i fix most of them, if you find any comment in that changeset i will fix. localization isn't uniform all over world but i tried to used general rule which we should use, local language as primary name, this is also many many countries did who has similar complex scripti & that is i'm requesting here. Rendering problem in some app is fixalbe but use english to fix for now isn't correct way. Future sustainability isn't mean we need to use english for primary name, as far i know OSM isn't english language maps/data even if it run by non-Bangla speaking. Most of bangladesh data has english name, running data analysis or eding maps isn't impossible. You said Google maps but just one thing is google doesn't prioritize any language. By default (without login) Google use browser language to show the maps language (You can also change that in your google profile). If browser languge is in english, google show both langugae for Bangladesh map; if browser language is in Bengali, google show only Bengali for Bangladesh map (english if bangla name doesn't avilable). It would be great if OSM also have same type of system. Thank you. সোম, ২৫ নভেম্বর, ২০১৯ তারিখে ২:৩৬ PM টায় এ Sajjad Hossen < sajjadsa...@gmail.com> লিখেছেন: > Dear Aftabuzzaman Ulla h, > > Myself Sajjad, involved with OSM Bangladesh community since 2013. The > thing which is being prioritized here is the conflict regarding the > localization of the map contextualized to Bangladesh. First of all, from my > experience; around the world where the osm communities are mostly active > they maintain internal communication for any kind of decision making > localized to their region. They go through a more coordinated approach. As > far as I've seen, you are conducting all your activities without even > establishing a communication with the OSM Bangladesh community. There are > rules written regarding the osm data format in its platform, but it does > not mean that it is uniform all over the world. There will be always a > local context. Developing a map database is not one man army show. You are > emphasizing writing the name in Bangla but there was supposed to build a > communication with the community to choose the best possible option! > Moreover, you are making errors in many cases that are causing issues with > the map rendering. When creating a name in the map database, you are using > three tags but in most cases, two name tags are used even in the most > popular map platform Google. One has to consider the use cases, not just to > think in a cornered way! For example, in Google platform they prioritize > English name then Bangla, both are shown in the map visual; whoever needs > to use it can use it easily whether in Bangla or English! Adding Bangla > name is not the fact, the fact is the data adding structure! Simply if you > are asked to run an analysis on the data set of China, can you imagine what > will be your situation? The people who are mostly supporting and developing > the OSM platform mostly belong to the non-Bangla speaking region even now! > So the data structure should be proper for the future sustainability of the > platform. It seems better to maintain a coordinated approach, rather than > just continuing the logical discussion! > > Best Regards > > Sajjad Hossen Sapan > > On Sun, Nov 24, 2019 at 5:43 PM Nasir Khan wrote: > >> Dear Frederik, >> >> Thank you for your email. >> >> Here is the response to your questions. I am a long term contributor to >> be Bengali Wikipedia and founding member of Wikimedia Bangladesh Chapter. I >> am the Bangladesh lead of Creative Commons. I am also involved in a number >> of open source projects by contributing code, content, documentations and >> more. >> >> 1. English is not being used for day to day conversations in Bangladesh. >> But people use to use different English words in conversations. On the >> other hand internet users have a minimum misunderstanding on English you >> can get an idea from the top sites from Alexa [1]. Apart from the news >> sites most of them are English websites, though many of them have Bengali >> version and/or localization options. >> >> For me it is better to write changeset in English. Most of the time >> changesets are checked by the contributors and not my by the mass users. >> Sometimes the contributors are from across the world and if each >> contributor describe changes in their own language then do you think it >> would be possible to understand each other or it would be helpful for >> collaboration? >> >> By law business signboards should be written in Bengali. But only a >> limited number of business are doing so. Recent time Bengali and English >> are being displayed side by side. For street signs Bengali and English are >> used in almost all cases. As you live outside Bangladesh you can check >> Mapillary [2] or Google Street View to check the real scenario. By the way >> i saw Bengali
Re: [Talk-bd] Discussion: Issues with name localization for Bangladesh
Dear Aftabuzzaman Ulla h, Myself Sajjad, involved with OSM Bangladesh community since 2013. The thing which is being prioritized here is the conflict regarding the localization of the map contextualized to Bangladesh. First of all, from my experience; around the world where the osm communities are mostly active they maintain internal communication for any kind of decision making localized to their region. They go through a more coordinated approach. As far as I've seen, you are conducting all your activities without even establishing a communication with the OSM Bangladesh community. There are rules written regarding the osm data format in its platform, but it does not mean that it is uniform all over the world. There will be always a local context. Developing a map database is not one man army show. You are emphasizing writing the name in Bangla but there was supposed to build a communication with the community to choose the best possible option! Moreover, you are making errors in many cases that are causing issues with the map rendering. When creating a name in the map database, you are using three tags but in most cases, two name tags are used even in the most popular map platform Google. One has to consider the use cases, not just to think in a cornered way! For example, in Google platform they prioritize English name then Bangla, both are shown in the map visual; whoever needs to use it can use it easily whether in Bangla or English! Adding Bangla name is not the fact, the fact is the data adding structure! Simply if you are asked to run an analysis on the data set of China, can you imagine what will be your situation? The people who are mostly supporting and developing the OSM platform mostly belong to the non-Bangla speaking region even now! So the data structure should be proper for the future sustainability of the platform. It seems better to maintain a coordinated approach, rather than just continuing the logical discussion! Best Regards Sajjad Hossen Sapan On Sun, Nov 24, 2019 at 5:43 PM Nasir Khan wrote: > Dear Frederik, > > Thank you for your email. > > Here is the response to your questions. I am a long term contributor to be > Bengali Wikipedia and founding member of Wikimedia Bangladesh Chapter. I am > the Bangladesh lead of Creative Commons. I am also involved in a number of > open source projects by contributing code, content, documentations and more. > > 1. English is not being used for day to day conversations in Bangladesh. > But people use to use different English words in conversations. On the > other hand internet users have a minimum misunderstanding on English you > can get an idea from the top sites from Alexa [1]. Apart from the news > sites most of them are English websites, though many of them have Bengali > version and/or localization options. > > For me it is better to write changeset in English. Most of the time > changesets are checked by the contributors and not my by the mass users. > Sometimes the contributors are from across the world and if each > contributor describe changes in their own language then do you think it > would be possible to understand each other or it would be helpful for > collaboration? > > By law business signboards should be written in Bengali. But only a > limited number of business are doing so. Recent time Bengali and English > are being displayed side by side. For street signs Bengali and English are > used in almost all cases. As you live outside Bangladesh you can check > Mapillary [2] or Google Street View to check the real scenario. By the way > i saw Bengali text are not being rendered properly in the Mapillary > website. > > I believe the skill of communicating in English of the people of age 50+ > are same across the world. You mentioned about Germany, it is same here in > Bangladesh as well. > > 2. This topic is not relevant with this thread, i think we can discuss > this on a separate thread. > > 3. I agree with Tasauf bhai and i think he describes the general practices > properly. > > Please do understand that the topic we are discussing here is to establish > a common standard for now. It is not about establishing or against any > individual or opinion nor it is a lifetime decision. As a community we can > change when necessary. I am proposing to use English in `name` and > `name:bn` and `name:en` should be added separately. Because i found it > would be much more helpful for the users and contributors as well. There > are a number of use cases of the OSM and we should go to the direction > where most of the cases can be covered. > I can write everything in Bengali and i have to think what percentage of > user will get benefited by doing so! For example i use Mapillary and > OpenStreetCam [3] to see the street level images. None of these can render > the Bengali text. So me or other community member can communicate with > these organizations and request them to fix the tool or we can build a new > tool. Both of these need
Re: [Talk-bd] Discussion: Issues with name localization for Bangladesh
Hello Frederik Ramm, the website given as example can't show render bangla
it's true (other language as well, see countries like greece, any arab
country, china etc) but by default they show english name or english name
in the bracket (In Bangladesh most of data has english name even when
default name tag is in Bengali). Anyone can use these service.
Yes, some app, site like this doesn't render correctly and we need to
contact with developer to fix this and i'm agreey with this. but we should
not fix this by doing other way around. I'm not requsting, saying no one
can't add english. Primary name should be added in Bengali but for some
reason if anyone can't add Bengali that's fine. We shouldn't make such
rule where majority people speak write in Bengali is that primany name must
be in English (even if it is temporay decision like for 5-10-15 years). If
someone like me wants to contribute in Bengali or adds primary name (" name
= ... ") in Bengali, i or anyone should able to do that.
Thank you
রবি, ২৪ নভেম্বর, ২০১৯ তারিখে ১১:৪৩ AM টায় এ Nasir Khan
লিখেছেন:
> Dear Frederik,
>
> Thank you for your email.
>
> Here is the response to your questions. I am a long term contributor to be
> Bengali Wikipedia and founding member of Wikimedia Bangladesh Chapter. I am
> the Bangladesh lead of Creative Commons. I am also involved in a number of
> open source projects by contributing code, content, documentations and more.
>
> 1. English is not being used for day to day conversations in Bangladesh.
> But people use to use different English words in conversations. On the
> other hand internet users have a minimum misunderstanding on English you
> can get an idea from the top sites from Alexa [1]. Apart from the news
> sites most of them are English websites, though many of them have Bengali
> version and/or localization options.
>
> For me it is better to write changeset in English. Most of the time
> changesets are checked by the contributors and not my by the mass users.
> Sometimes the contributors are from across the world and if each
> contributor describe changes in their own language then do you think it
> would be possible to understand each other or it would be helpful for
> collaboration?
>
> By law business signboards should be written in Bengali. But only a
> limited number of business are doing so. Recent time Bengali and English
> are being displayed side by side. For street signs Bengali and English are
> used in almost all cases. As you live outside Bangladesh you can check
> Mapillary [2] or Google Street View to check the real scenario. By the way
> i saw Bengali text are not being rendered properly in the Mapillary
> website.
>
> I believe the skill of communicating in English of the people of age 50+
> are same across the world. You mentioned about Germany, it is same here in
> Bangladesh as well.
>
> 2. This topic is not relevant with this thread, i think we can discuss
> this on a separate thread.
>
> 3. I agree with Tasauf bhai and i think he describes the general practices
> properly.
>
> Please do understand that the topic we are discussing here is to establish
> a common standard for now. It is not about establishing or against any
> individual or opinion nor it is a lifetime decision. As a community we can
> change when necessary. I am proposing to use English in `name` and
> `name:bn` and `name:en` should be added separately. Because i found it
> would be much more helpful for the users and contributors as well. There
> are a number of use cases of the OSM and we should go to the direction
> where most of the cases can be covered.
> I can write everything in Bengali and i have to think what percentage of
> user will get benefited by doing so! For example i use Mapillary and
> OpenStreetCam [3] to see the street level images. None of these can render
> the Bengali text. So me or other community member can communicate with
> these organizations and request them to fix the tool or we can build a new
> tool. Both of these need time so what could be done now? stop using these
> services or what else?
> Any one can say that OSM based tools can be fixed easily. But till today
> it has not been fixed i gave an example above and there are more, so it is
> not that easy too (might be a issue of technology or initiative). So we
> should push the tool developers to make it compatible for Bengali and also
> contribute to fix those too. But now it is not the right time to do
> everything in Bengali.
>
> regards
> Nasir Khan
>
>
> [1] - https://www.alexa.com/topsites/countries/BD
> [2] - https://www.mapillary.com
> [3] - https://openstreetcam.org
> --
> *Nasir Khan Saikat*
> www.nasirkhn.com
>
>
>
> On Sat, 23 Nov 2019 at 09:53, Tasauf A Baki Billah
> wrote:
>
>> Dear Frederik,
>>
>> Hope this finds you well. Great to hear from you!
>>
>> I'm Tasauf aka Ribin from OSM Bangladesh community. You might remember
>> me having a discusion with you about data quality, possible vandalism &
>> your advice on
Re: [Talk-bd] Discussion: Issues with name localization for Bangladesh
Dear Frederik, Thank you for your email. Here is the response to your questions. I am a long term contributor to be Bengali Wikipedia and founding member of Wikimedia Bangladesh Chapter. I am the Bangladesh lead of Creative Commons. I am also involved in a number of open source projects by contributing code, content, documentations and more. 1. English is not being used for day to day conversations in Bangladesh. But people use to use different English words in conversations. On the other hand internet users have a minimum misunderstanding on English you can get an idea from the top sites from Alexa [1]. Apart from the news sites most of them are English websites, though many of them have Bengali version and/or localization options. For me it is better to write changeset in English. Most of the time changesets are checked by the contributors and not my by the mass users. Sometimes the contributors are from across the world and if each contributor describe changes in their own language then do you think it would be possible to understand each other or it would be helpful for collaboration? By law business signboards should be written in Bengali. But only a limited number of business are doing so. Recent time Bengali and English are being displayed side by side. For street signs Bengali and English are used in almost all cases. As you live outside Bangladesh you can check Mapillary [2] or Google Street View to check the real scenario. By the way i saw Bengali text are not being rendered properly in the Mapillary website. I believe the skill of communicating in English of the people of age 50+ are same across the world. You mentioned about Germany, it is same here in Bangladesh as well. 2. This topic is not relevant with this thread, i think we can discuss this on a separate thread. 3. I agree with Tasauf bhai and i think he describes the general practices properly. Please do understand that the topic we are discussing here is to establish a common standard for now. It is not about establishing or against any individual or opinion nor it is a lifetime decision. As a community we can change when necessary. I am proposing to use English in `name` and `name:bn` and `name:en` should be added separately. Because i found it would be much more helpful for the users and contributors as well. There are a number of use cases of the OSM and we should go to the direction where most of the cases can be covered. I can write everything in Bengali and i have to think what percentage of user will get benefited by doing so! For example i use Mapillary and OpenStreetCam [3] to see the street level images. None of these can render the Bengali text. So me or other community member can communicate with these organizations and request them to fix the tool or we can build a new tool. Both of these need time so what could be done now? stop using these services or what else? Any one can say that OSM based tools can be fixed easily. But till today it has not been fixed i gave an example above and there are more, so it is not that easy too (might be a issue of technology or initiative). So we should push the tool developers to make it compatible for Bengali and also contribute to fix those too. But now it is not the right time to do everything in Bengali. regards Nasir Khan [1] - https://www.alexa.com/topsites/countries/BD [2] - https://www.mapillary.com [3] - https://openstreetcam.org -- *Nasir Khan Saikat* www.nasirkhn.com On Sat, 23 Nov 2019 at 09:53, Tasauf A Baki Billah wrote: > Dear Frederik, > > Hope this finds you well. Great to hear from you! > > I'm Tasauf aka Ribin from OSM Bangladesh community. You might remember me > having a discusion with you about data quality, possible vandalism & your > advice on that at Heidelberg during SotM. However, I have been involved > with OSM in Bangladesh since 2014 & now leading the community's > coordination groups. I'm also a board member of HOT. > > Just to clear up you queries one by one: > > 1. Most of the people in Bangladesh using internet/map understands the > names written in English as English is the second language used from the > primary education system. Though in case of writing they preffer to write > it as Bangla on Roman script as using bangla keyboard is not yet much > popular for the general population. > > The population under 50 mostly using internet considering both high & > avarage educated people do understands & can communicate in basic English > while in written but while speaking Bangla is the native. But also have to > keep in mind a good bit of english word stock is found on the > conversations. People over 50 unless educated are not that much of popular > user of internet/ maps. We are still on a verge to institutionalize Bangla > in our official use but not even at the half of the way. > > Personally I would love to see Bangla everywhere but using Bangla is more > of an argument of emotion than use case for us for the time being & having >
Re: [Talk-bd] Discussion: Issues with name localization for Bangladesh
Dear Frederik, Hope this finds you well. Great to hear from you! I'm Tasauf aka Ribin from OSM Bangladesh community. You might remember me having a discusion with you about data quality, possible vandalism & your advice on that at Heidelberg during SotM. However, I have been involved with OSM in Bangladesh since 2014 & now leading the community's coordination groups. I'm also a board member of HOT. Just to clear up you queries one by one: 1. Most of the people in Bangladesh using internet/map understands the names written in English as English is the second language used from the primary education system. Though in case of writing they preffer to write it as Bangla on Roman script as using bangla keyboard is not yet much popular for the general population. The population under 50 mostly using internet considering both high & avarage educated people do understands & can communicate in basic English while in written but while speaking Bangla is the native. But also have to keep in mind a good bit of english word stock is found on the conversations. People over 50 unless educated are not that much of popular user of internet/ maps. We are still on a verge to institutionalize Bangla in our official use but not even at the half of the way. Personally I would love to see Bangla everywhere but using Bangla is more of an argument of emotion than use case for us for the time being & having changeset discussions/ tagging in Bangla is a good to have rather than a necessity in this stage. Also to keep in mind, even the translation engines often have ambiguous/ inappropriate results as not a lot being done at backend. Most of the signages on the roads of the city Uses both English & Bangla on them, though a significant number has only English nameplates. There are a few only Bangla signboards too visible. If you go to the rural part you will find more only Bangla signage appearing on the scenerio. 2. OSM was introduced in Bangladesh back in 2011. The more coordinated community based approach started from 2015 and OSM Bangladesh Foundation has been legally formed & registered at 2018. As of now anyone contributing to OSM in Bangladesh is considered a member of the foudation though a coordination board is present for handling the legal & organizational proceedures while a team of 45+ mappers/developers mostly known as "BHOOT" s are coordinating the technical, data & volunteer engagement part. The foundation remains open to any individual suggesting / get involved on the regular discussions. The State of the Map Asia held in Dhaka is hosted by the foundation earlier this month where 500+ osm contributors gathered togather. Also, discussions being made to push OSMBDF applying under OSMF local chapter for better calibration. The OSMBD community including the foundation itself has been having discussions/ updates channeled through the facebook group https://www.facebook.com/groups/osmbd rather than the website itself. So, going through that might give you better storyline. 3. As part of mailing list ettiquete you can eaither use the first or last name of a person you want to address. Having Mr. On salutation with the last name is more formal approach. Usually, in Bangladesh we put Bhai(M) & Apu(F) after the first name as general casual referencing to a person in group. Hope these resolves all the basic queries you have. Will gladly try to cooperate more if you need any. Thanks for being in touch. Tasauf (Ribin) On Sat, 23 Nov 2019, 5:05 am Frederik Ramm, wrote: > Hello everyone, > > the Data Working Group has been made aware of this discussion. I am from > Germany and I have very little knowledge about Bangladesh, so I would > initially like to ask three basic questions that will help me understand > the situation: > > 1. What is the status of English in everyday life in Bangladesh? Can > everyone who uses the Internet also communicate in written English, or > would a requirement of "please write your changeset comment in English" > exclude certain parts of the population? Also, what about signage - will > signs with street names or city names contain Bangla, English, or both > names? > > For comparison, here in Germany, while nowadays most kids learn English > at school, a significant portion of people who are 50 years or older > would not be able to communicate in English unless they had higher > education. > > 2. What is the relationship between the "OpenStreetMap Bangladesh > Foundation" and the mapper community in Bangladesh? How many mappers are > members in the OSMBDF? How can mappers join the organisation, and how do > they democratically influence what the OSMBDF does? I checked the web > site but I found no information about that. > > 3. A general question about mailing list etiquette. Is it usual, in > mailing list discussions in Bangladesh, to refer to other participants > with their last name? If you were to reply to my post with "Dear Mr > Ramm", would that be (a) normal, (b) an
Re: [Talk-bd] Discussion: Issues with name localization for Bangladesh
Hello Frederik Ramm, Thanks for your mail. Regarding your first question:
In every day's real life, we don't speak in English. Even in internet, most
of people write in Bengali or sometime Banglish (Banglish is Bengali
written in latin alphabet. e.g "Aponi kemon achen?" insted of "আপনি কেমন
আছেন?" This is because sometime people don't have bengali keyboard or don't
know how to activate even though their device have bengali keyboard in the
language settings.). Sometime you may find some (higher educated) people
write in English but most of people write in Bengali.
As you said in comparison section, same thing here in Bangladesh, like
every other country most kids learn English at school but more than a
significant portion of people would not be able to communicate in English
unless they had higher education. Not only that, many people wouldn't
undersatnd or cann't read english at all. For example, my grandmother can't
read or understand English, My mother who is not 50 years old can read some
english but not every word and dont understand. Even for me, i don't speak
english. You may say how can i able to write english here, this is because
i am getting help from Google translate. it's taking me two hours to write
this short email.
It really hurts when someone say i should write my changeset in English,
it hurts because i don't speak or fluent in writing in this language. It's
really discomprting in order to contribute.
What is more discomprting and hurts is that when it was told/suggesed to
me/proposed (see archive of this mail) to write primary name ("name" tag)
in English because some foreign people can't read Bengali or some aid
organization cann't read Bengali (anyway aid organization usally get help
from govment or recrute local people in order to oparate. also every data
have a english name in the id, they can esaly read that) while we are
forgation million of Bangladeshi people. (this problem, some foreign people
can't read Bengali, will never fixed, no one can't fix it, even if wait
1000 years).
Although every modern device support Bengali, but yes, some Apps doesn't
render Bengali correctly. This little technical problem is fixable. Our
approach should be contact right people in order to fix this. Not the other
way around (use English as primary).
Unlike our neighbour country India, we don't have 22 official language.
Bengali is the official and *de facto* national language
of Bangladesh. It is the
official and most widely spoken written language of Bangladesh. Every
street names or city names contain/written in Bengali and sometime also
english (but not without Bengali). Primary name ("name = ... " tag) for
Bangladesh in OSM should be in Bengali. Any other language should be added
via their language code.
I have no comment regarding second and third question.
Thank you.
শুক্র, ২২ নভেম্বর, ২০১৯ তারিখে ১১:০৫ PM টায় এ Frederik Ramm <
frede...@remote.org> লিখেছেন:
> Hello everyone,
>
> the Data Working Group has been made aware of this discussion. I am from
> Germany and I have very little knowledge about Bangladesh, so I would
> initially like to ask three basic questions that will help me understand
> the situation:
>
> 1. What is the status of English in everyday life in Bangladesh? Can
> everyone who uses the Internet also communicate in written English, or
> would a requirement of "please write your changeset comment in English"
> exclude certain parts of the population? Also, what about signage - will
> signs with street names or city names contain Bangla, English, or both
> names?
>
> For comparison, here in Germany, while nowadays most kids learn English
> at school, a significant portion of people who are 50 years or older
> would not be able to communicate in English unless they had higher
> education.
>
> 2. What is the relationship between the "OpenStreetMap Bangladesh
> Foundation" and the mapper community in Bangladesh? How many mappers are
> members in the OSMBDF? How can mappers join the organisation, and how do
> they democratically influence what the OSMBDF does? I checked the web
> site but I found no information about that.
>
> 3. A general question about mailing list etiquette. Is it usual, in
> mailing list discussions in Bangladesh, to refer to other participants
> with their last name? If you were to reply to my post with "Dear Mr
> Ramm", would that be (a) normal, (b) an expression of respect, or (c) an
> expression of "you are not part of my group so I will not use your first
> name"?
>
> Bye
> Frederik
>
> --
> Frederik Ramm ## eMail frede...@remote.org ## N49°00'09" E008°23'33"
>
> ___
> Talk-bd mailing list
> Talk-bd@openstreetmap.org
> https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-bd
>
___
Talk-bd mailing list
Talk-bd@openstreetmap.org
https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-bd
Re: [Talk-bd] Discussion: Issues with name localization for Bangladesh
Hello everyone, the Data Working Group has been made aware of this discussion. I am from Germany and I have very little knowledge about Bangladesh, so I would initially like to ask three basic questions that will help me understand the situation: 1. What is the status of English in everyday life in Bangladesh? Can everyone who uses the Internet also communicate in written English, or would a requirement of "please write your changeset comment in English" exclude certain parts of the population? Also, what about signage - will signs with street names or city names contain Bangla, English, or both names? For comparison, here in Germany, while nowadays most kids learn English at school, a significant portion of people who are 50 years or older would not be able to communicate in English unless they had higher education. 2. What is the relationship between the "OpenStreetMap Bangladesh Foundation" and the mapper community in Bangladesh? How many mappers are members in the OSMBDF? How can mappers join the organisation, and how do they democratically influence what the OSMBDF does? I checked the web site but I found no information about that. 3. A general question about mailing list etiquette. Is it usual, in mailing list discussions in Bangladesh, to refer to other participants with their last name? If you were to reply to my post with "Dear Mr Ramm", would that be (a) normal, (b) an expression of respect, or (c) an expression of "you are not part of my group so I will not use your first name"? Bye Frederik -- Frederik Ramm ## eMail frede...@remote.org ## N49°00'09" E008°23'33" ___ Talk-bd mailing list Talk-bd@openstreetmap.org https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-bd
Re: [Talk-bd] Discussion: Issues with name localization for Bangladesh
Dear Mr Aftabuzzaman, Thank you for participating in the discussion. We really appreciate it. > I respectfully disagree that we should use default/primary "name" tag in English instead of Bangla. If i understand correctly, OSM policy/general community guideline is that default/primary "name" tag should be in whatever language is used locally (for Bangladesh it is Bangla). ( https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Names#Localization https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Multilingual_names ) It is common practice and it is followed by most countries e.g Japan, China, Russia, all arabic, cyrillic speaking countries etc countries. Disagreement is part of discussion and always welcomed. You have said that as per your understating the OSM policy/general community guideline says `name` tag should be in local language and you refer to 2 OSM wiki links. The first link is about `name` tag localization not about what should be on a `name` tag. The first line of that section says, "By now the majority of rendering systems can deal with Unicode characters, so you can use the local script for the default name tag. There is no need to use the Latin script.". If I understand it correctly it says we can use local script assumed it works in most system but for us it is not working. The second link is about one place having multiple name in multiple language. If you check the Issue section ( https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Multilingual_names#Issues), it says in the first point "if not disputed" `name` should have local name. I agree to disagree. We have dispute in local name. Multilingual name is not same as localization. For example, 'United States' has 'মার্কিন যুক্তরাষ্ট্র' as Bengali as Multilingual name but in the context of our country we call it 'America'. Please don't mix them up. You have also referenced that Japan, China, Russia usages it but spiked about India which has similar font to Bangladesh than any of those countries. India has a different page ( https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/India#Naming_in_different_scripts_and_languages) for it where the community after much discussion decided to keep English in `name` tag. Emphasis on 'after much discussion'. Let's see if we have anything of the same kind, shall we? We see that we do have a Bangladesh section (https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Multilingual_names#Bangladesh) that says that `name` should be Bengali and `name:en= should be in English. But if we see the version history ( https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/w/index.php?title=Multilingual_names=history) for that page that this edit was made by you( https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/User:Aftab) on 19:55, 28 May 2019. The first ever edit made by you on OSM was on 04 Jul 2018 17:53:57. Nobody in the community knows about the page or the change. This looks very convenient, isn't it? This is very heart-breaking to see that you edited the wiki page without community consent to justify your work. > We should use English because some software doesn't render Bangla correctly isn't acceptable reason. It's may be true but By now the majority of rendering systems/software can deal with unicode characters, supports Bangla characters. Just because some software/site doesn't support Bangla so we should use English, is like you have headache so cut the head like solution. Let's focus on the problem, shall we? The problem is putting Bengali in `name` tag is causing problem and how we should solve it. For you, UX problem caused by software that can't render Bengali is not an 'acceptable reason' to replace Bengali names with `name:bn` tag even if it makes the work of disaster response challenging, and we should ask the dev to fix them. Fair enough. What we need to remember that this is an open source ecosystem and people work as volunteer so it is tough to put a deadline on a problem like this. So what should we do in the meantime? If it doesn't work, shouldn't we use the Latin script instead of making a horrible user experience and waiting for the devs to fix the problem? I think, in your rush to reply you didn't read the email completely or understand it. For example, forgot about the second point for adopting English name in `name` tag which was the problem faced by humanitarian aid agencies like UN, MSF, Red Crescent and WFP who were unable to the data for Bangladesh. You said that "It is not true that in order to fix Bangla rendering problem, developer needs to learn Bangla.". Unfortunately, I didn't say that on my mail. What I said that if we keep default names to Bengali, people from other country who wants to use the map of Bangladesh in OSM needs to learn because how else they will use that map with Bengali name? > It is also not true that English names were deleted altogether, i can see it just moved to "name:en" field (e.g "name = Road 1" became "name = সড়ক ১" & "name:en = Road 1"). If any software/site doesn't want to show local language but english, they easily fallback to name:en. At the past
Re: [Talk-bd] Discussion: Issues with name localization for Bangladesh
Hello. Thanks for mail. I respectfully disagree that we should use default/primary "name" tag in English instead of Bangla. If i understand correctly, OSM policy/general community guideline is that default/primary "name" tag should be in whatever language is used locally (for Bangladesh it is Bangla). ( https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Names#Localization https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Multilingual_names ) It is common practice and it is followed by most countries e.g Japan, China, Russia, all arabic, cyrillic speaking countries etc countries. We should use English because some software doesn't render Bangla correctly isn't acceptable reason. It's may be true but By now the majority of rendering systems/software can deal with unicode characters, supports Bangla characters. Just because some software/site doesn't support Bangla so we should use English, is like you have headache so cut the head like solution. Like you said openstreetmap-carto was unable to render Bangla but it was fixed now. Same thing can be done with others, if an app doesn't support Bangla, we need to submit bug report, reach out the developer for adding Bangla font. Thats will be correct solution. It is not true that in order to fix Bangla rendering problem, developer needs to learn Bangla. They will just need to specify/include a Bangla font. we should need to take necessary step to fix rendering problem in the apps/site that don't render Bangla correctly e.g. submiting bug report (for exemple, to fix HOT rendering problem we need to ask developer to add a Bangla font here https://github.com/hotosm/HDM-CartoCSS/tree/master/fonts . i can see they already added arabic, tamil, thai, lao etc font) I will be happy to help with this & others. It is also not true that English names were deleted altogether, i can see it just moved to "name:en" field (e.g "name = Road 1" became "name = সড়ক ১" & "name:en = Road 1"). If any software/site doesn't want to show local language but english, they easily fallback to name:en. Per OSM policy/general community guideline, We should use default/primary "name" tag in Bangla, any other name language in their code e.g name:en for English, name:it for Italian etc. That's should be our general guideline. Yes, If for some reason someone cannot/don't do this, thats fine, no one going to yell / block them. But in general, our broad nameing guideline should be same as OSM general guideline, use default/primary "name" tag in Bangla. ___ Talk-bd mailing list Talk-bd@openstreetmap.org https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-bd
[Talk-bd] Discussion: Issues with name localization for Bangladesh
Greetings, everyone, I am Fazle Rabbi from OpenStreetMap Bangladesh Foundation (OSMBDF), the representative of OpenStreetMap Bangladesh community. I'm also a member of the core team of the community, commonly known as "BHOOT" to the global OSM community. For some time, there has been a lot of discussion and debates on how – or rather, if – we should localize names for Bangladesh (Bengali). Recently, we have seen a lot of changes from a few contributors who changed the `name` tag from English (Roman) to Bengali. We agree with the policy that names should be localized, but which tag we should use is up for discussion. We, the community of Bangladesh, have been following a style for more than 4 years now to map Bangladesh with English (Roman) for `name` tag and Bengali for `name:bn` tag. The community have come to this conclusion after many trials and errors and thoughtful consideration that `name` tag should be had the name in English (Roman). But we made a mistake. We did all the discussion internally as all the initial contributors used to sit together in a small room. What we should have done is discuss it in a more appropriate manner where anyone – past, present, future contributors – would be able to raise their voices. We would like to apologize for our mistake and take steps to fix that problem by starting a discussion here to make a string tagging guideline for Bangladesh. The OSM community in Bangladesh is one of the strongest communities in the world, and community members have gathered under the wing of OSMBDF, the legally registered entity in Bangladesh, and waiting for the local chapter recognition from OSMF. The members of our community are mainly connected via a Facebook group. Though this mailing list was set up at a very initial stage, it was not very active. Recently, on the State of the Map Asia 2019 held in Bangladesh, we decided to make the mailing list more active and the core communication channel. We would like all of our community members to engage in the mailing for this kind of discussions rather than using the Facebook group. The OSM community and, as a part of that larger community, we, the members of OSM Bangladesh community, strongly believe that the main site at openstreetmap.org is a geo-spatial data repository which is used by many other apps, websites and service providers, but not as a map. I would like to draw your attention to two sentences in the [About Page of OpenStreetMap](https://www.openstreetmap.org/about): - "OpenStreetMap powers map data on thousands of websites, mobile apps, and hardware devices" - "OpenStreetMap is built by a community of mappers that contribute and maintain data about roads, trails, cafés, railway stations, and much more, all over the world." It is a data repository, not a map. The reasons we have agreed upon using English name in `name` tag are: - The rendering problem with Bengali makes a horrible UX experience. The rendering style used by OSM main site is openstreetmap-carto that had a problem with rendering Bengali. The problem is fixed recently which is a great news. While it is convenient to use from a desktop or laptop at home, unfortunately, it is impossible to use on the go. Most of the people use mobile apps to navigate on the road, but the large array of the most-used mobile applications like OsmAnd, Maps.Me, Magic Earth that still can't render the Bengali characters make it unable to use for the users. The Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team (HOT) made a map for disaster response that is available in OSM main site as an additional layer, which also can't render Bengali. And that makes it a challenge in times of disaster response. Screenshot for reference: https://photos.app.goo.gl/Zj9rwFsG76H3ZPReA - Aid agencies like UN, MSF, Red Crescent have run many projects to map large portions of the country and given those data to OSM, which makes them big contributors and users of the OSM data. But this data becomes useless if all `name` tags are replaced with Bengali. As per, it came to us, WFP recently faced the issue while they tried out using the dataset in one of their projects. OSM is an open community where everything gets done by discussing, and we have tried to follow that convention. When we noticed the `name` tag problem, we requested the editor to change it by putting the Bengali value in `name:bn` tag. We are very disheartened to see when they changed OSM Wiki to justify theirs without community consent or even discussion, which is not appreciated in an open community. Moreover, the English names were deleted altogether, which is problematic, because there is no fall-back policy for applications that can render `name:en` tags. When we asked them about the rendering problem of the `name` tag in the changeset comments, they replied that it is not their concern and the developer of those apps should be asked to fix it. A very valid point! But a large number of users are foreign people, so we can't just ask them to learn
