ants 寫:
[tt] <base loc="en" >An error occured which prevents %@ from running (failed to initialize layout engine).</base>
<tran loc="zh_TW" origin="">錯誤導至不能執行 %@（無法啟動格式引擎）。</tran>[/tt]
Those are some that I found. Suggestions from other people should be better than mine.
Let me state a general principal while I translate UI's.
I try my best to keep it as faithful as I can and keep it consistent for the same phrase while trying to use the most popular and the simplest words whenever we can.
Since there are often multiple candidates to translate a phrase and multiple phrases may be translated to the same phrase in Chinese. It is a many-to-many mapping.
Why I choose the faithfulness and consistence over popularity and simple would be best illustrated by the example of "find" and "search". Literally these 2 words are interchangeable and both can be translated into either "尋找" or "搜尋". However, we know that in computers, "find" often means "find in the opened window / document" and "search" often means "search it elsewhere". A consistent translation, that always translates "find" into "尋找" and "search" into "搜尋" and don't mix them up, will benefit the user to understand the fine differences between these 2 words beyond their literal meanings.
Therefore, my practice is keeping the translation as consistent as possible and do not substitute another popular/simple but unfaithful term for the unpopular/complex term.
About this specific case:
Normally we (Jack and I) translate the term "initialize" as "初始化" to differentiate it from "launch" and "activate".
For example, we may have another phrase, "failed to launch layout engine", in next version. It is unlikely that we would realize that we had translated "無法啟動格式引擎" in another error already. We would have 2 unrelated error dialogs showing the same phrase. The solution to these errors might not be the same. Hence the user would have a hard time to get help since the developers and other users were confused between these errors as well.
"Layout" is first encountered in Camino. "Layout" is translated into "佈局" in the Apple provided glossaries of "htmldisplay_Tier2_proj.lg". It is better to keep it consistent and not to confuse with another term, "format".
Normally, "can't", "cannot", "couldn't" and "could not" are translated into "無法". "Failed" and "is failed" are translated into "失敗". I agree that the meanings of those English and Chinese phrases are pretty much the same and they are interchangeable; however, I guess a consistent translation is still a better practice.
Do you agree with the above reasonings?
Sorry that I have turned down most of your suggestions.
However, please do not hesitate to tell me if you think otherwise. Furthermore, please help us out in next version as well. Your feedback is very valuable!
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