User talk:Stephen G. Brown/2016

January 2016

Thank you!

Thank you for approving my whitelisting. Tharthan (talk) 15:57, 9 January 2016 (UTC)

You’re welcome. —Stephen ^(Talk) 16:18, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

February 2016

Insistent anons at bilááh and biʼoh

Hello Stephen --

A couple anon IPs have edited these two entries to essentially reverse the meaning of the usage examples. Would you be kind enough to have a look? I reverted the first time, but with it happening again, I wonder if it's a native speaker whose edit summaries are just a bit sparse. ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 18:29, 5 February 2016 (UTC)

This has been going on since last June at bilááh. They could very well be the same person: they all seem to geolocate to the same part of the Phoenix, AZ metropolitan area, with the same ISP. Chuck Entz (talk) 19:09, 5 February 2016 (UTC)

Just to make absolutely sure, I will ask the experts one more time. I await their answer. —Stephen ^(Talk) 09:44, 6 February 2016 (UTC)

Okay, I have their answers. It’s the same as the answers I got the last time I asked about this. All of these people are Navajo who speak the language as their first language:

(Stephen Brown) A Diné from Phoenix tells me that I have this backwards. The question is about this sentence:

>Shijáád éí nijáád bilááh áníłnééz.

What does it mean? Whose legs are longer, shijáád or nijáád?

And also this sentence:

>Shigaan éí shijáád bi’oh áníłtso.

What is the meaning? Which is shorter, shigaan or shijáád?

(Adrian B.) My legs are longer than yours. My arms are not as long as my legs.

(Nova M.) 1st sentence:

My legs are longer than your legs

2nd sentence:

My arms are shorter than my legs

Biʼoh means "limited" but in this sentence it means "comes short of"

(Janice C.) Nova M. did an excellent explanation.

(Stephen Brown) Ahéheeʼ tʼáá ánółtso, that is how I understand it, too:

For some reason, this guy was insisting that the translation was wrong. He says that it means:

>Your legs are longer than my legs.

>My legs are shorter than my arms.

I don't know why he says that we're wrong.

(Lee R.) Nova M. is Correct.

(Marley T.) The first sentence says: "my legs are longer than your legs." And the second sentence says: "my arms are shorter than my legs."

(Jerry H.) Maybe they felt that it should be the obviative yilááh. Dunno. When it's something attached to yourself, obviative doesn't seem right. In this context, I would agree with the others.

(Melanie R.-K.) Perhaps a better way to express these might be:

Nijáád bił ałhąąhgo shí shijáád hózhǫ́ nineez.

Shigaan éí shijáád tʼáá bichʼįʼ áníłnééz.

noche

Is it common for Speakers to drop the final vowel? I have a song that appears to have that. If that’s the case, we could modify the pronunciation to /ˈno.t͡ʃ(e)/. --Romanophile ♞ (contributions) 01:27, 15 February 2016 (UTC)

In Mexican Spanish, a final unstressed [-e] after [-ch-] is often whispered, or even deleted. —Stephen ^(Talk) 16:37, 16 February 2016 (UTC)

Telugu citations

I have started giving Citations for Telugu words from Mahakavi Dairies of Gurajaza Appa Rao. But I doubted about my own translations. Now I found a book by Charles Philip Brown [1] published in 1829. But it is poetic work of Vemana, he has translated to English. I have started using it like Citations:కంచు. Is it right or not; Is there any difference between prose and poetry in the presentation in Wiktionary.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 07:36, 16 February 2016 (UTC)

Citations:కంచు looks good to me. There is no difference is how prose and poetry are treated, except for one thing: Since poetry has distinct lines, the lines of poetry are separated by the solidus symbol (స్లాష్ చిహ్నం), "/", like this: Hence no force, however great, / can stretch a cord, however fine, / into a horizontal line / which is accurately straight. —Stephen ^(Talk) 17:31, 16 February 2016 (UTC)

I must say, I respect your work on Telugu around here @Rajasekhar1961. Also, welcome back! —Aryamanarora ^{(मुझसे बात करो)} 23:44, 17 February 2016 (UTC)

Thank you sir. I must thank Stephen G. Brown for his timely help. Stephen sir, can we improve this template to take us to the reference page in the book directly, like you did for Charles Phillip Brown Telugu-English dictionary {{R:te:CPB|362|head=గాజు}}.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 14:33, 18 February 2016 (UTC)

I might be able to make a template for that book, but it may not be dependable. That’s a printed book (printed on paper), and searching it requires comparing the images of each letter. It can't search for Telugu words, only English words. For example, you could search for these words: The light man will always. —Stephen ^(Talk) 05:45, 19 February 2016 (UTC)

There are two references of this book; one in 1829[2] and the other in 1911[3]. You can link to the page number from the Citation.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 10:59, 19 February 2016 (UTC)

With 1829, I can see the book and I can search for English words, but I cannot search for page numbers. With 1911, I can only see the first page, and a lot of the Telugu words are unreadable, and I can't search for anything. —Stephen ^(Talk) 11:15, 19 February 2016 (UTC)

How did you learn so many languages?

Out of curiosity, at what age did you begin learning all those languages, and how did you become so proficient in them? Did you learn any by immersion, or did you just study them a lot? I'd love to learn that many, but my progression has been pretty slow lately, so I'm trying to figure out how achievable my ambitious goals are. Andrew Sheedy (talk) 21:06, 19 February 2016 (UTC)

I started at age 13 to study Ancient Greek (by myself), then took Spanish and French in high school. The Army sent me to DLI (Defense Language Institute) in California to learn Russian, then I was stationed in West Germany for three years to eavesdrop on Russian military radio transmissions coming out of East Germany. While in Germany, I took the opportunity to learn German, and after I left military service, I remained in Europe where I worked in Germany, France, Spain, Turkey, Italy, and Greece.

Later when I came back to the U.S., I opened a translation company in Dallas and hired about 200 professional translators as independent contractors. I continued to translate Russian, German, Spanish, French, Portuguese, Dutch, and Italian for commercial companies such as Dr Pepper, Texas Instruments, Hunt Oil, Petrobras, Poulan Chainsaw, Daisy BB, Bell Helicopter, and so on, and my other translators could handle all of the commercially important languages (Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Danish, Swedish, Norwegian, Hungarian, Czech, Serbo-Croatian, Bulgarian, Finnish, Turkish, Arabic, Hebrew, Greek, Polish, and some others.

Many of our clients ran into severe difficulties trying to handle the translations that we presented to them, since in the 20th century (1970s through 2000) almost no one had the equipment or expertise to type, word-process, or typeset any language other than English, so we invested in some extremely expensive phototypesetting machines that gave us the capability of setting any of the commercially important languages and offer our clients completed translations that were ready for printing and publishing. In those days, almost no males could type on a typewriter, and among Europeans, no males and few females could type their native languages. In Asia, nobody at all could type or typeset any of the Asian languages. Almost all Asian newspapers were largely or completely handwritten. For my company, that meant that none of my 200 translators knew how to type, and most of their translations were turned in in manuscript form. Therefore, I started learning how to type and typeset all of those languages myself.

In the 1990s, I started doing a lot of pro bono work for the Unicode Consortium in an effort to create fonts and typing software for the languages of India and Indo-China. Up until then, the few machines that were capable of typing in Indian languages, Vietnamese, Korean, Cambodian, were very primitive and slow, and a good operator might be able to reach speeds as great as 6 words a minute. There was no software in existence then that could help a typist select the various letter forms for Arabic, Devanagari, Cambodian (initial letters, medials, finals, independent, and so on), and the final result was poor quality. So we looked for ways to type those languages that used software to select the correct ligatures and letter forms without operator input. We also spent a lot of time and effort creating decent Unicode fonts to use for those languages. I became an expert with Fontographer.

There are a lot of difficulties with translating technical materials, especially in the more exotic languages, because there were few dictionaries for technological use, and translators often know the technical lingo only in one language (either English or a foreign language, but usually not both), so we had to do a lot of proofreading and redacting, and when we started typing and typesetting the translations, I took the extra step to proofread as I went. By typing and proofreading all of those languages for 30 years, usually 12 hours a day, I gradually picked up more and more vocabulary and grammar. I retired in 2001 and sold my company, and then I began to concentrate on some more exotic languages (but of little commercial value) such as Khmer and Navajo. So that’s pretty much how I did it. —Stephen ^(Talk) 22:31, 19 February 2016 (UTC)

Wow, I didn't expect such a lengthy reply, but thank you for taking the time to write it! It sounds like you've had a pretty interesting career. If you don't mind me pestering you with another question: Would you say that a native-like understanding of a language is absolutely necessary in order to begin a career as a translator (if one is only translating from that language into one's first language)? I'm curious to know how likely it is that I could pursue a career in (mostly French to English) translation in a few years time, as I'm not yet sure that I'll have "perfect" French by then. I do expect to be able to readily understand anything I read in it in a couple years, just not produce complex, error-free text in the language. Andrew Sheedy (talk) 23:32, 19 February 2016 (UTC)

It’s not necessary to be completely bilingual, but it would help. There are a lot of variables. For some languages such as Spanish and French, a translator really needs to know the source language and the target language well. For exotic languages such as Burmese or Tibetan, it is usually impossible to find translators who know English well. For these difficult languages, usually we have to use a native speaker of the foreign language to translate in both directions. For the more common European languages, the prevailing view is that a translator should only translate into his first language. However, in my years of experience with this, I have found that the best job is usually done by a translator who regularly translates in both directions. Almost as good is the translator who translates from his native language into his second language. And the worst job is usually done by translators who only translate into their first language.

The reason for this is that (1) language is often complex, figurative, idiomatic, ambiguous, hazy, and not always well written or correctly written, and most translators frequently misunderstand some parts of a text written in their second language, even if they are very good in their second language. However, translators can usually understand a text written in their first language with ease, even if badly and carelessly written. And (2) understanding a text is usually easy for a native speaker, even if the text contains misspellings, bad grammar, and various other mistakes. So, while a translator who translates into his second language will probably make some errors that a native speaker would not make, he can nevertheless express his thoughts well enough that the native speaker can read his translation easily and accurately. Language is very forgiving that way.

So a translator who translates from his second language into his first language will write his translation in perfect, idiomatic, grammatical language, but, since he is likely to misunderstand some complex or poorly written parts of the text written in his second language, he will write his incorrect understanding perfectly in his first language. On the other hand, the translator who translates from his first language into his second language will understand his first-language text perfectly, no matter how complex or poorly written it might be, and he can express his correct thoughts into his second language, but imperfectly and with a few grammatical errors. But this will usually not matter, because a native speaker will be able to read his translation easily and correctly, even with its grammatical and stylistic errors.

One very important thing to keep in mind: while there is a lot of material being translated every day between the major languages such as English, French, and Spanish, there are also large numbers of qualified translators in those languages. It is difficult to break into translating jobs for these major languages. Someone who needs a text translated already has several experienced translators that he uses for French or Spanish translations, and he will not take a chance on someone new unless all of his regular translators are off sick or away on vacation. In a rare case like that, you might finally get a chance to show your stuff, and if you do an excellent job in good time and are easy to work with, he might start giving you some work. Also, keep in mind that the translation rates for these major languages are the lowest. There is a lot of competition among many thousands of French translators, and it keeps the pay scale down. If you translate an exotic language such as Cambodian or Burmese, there are relatively few translations needed, but there are also very few translators available to do those jobs, and the pay is the best.

Chinese, Japanese, and Korean are optimal, because there is a lot of translation work needed, but it is hard to find qualified translators. Also, many translators for these languages do not know how to type them well, so if you know one of these three languages, you can readily break into the industry and draw top dollar.

You have to specialize in one or two technical fields, such as finance, petroleum, chemistry, civil engineering, etc. You need to learn the field(s) well (for example, finance, which is difficult translation, but one of the best fields to specialize in if you can hack it), and you need to learn the field in both of your languages.

And there is the matter of your location. In the U.S., you don't have to have any special license or certificate to be a translator. Anybody can translate if he can convince somebody to pay him to do it. Of course, it is a big plus to have a college education and certification from the ATA (American Translators Association). If you are in Europe, translators are considered professionals, just like doctors and lawyers. See this for some insight on becoming a European translator.

And finally, there is some necessary technology that you have to purchase and learn to use, called translation memory. When I was a translator, translation memory did not exist. Today, you have to use it. Your clients will want not only the translation, but the translation memory. Translation memory also complicates the translation charge. There are different rates for new text that you really have to translate, and repetitious text that you can use translation memory for. I can’t help much here, since I have never used translation memory. Two common brands of translation memory are Wordfast and Trados. You will probably need to be proficient with all of the brands of translation memory, since your clients will specify the one that they want.

Hope this helps. —Stephen ^(Talk) 01:32, 20 February 2016 (UTC)

It very much does, thank you. Some of it contradicts to some degree what I've read elsewhere, but I agree that I'd probably be better off learning a more exotic language. I'd been considering picking up Japanese, Mandarin, Arabic, or a couple of those, and I just might think more seriously about doing that sooner, rather than prioritizing all the European languages I want to learn. Andrew Sheedy (talk) 05:37, 20 February 2016 (UTC)

Sorry for barging in on your discussion so unceremoniously, but I would very much like to make known that in my hay days I did do a wee bit of translation and what I had unswathed in the process hereof was a still-born, malformed baby in the middle of a wolf-haunted, tenebrous wald screaming at the top of its lungsː whereof one doth not understand thereof one should not translate, and then I woke up in a cold sweat. These are the words to live by if you are a translator (straight out of the mouth of babes). And also just to reiterate the point made by Stephen earlier, it is, I have found, ofttimes the case that one should come in direct contact with some dialectal, poorly written or extremely complex form of the language which is to be translated from and in such cases it is of paramount importance that one understand the target language very well for otherwise a faithful translation is out of the question, but on the other hand, and it is all too true, when you have a non-native speaker translate some extremely complex text, full of run-on sentences and such, from his native language into his second language you must needs be sure that a large part of the complexity of the original text will be lost in translation. In conclusion, it's a lose-lose situation any-road, lest one be ambilingual. So my point in plat and plain English is that it is very important to at least have a near native understanding of the language from which you intend to translate. You don't have to be able to speak it perfectly, but you do need to be able to understand it almost as well as a native speak would. Mountebank1 (talk) 20:57, 24 February 2016 (UTC)

Another looky-loo, here: 1) I've been on a documentary kick lately and I'm imagining your story in that format (to great effect). How cool would that be in a documentary about Wiktionary admins? Plus why you contribute, etc. Anyway, 2) So I just applied for a Masters program in translation studies in Barcelona. I live in Madrid this year and I'm trying to take advantage of that to do everything I can in Spanish. But last night as I was reading a book I had this conversation in mind and really focused on everything I didn't understand and why. It was mostly vocabulary, but also some weird grammatical structures and even typos I'm now taking note of. So I just wanted you to know about how you've already helped and to ask if you have any more general advice for someone else whose mind is set on becoming a translator? Ultimateria (talk) 17:49, 25 February 2016 (UTC)

A lot of my advice in this matter is likely to be out of date, because there have been big changes in the past 20 years since the advent of the internet. But another thing that might be useful to some: a friend of mine from Czechoslovakia wanted to translate Japanese, and when he looked into the matter, he realized that he needed to forget about the Czech language and become fluent in a different language: English. There simply is no work from Japanese into Czech. He began studying Japanese in a Czech university, and when he graduated, he moved to the UK and then to the U.S. to learn English. When his English was good enough, he moved to Japan to learn advanced Japanese, especially written Japanese. At some point, I forget when, he also studied patent documents, concentrating on the language style and format used in Japanese and English patents. He also married a Japanese wife. When he felt ready, he went into business translating Japanese patents into English, and he is one of very few translators who can do it. He makes a lot of money this way, and does nothing but Japanese patents into English.

Another friend, born in Navarra (Spain), moved to Japan after World War II. He studied English in Japan and became fluent, and eventually he started translating technical English material into Spanish for Japanese companies. He specialized in electric sewing machines, such as Brother, Singer, and Janome. Sewing-machine technical language is strange and unfamiliar, so most English-speakers could not understand it. My friend made a great fortune in his lifetime translating nothing but repetitive sewing-machine English into Spanish for Japanese manufacturers. (Note that Japanese companies pay very little to native Japanese translators who translate between Japanese and another language, but they pay handsomely to foreign translators in Japan who translate between English and another language.) —Stephen ^(Talk) 23:26, 25 February 2016 (UTC)

That's good to know. If I learn Japanese, which I think I might, as I have relatives who speak it, English to French might be an option for me, provided I'm not translating complicated texts. Do you know if it would be beneficial (as a translator) to learn Punjabi? There seem to be quite a few Punjabs here in Canada, and I have relatives who speak that language as well.

I don't suppose you'd know if there is much demand for translators for material related to zoology, especially ethology? That is a subject that has interested me ever since I can remember, and I would love to translate something that I find interesting. Andrew Sheedy (talk) 04:50, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

I’m not sure about Punjabi. In all my years in the translation business, we only had one small Punjabi job. Rarely anything to do with India or Pakistan (probably because English is such a lingua franca in those countries). However, it is possible that Punjabi could be important in another country, such as the UK or Canada.

As for zoology, we did not have any work in that specifically. I think the closest that we came to that was some ranching texts (livestock, cattle, horses, veterinarian terminology), but not too much of that. We did not get translations that were as simple as the pure sciences or literary (books). Here is a list of some translation fields, but most of our work was in petroleum, civil engineering, construction, law and contracts, software, food, advertising, financial, business, agricultural, aerospace, and so on. —Stephen ^(Talk) 23:25, 27 February 2016 (UTC)

There seem to be a fair number of Punjabi speakers here in Canada, but I think I'll have to research that more. I notice that biology is on the list you linked to, but I imagine there's more work in business-related subjects. I'll have to put some thought into this. I've got some time to make up my mind, as I'm young yet, but this conversation has certainly helped narrow my focus a bit, or at least afforded me some clarity. Andrew Sheedy (talk) 03:04, 29 February 2016 (UTC)

An immigrant community is going to have a large number of bilinguals, and some of those will be educated in the subject fields that would provide the translating business. Such people would have an inherent advantage over non-native speakers, and immigrants tend to be used to working harder to make it in a new country, anyway. I think that, rather than choosing right away, you'd be better off developing your skills for learning languages in general (especially in languages that are quite different from English or French), building up your knowledge in subject fields, and exposing yourself as much as possible to the rest of the world to see what's really out there and where the opportunities are. Chances are that what seems like a sure thing now will be replaced in the long run by something you would never imagine for yourself based on what you know today. Chuck Entz (talk) 04:02, 29 February 2016 (UTC)

It is mostly a matter of logic. Wherever you live, just think about the businesses and organizations nearby. Is there an aircraft manufacturer who might be doing business (sell aircraft, buying parts, etc.) with other countries? Are there food or beverage companies who import or export to other countries and who might need contracts, ingredients lists and so on in other languages? Is there a computer company such as Apple or IBM who might need translations of contracts, lawsuits, or help-me texts, or localizations in other languages? Thinking of biology, is there a business or organization that you think might be wanting to translation biology texts into or from another language (I ask this one because I think it would be quite rare in the U.S. However, I suppose that in some small countries, the government or a university might want to translate biological treatises from English.) Are there advertising agencies that do business in foreign countries? Is there an organization such as the EU that requires lots of translations for various member countries? Are there book publishers that like to translate successful books into other languages? (Big publishers usually do not do this, but sometimes a writer might want to have his or her book translated. These writers normally do not go through a translation agency, but search privately for really talented translators.) Does your city, state, or province have large immigrant populations and might need to translate official materials (income tax forms, etc.) into their languages? Considering just one certain language, such as Punjabi, can you think of any businesses or organizations nearby that would need to have Punjabi translations of some sort? (The answer to this question in Dallas would be no, there does not seem to be anyone in Dallas who would want to buy Punjabi translations.)

Thinking of translation agencies, you can find a number of them in your Yellow Pages. Most of them normally handle a couple of languages, a single language (usually spoken by the agency owner), 8 to 12 languages (for many larger agencies), up to around 30 languages. All or almost all of the languages they handle are the common languages that you would think of in Europe and Asia (French, German, Chinese, Korean, but not Cambodian, not Burmese, not Lithuanian, not Georgian, no African languages except for Arabic, no Indian languages). There are a small number of companies that specialize in rare and exotic languages (such as Cambodian, Burmese, Turkmen, Kazakh, Hawaiian), and these companies charge an arm and a leg for small translations, and quality/accuracy is not guaranteed. So it is really a matter of putting your mind to it: logic. —Stephen ^(Talk) 23:43, 29 February 2016 (UTC)

If I may barge in, I have a related question. Would you say that there’s a significant demand for Romanian translators or interpreters in Hispanophone countries? It seems rare to find Hispanophones who desire to learn Romanian or know it as a secondary language. It’s possible that the majority learn it for fun rather than as a necessity. --Romanophile ♞ (contributions) 09:23, 28 February 2016 (UTC)

Romania and Spain are both members of the European Union, so there should be significant translation needed between them. If it were not for the EU, there would probably be very little translation. Of course, there would be much more translation needed among the wealthier Western European countries. See here for some info on EU translators. —Stephen ^(Talk) 09:58, 28 February 2016 (UTC)

[4]

Did you delete my request by accident? --Romanophile ♞ (contributions) 08:53, 25 February 2016 (UTC)

By accident somehow. I have no idea how it happened. I was just restoring the top entry and moving a misplaced request to the bottom. Anyway, restored. —Stephen ^(Talk) 10:46, 25 February 2016 (UTC)

March 2016

carta verde

On Google Books, I’m finding Spanish results for carta verde, and it seems to mean the exact same thing as green card, but I don’t know if it’s good Spanish or not. Maybe it’s at least slang? --Romanophile ♞ (contributions) 05:48, 22 March 2016 (UTC)

A green card is most commonly called tarjeta verde. Also, but less commonly, carta verde, and permiso de residencia. They are good Spanish. —Stephen ^(Talk) 08:49, 22 March 2016 (UTC)

Ah, okay. Thank you. I thought that carta could only be used for playing cards, not cards in general. --Romanophile ♞ (contributions) 09:00, 22 March 2016 (UTC)

carta can mean letter (correspondence), card (in general), menu, charter, map, epistle, and playing card. —Stephen ^(Talk) 09:07, 22 March 2016 (UTC)

Khmer

Hello! May I ask you a question. Do you know if there are language codes for Pre-Angkorian Khmer and Angkorian Khmer? Thank you! --หมวดซาโต้ (talk) 14:44, 25 March 2016 (UTC)

No, there is only km for Central Khmer, and kxm for Northern Khmer. You will find language codes for the many related languages at Eastern Mon-Khmer, Mon-Khmer, and Austro-Asiatic. Pre-Angkorian Khmer and Angkorian Khmer both belong to Old Khmer, and were spoken from 600 CE through 800, and from 800 through 1200 CE. If you want to enter words in Pre-Angkorian and Angkorian Khmer, we can make special language codes that you can use here on English Wiktionary. If you want special language codes, ask Angr. He knows how to do it. —Stephen ^(Talk) 03:20, 26 March 2016 (UTC)

your focus

Why do you rarely touch the entries for European languages? Most of your work in recent years seems to be either Native American or Asian ones. --Romanophile ♞ (contributions) 14:36, 31 March 2016 (UTC)

I used to do almost all of the Russian and Arabic entries, but there began to be so much controversy over the transliteration systems, and then some editors started deleting some Russian entries as SOP, so I stopped working on Russian. Years ago when we first started discussing SOP, it referred to something different. We were trying to define SOP as well as valid terms. In a sentence such as "A value-added tax, or goods and services tax, is a popular way of implementing a consumption tax in Europe", SOP referred to such combinations as "a value", "tax or", "or goods", "goods and", "is a", and so on. Valid term referred to "value-added tax", "goods and services tax", and "consumption tax". Originally, being SOP was not in itself a reason to delete an entry, but if an entry were SOP and nothing else, then it had no value. But if an entry were SOP and also a valid term, such as "consumption tax", then it was a useful entry. That definition fell by the wayside fairly quickly, and SOP applied to almost any term that included a word space. So when Russian entries began to be deleted as SOP, I stopped working on Russian.

The same thing started to happen to other languages I worked in, so I stopped doing those languages. I stopped making Navajo entries because of the same problem. There was also a feeling among some editors that Native American languages cannot have modern terms such as atomic energy, but should only be able to talk about bows and arrows, tepees, the Great Spirit, and wampum. But Native American languages are like any other language, in that if they continue to be used, they develop vocabulary for modern terms. So Navajo entries are deleted not only because some English translations are SOP (the English translations being SOP does not mean that the Navajo original is SOP), but also because some editors believe that Navajo cannot have modern terminology. I don’t mind adding translations to the translation tables, but I don’t like to waste my time creating entries only to have them deleted months or years later.

Now I am seeing that Khmer entries are starting to be deleted because some of their English translations are SOP, so I don’t want to waste time creating Khmer entries. The Ojibwe entries that I created some ten years ago were criticized bitterly for not adhering to recent formatting standards (because those standards did not exist ten years ago), so I stopped making Ojibwe entries.

I think I can still do some work in Yup’ik without worrying too much about entries being deleted. Most other Native American languages have little literature, so the problems complying with CFI are too great.

And that is why I do very few languages now, and don’t create many entries. —Stephen ^(Talk) 15:53, 31 March 2016 (UTC)

Hi Stephen. Please don't feel too personal about some entries being deleted! My entries get deleted too but I am still here. It's the "benefit" of working on any Wiki-project. I felt very sorry that you stopped working on Russian and Arabic entries and I really hope you don't stop working with Khmer and other Asian languages. If you get too sensitive there won't be any language to work with... Please persevere. :) --Anatoli T. ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 23:41, 31 March 2016 (UTC)

I don’t take it personally. I just feel that it’s too big a waste of time to put time and energy into entries that will soon be deleted, or in some cases (such as Ojibwe) will become objects of criticism and insult. It’s too bad, however, that there are not many languages left that I feel I can contribute in. But I can still add translations to the translation sections. They only take a moment, so I don’t care if some get deleted. —Stephen ^(Talk) 23:08, 1 April 2016 (UTC)

There are still basic, atomic words that should please everybody and would always pass CFI by anybody's standard. Languages, such as e.g. Khmer still lack basic everyday words. Category:Khmer_lemmas has mere 1,604 lemmas today. Even the smallest published dictionary will have more words. Working on basic words seems to be boring for many editors but that's the first thing they should do before adding advanced vocabulary, idioms, phrases, colloquialisms, etc, things that are "interesting". That's my opinion, anyway. That's why I have been focusing on the Russian and Chinese frequency lists first, occasionally adding some other words I come across. --Anatoli T. ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 00:49, 2 April 2016 (UTC)

April 2016

Translation request

Hello I made a translation request from English to Sanskrit on wiki. I've never used it before so I'm not sure how it works but other people's requests after mine have been answered. Am I just impatient or did it get overlooked? Thanks for your insight. Laurajoellelynn (talk) 00:24, 3 April 2016 (UTC)

Your sentence is a lot harder than most and I haven’t had time to do it. Most requests only take a minute or two, but yours will probably need an hour at least. Also, you requested accuracy and I can’t guarantee that. Sanskrit is a dead language, so there are no native speakers, only learners; and it has difficult grammar and many irregularities. —Stephen ^(Talk) 06:30, 3 April 2016 (UTC)

Asterisks

@Stephen G. Brown:

How could I leave a message on your talk page if you block my IP? Just let me explain my point, then I'll be happy to read your reply. The reason for the removing of the * (asterisk) symbol from Italian IPAs is simple: that symbol is absolutely not used, neither in IPA nor in any other standard phometic transcription, for the so called "syntactic gemination" occurring in Italian. In was an invention of IvanScrooge98, who deliberately introduced both in this Wiki dictionary (I've noticed it just yesterday) and in the Wiki encyclopedia. There he was contested, the issue was discussed (you're free to read it, nay, please read it, it's quite short: [5]) and it was unanimously decided to remove this arbitrary convention. IvanScrooge98 didn't even take part in the discussion even if he was invited to. And the decison was taken by some of the most expert users about phonetics and IPA on en.wikipedia (Macrakis Peter238 Ƶ§œš¹). Then, why should this wrong symbol, contradicting the very IPA standards in which words are transcribed, be kept here? It just confuses readers, as it happened for the discussion I've just talked about. Will you ponder this question, please? If you still think I'm wrong tell me, but I really see no reason to leave here a symbol which was subjectively inserted by a single user and already removed elsewhere. Let me now, thank you in advance! — This comment was unsigned.

Whatever the merit of what you want to do, you don't go implementing it in dozens of entries without getting consensus (the Beer parlour would be a good place to start). As Angr pointed out to you, the consensus on Wikipedia is irrelevant to Wiktionary, and doing what you tried to do would be, in effect, unilaterally changing the rules for Wiktionary without asking. You seem to be awful anxious to ramrod this through in a hurry- is this some kind of personal issue? Chuck Entz (talk) 13:47, 6 April 2016 (UTC)

Actually I was talking to Stephen G. Brown, but since you were the first one who reinserted the asterisks I'll be glad to reply to you too. But let me tell you I don't like the tone you used towards me. Now: "you don't go implementing it in dozens of entries without getting consensus" isn't it exactly what IvanScrooge98 did? Why when he inserted that absurd symbol has nobody ever undone his edits, while now everyone is reverting each attempt to remove them? Double standard? More: who has changed Wikitionary's rules? I'm just re-applying them after a single user has changed on his own free will, according to nothing but his own opinions, his deliberate choice. Absurdly, you should thank me for restoring these uncyclopedic edits instead of defending them. Again: double standard. Why am I doing this? Because I'm Italian and I don't like that my language's words are handled like that, making them more difficult to understand to readers, just because of a user who thought he could change phonetic principles at will. You, both, are not helping this dictionary, nor the Wiki project, by doing what you've done so far about this issue. Apart from the burocratic problems, what do you personally think about the use of the asterisk in this particular case? Let me know. unsigned comment by‎ User:2001:1600:3:7:224:e8ff:fe7f:8c25 14:33, 6 April 2016 (UTC)

What Chuck Entz said is correct. As for IvanScrooge98, making such changes and additions to entries is our purpose here. You were not blocked for trying to improve entries, you were blocked because some of your edits had been reverted by one of our admins, and then you started making the same edits again...edit warring. We don’t tolerate that. As for the asterisks, we probably should not use this notation, but we have to discuss it first. You can bring it up at the Wiktionary:Beer parlor for discussion. The asterisk notation has been in use for several months already. After all this time, removing it requires discussion. But remember, if an admin reverts you, you have to stop doing what you’re doing immediately. If you continue after having been reverted, you will be blocked. —Stephen ^(Talk) 02:16, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

Oh, right... The famous "free" encyclopedia, isn't it? Pardon, I meant "occupied"! unsigned rant by Special:Contributions/2001:1600:3:7:224:e8ff:fe7f:8c25 08:40, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

The matter is not so important, but the process is. I personally have no interest in the matter and do not intend to join the conversation. Others will consider the matter and eventually decide on whether to change the asterisks to some other form, or remove it altogether. After the matter is decided, it will be done according to the consensus. I can’t say how long it will take. Sometimes it’s only a day or two, other times it takes weeks, even months. —Stephen ^(Talk) 00:36, 11 April 2016 (UTC)

your Q

that should be the answer Seb az86556 (talk) 07:25, 13 April 2016 (UTC)

Thanks, looks perfect. —Stephen ^(Talk) 08:22, 13 April 2016 (UTC)

Palochka

Discussion moved to Wiktionary:Beer parlour/2016/April#Palochka.

folk linguistics

Have you met a lot of people who seriously consider English to be a Romance language? --Romanophile ♞ (contributions) 22:41, 23 April 2016 (UTC)

No, not many. Maybe just one. Usually if someone knows the term "Romance language," they have enough intelligence and education to know that English is not one. —Stephen ^(Talk) 08:09, 24 April 2016 (UTC)

I've met many such people. --WikiTiki89 14:39, 25 April 2016 (UTC)

I've met a guy (a Portuguese speaker from Brazil, like myself) who was under the impression that English and French are related, because, not speaking English or French, he discovered a few words from these languages and felt odd that the same letters may have different sounds in different words. He felt that the possibility of the same letters having different sounds in different words was something unlikely to happen in a language. Since English and French have that characteristic in common, he felt that they must be therefore related. --Daniel Carrero (talk) 15:33, 25 April 2016 (UTC)

• Actually, when I took linguistics at university, the idea of English as a Romance language was one of the topics covered. The basic idea is that Middle English is a creole language consisting of a Norman French acrolect (the language of high society) and an Old English basilect (the language of the plebs), which would make Modern English a French-based creole language with Germanic grammar. The idea of English as a French creole is very politically-charged though, since the English and French have warred for hundreds of years. Nicole Sharp (talk) 13:16, 5 September 2016 (UTC)

easy to work with

You said, in a post above: "When you finally get a call for a job, if they see that you are very available and easy to work with, and if they think you’ve done a good job, then they will start using you."

Also: "if you do an excellent job in good time and are easy to work with, he might start giving you some work."

If it's OK to ask, I wonder: how can a translator be a difficult person to work with? --Daniel Carrero (talk) 13:24, 24 April 2016 (UTC)

Translators can be very difficult sometimes. Here are some of the problems I have encountered. Translators in the U.S. are usually hired as subcontractors, which means that they essentially work for themselves (just like a plumber, a carpet layer, or an auto mechanic), and they contract with me to do specific jobs. Since they work for themselves, they are responsible for their own income tax, social security, sales tax, etc., and if they want medical insurance or other kinds of insurance, they must obtain it for themselves. I had a Japanese translator who was very insistent that I provide insurance for him. I tried to explain to him that subcontractors have to handle their own insurance needs, but he would not listen. I dismissed him.

Another translator who did a job for me decided that he wanted to be paid for the work the day after the job was finished. Usually a company pays us for our services 30 days after the work is delivered, and we pay our translators every two weeks (every other Friday). When I explained that he would be paid in two weeks, he became abusive and threatening, so I paid him immediately and fired him.

Another translator gave us a list of his phone numbers (about four phone lines, I think). When we had work for him, the dispatcher called one of his numbers and left a message for him to call us. It turned out that that phone number was for the cell phone in his car, and he rarely checked it for messages, so he was too late in returning our call. He blamed us for the mix up, saying that we should have called all of his phone numbers and left messages on each of his phones. That's not reasonable, we only call one number and leave one message. If he didn't want us to call his car phone, he should not have given us that number. We had to dismiss him over the incident.

One of the worst was a French translator who did a very big job for us. We gave him several large notebooks full of text to translate into English. The translation had to do with some cargo aircraft that had crashed and needed major service and repairs. After the translator finished the translation, she called me and said she felt that the translation was very, very important, and therefore she wanted to renegotiate her fees. She demanded that we pay her double her original quote for the job. When we contract with a client to translate their material, we keep 50% of the translation fee for the company, and pay 50% of the money to the translator. So when she demanded double payment, it meant that she would take the entire check. She refused to turn over the manuals unless we met her demands, so we were forced to pay her want she wanted. After we paid her the doubled fee, we filed a lawsuit against her in small claims court and we were awarded our rightful portion of the money. We fired her and blacklisted her in our State.

One time I had an important meeting with the board of a company concerning Arabic translation. One of the products that the company needed translations for was pork products, which they wanted to sell on the Arab market in several Arab countries. I wanted to talk them out of offering pork products to Arab importers, but I needed certain terms translated into Arabic so that I could make an intelligent argument. However, my Arabic translator refused to translate any of the material for the pork products. I told her that I was going to talk the company out of exporting any pork, but I needed the material translated so that I could made a cogent argument. Still she refused, and so I fired her and hired another Arab translator who would do as I asked.

Another French translator started to work on a job we gave her, and then she realized that it was too technical for her, so she called the client and suggested that they find a different translation service. That was a serious mistake, since we had plenty of other French translators who could have handled the job. We had to let her go because of her bad judgment.

A Korean translator did a large job for us into Korean. It was a Korean written exam to obtain a drivers license, and we needed to translate it and enter the translation into a special database that would run on the client's specialized computers. The Korean translator submitted his translation, then I entered it into the database (I had to retype the entire Korean translation to get it into the database). When I was finished, I printed the translation out and asked the Korean translator to proofread it to make sure that I had not made any mistakes. The client's printer did not use good Korean fonts, but this was not a problem because the Koreans who would take the Korean test would only see the test on screen, not a printout. The printout was only for proofreading. But our Korean translator was so upset that the printout was in an ugly font, that he refused to proofread it. He did not understand that the material would be used only on screen, and he wanted me to make the client buy thousands of Apple computers for the Korean language test. Long story short, I had to call in a different Korean translator to proofread the job, and I had to fire the original translator because he was unreasonable.

In another job, a client was madly in love with a Turkish girl and he wanted to translate love letters into Turkish. I gave the love letters to one of our Turkish translators, and after the translator read the love letters, he felt that the client was acting like a complete fool, so he called the client and told him what a fool he was. We lost that job and I fired that translator.

Most of our translators were very responsible and easy to work with, but with more than 200 translators over a period of 30 years, there were occasional problems such as the ones I have described. These were translators who were difficult to work with. —Stephen ^(Talk) 14:56, 24 April 2016 (UTC)

Thanks, your reply was really interesting. It can be read as a serious list of some things not to do in a job.

From what you said, it seems obvious to me that it was wrong of the Turkish translator being judgemental of the Turkish love letter guy. Being the client a fool or not, he had the right to have his love letters translated or he could simply call another company. I can understand the reasoning to some extent in that, I've been working in multiple jobs selling stuff, (1 fast-food job, 1 telephone-answering job and now I have an online store) and I don't see myself suggesting to a client "give up your plans about buying what I have, try another company or just go home". The Arab pork case was somehow different, in which you had the chance to think "I'll translate whatever you have, no questions asked" but you had good reason to dissuade the client of a bad business decision. --Daniel Carrero (talk) 02:34, 26 April 2016 (UTC)

Yes, companies almost always have commercial or legal reasons that they want a translation, but private individuals may have all sorts of reasons, and it is not the job of a translator to make judgments. That reminds me of another case we had ... a judge in the criminal courts needed a Thai interpreter, and he agreed to our price quote. We sent the interpreter, but then the judge tried to renegotiate the price of the job with her, asking if she would agree to do the job at half price. The Thai interpreter agreed, since the amount seemed reasonable to her, but she didn’t stop to think that our company keeps 50%. So in the end, we paid her 50% of her renegotiated price, which made her unhappy, but then she understood the reason why. The business office negotiates the prices, not the individual translators. In this instance, we stopped accepting work from that judge. —Stephen ^(Talk) 09:32, 26 April 2016 (UTC)

Old Khmer

Hello and sorry to bother you! I would like to hear your opinion regarding Old Khmer.

Now, there are an increasing number of entries in which Old Khmer terms need the native script. But all the available Old Khmer dictionaries seem to write terms in the Latin script only. So, on English Wiktionary, do you think it is okay to write an Old Khmer term directly in Latin rather than using it as a transliteration and requesting the native script for it? For example:

(in the etymology of กลาโหม)

instead of

{{m|km||tr=kralā homa}}

And because of such increase, do you think it is the time to have specific language codes for Old Khmer, Pre-Angkorian Khmer, Angkorian Khmer, Middle Khmer, and Modern Khmer? So that we don't have to use a format like this:

Old {{cog|km|-}}, to produce: Old Khmer

or

Angkorian {{cog|km|-}}, to produce: Angkorian Khmer

etc.

Thank you very much! --หมวดซาโต้ (talk) 05:39, 28 April 2016 (UTC)

@Wyang, Octahedron80, Suzukaze-c, Iudexvivorum This topic may interest you. --หมวดซาโต้ (talk) 05:49, 28 April 2016 (UTC)

I support codes for older varieties of Khmer and using Latin to write Old/Pre-Angkorian Khmer (for now). Wyang (talk) 06:05, 28 April 2016 (UTC)

I believe you have pinged the wrong person; I don't deal with Thai entries. —suzukaze (t・c) 06:06, 28 April 2016 (UTC)

I pinged you since you made a relevant edit at กลาโหม :) --หมวดซาโต้ (talk) 06:10, 28 April 2016 (UTC)

Yes, I think Latin script is best, at least for now. For one thing, Old Khmer was written in an old script that is no long used. I don’t think there are fonts available for Old Khmer. Also, I don’t know of any resources that could be used for spelling Old Khmer.

As to language codes for Old Khmer, Pre-Angkorian Khmer, Angkorian Khmer, Middle Khmer, yes, we need them. —Stephen ^(Talk) 06:08, 28 April 2016 (UTC)

Thanks! Then I will request User talk:Angr to make special codes for them. --หมวดซาโต้ (talk) 06:14, 28 April 2016 (UTC)

Decree Nisi Changes - Language

Hello, I replied back on my talk page. Still getting the hang of how to use website features.

Hi. Please sign your comments with four tildes: ~~~~. —Stephen ^(Talk) 20:50, 29 April 2016 (UTC)

Haha "I may as well have written it in chinese". I guess our fluency flow is a bit different. First, a claim's validity is a claim's truthfullness & also juristic truthfullness & a claim's legitimacy is its legal officiality. Second, I used "to" as in 'in regard to'. Third, I used "unless" to mean 'instead but if', as in instead but if the party's cause demonstrates why not. Fourth, I used "cause" in regard to a parties case//defense//rebuttal against such claims validity. I did do my best to include legalisms. Also I maybe should have included the entry in nisi due to a "decree" being a courts doing & not an individuals in that sense, although a verdict is that which is veridical & thus an individual can have jurisdiction & validation//verification to their claims validity until rebutted//refuted, by nisi, the principle of nisi, & maybe as you know a verdict is basically a decree, except with the advantage that it involves something being veridical, determined by the logicality of its semantic derivative.x8BC8x (talk) 23:17, 29 April 2016 (UTC)

A rule regarding a claim’s validity and legitimacy; on the other hand, if a party’s cause demonstrates why not, if not as a nullity of illegitimacy for nullification.

It’s better, but it still does not make sense. It demonstrates why not what? And then "if not as a nullity of illegitimacy for nullification" is incomprehensible. And it still is not clear what the rule is. The rule is "regarding" a claim’s validity, but what is the rule? Is it a rule regarding a claim’s validity that says anyone who does not validate a claim may be penalized with a $10,000 fine? —Stephen ^(Talk) 23:51, 29 April 2016 (UTC)

Okay, I looked in some legal dictionaries to see what they say about rule nisi:

(1) A rule upon condition that is to become absolute unless cause is shown to the contrary. (2) An ex parte order, often in the absence of the person against whom the relief is being sought, that will go into effect unless the party that is affected can convince the court that the order should not go into effect. (3) A court ruling that becomes final unless one or both parties show cause for it not to. —Stephen ^(Talk) 01:09, 30 April 2016 (UTC)

Sorry I took so long to look to check & reply, I thought that wiktionary would send me another message if you replied back, I should've checked sooner. Yes i do agree with those definitions and mine was supposed to be another form of the first defintion you've given but with some more details, which i attempted to entail / give result to. If a party's cause demonstrates why not as in 'why it shouldn't' be otherwise valid, and "if not" as in 'should it not', then 'as' as in 'in the form of' a nullity 'among' illegitimacy (which should be for nullification/negation/removal), and is as a rule due to the legal term being a principle of law , especially ex vi termini (by the vis of the term). Hopefully that brings hence/present some sense to such ambiguous senses = ) . x8BC8x (talk) 21:10, 20 May 2016 (UTC)

May 2016

homeowner

Hi. At homeowner you restored the deleted "Someone who owns a house for all practical intents and purposes, but is technically still in the process of paying for it over a long period of time". What does it mean? Does it mean:

1. Someone who has title to a house and a mortgage on it.
2. Someone who does not have title to a house, but has possession and is paying by instalments, or renting-to-buy, or some such.
3. Or something else.

I am quite puzzled as to what it means. I thought someone had started typing the first five words and then got carried away on a verbose and oblique flight of fancy. Thanks. Nurg (talk) 09:48, 1 May 2016 (UTC)

It means the 2nd one, "Someone who does not have title to a house, but has possession and is paying the principle and interest by instalments." You cannot have the title until the mortgage is fully paid. But if you are renting-to-buy, you’re not an owner, you’re a renter. In this case, you don’t become an owner until you eventually stop renting and sign a mortgage contract to become a regular buyer. —Stephen ^(Talk) 11:51, 1 May 2016 (UTC)

Thanks. Nurg (talk) 22:39, 3 May 2016 (UTC)

សូម (soom) / សុំ (som)

Hi Stephen.

When I put the "attention" template in one of these I somehow didn't realize that there were two different but similar words and I didn't actually check my phrasebooks for which one they used for "please".

I'll try to check that today. Thanks for fleshing all this Khmer stuff out by the way! It's remained the most fascinating of the languages from my last trip and nobody else here seems to be working on it at all. — hippietrail (talk) 03:40, 16 May 2016 (UTC)

Yes, interesting language. I especially like the script. —Stephen ^(Talk) 05:26, 16 May 2016 (UTC)

къобуз

Hello, could you please tell me which Turkic language this spelling of the name of a plucked musical instrument is? къобуз Thank you, 204.11.189.94 15:20, 17 May 2016 (UTC)

Karachay-Balkar. See also the Kazak w:kobyz. —Stephen ^(Talk) 20:08, 17 May 2016 (UTC)

Gloria sah (talk • contribs)

Hi. Can you please make Gloria sah an autopatroller? --Romanophile ♞ (contributions) 17:47, 21 May 2016 (UTC)

I would be happy to, but in Wiktionary:Whitelist Ungoliant advises against it for the time being. —Stephen ^(Talk) 17:57, 21 May 2016 (UTC)

Me too, I'm waiting for so long, that our dear Ungoliant would whitelist me ;-pp , --Glo (talk) 18:51, 21 May 2016 (UTC)

Well, that comment is from many months ago. Gloria’s technical knowledge has improved greatly since then, and I’m all for her being whitelisted now. (But someone should nominated her again instead of using this discussion; whitelisting is a public process!) — Ungoliant ^(falai) 19:01, 21 May 2016 (UTC)

I don’t think anyone has ever been re-nominated after a delay was placed on the nomination. I doubt that it will ever happen unless someone sees this discussion and goes to Wiktionary:Whitelist to nominate her again. —Stephen ^(Talk) 19:07, 21 May 2016 (UTC)

Just did it. — Ungoliant ^(falai) 19:31, 21 May 2016 (UTC)

@Ungoliant MMDCCLXIV: I couldn’t remember what the autopatroller page was called. My medications have demented effects so I have to either act quickly when I have a plan, or write it down. --Romanophile ♞ (contributions) 19:14, 21 May 2016 (UTC)

Done. —Stephen ^(Talk) 19:35, 21 May 2016 (UTC)

Nisi // rule nisi // Even decree nisi

Hello there Stephen, so very sorry I took so long to look to check & reply, I thought that wiktionary would send me another message if you replied back, I should've checked sooner. Yes i do agree with those definitions and mine was supposed to be another form of the first defintion you've given but with some more details, which i attempted to entail / give result to. If a party's cause demonstrates why not as in 'why it shouldn't' be otherwise valid, and "if not" as in 'should it not', then 'as' as in 'in the form of' a nullity 'among' illegitimacy (which should be for nullification/negation/removal), and is as a rule due to the legal term being a principle of law , especially ex vi termini (by the vis of the term). Although i'm not quite sure where you came up with the $10,000 fine reference . Hopefully such specifications brings hence/present some sense to such ambiguous senses = ) you should check out my new chinese i came up with for nisi or rule nisi for us to decode ; ) baha! I guess I can show you if you reply back. This message has additional info compared to the other similar message which I hence has already been sent. x8BC8x (talk) 14:40, 23 May 2016 (UTC)

$10,000, just a random example. Not from a real-life case. —Stephen ^(Talk) 03:54, 24 May 2016 (UTC)

How do you feel about my definition? Still appear to be in major error? Feel free to correct me or make a point if you feel it would be beneficial for a postive result . Anyways, so an individual & a court can implement/apply the legal principle of nisi & rule nisi but only a court can implement a decree nisi , & there should be due amendment to Wiktionary's current defintion of both rule nisi & decree nisi? Whenever you have time I think it would be benefical for either you or me or us to come to an agreement on amendments to such terms. x8BC8x (talk) 19:58, 26 May 2016 (UTC)

You mean your original definition? I could not understand it. I'm still not happy with the current definitions at rule nisi and decree nisi. They read well, but they really do not explain what the phrases mean. The definitions from Black's Law Dictionary and some others are a lot better, but I don't want to copy them word for word. —Stephen ^(Talk) 05:14, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

Yes, my main definition but with the exclusion of the explanations of each part's individual understanding. Does it now have clarification? I was hoping the explanations demonstrated its sufficiency without having to include the extra exponents. Also, for some reason Wiktionary show's 'Decree Nisi' & 'Decree Absolute' to be of rules of marriage, although I don't see why that would be, 'Decree Absolute' say's it's a rule from Britain but I'm not certain if it actually is, also other sources & legal authorities would disagree with the terms current status. I can do my best to either change or make an addition to them without speaking foreignly, unless you would rather do so in place of my attempts instead. = ) x8BC8x (talk) 23:23, 29 May 2016 (UTC)

You can try. There was not much in your original definition that people would be able to understand, I don’t think. The current definitions do not make the meanings clear, either. I’m not sure how to rewrite them so that the definitions are clear and understandable. —Stephen ^(Talk) 11:36, 30 May 2016 (UTC)

Alrighty, I'll do my best to do so without any confusion. Thanks for your time. Do feel free to message me whenever for whatever. See ya. = ) x8BC8x (talk) 01:59, 2 June 2016 (UTC)

another business question

Hey Stephen. I don't have any plans to work in translation (as much as I respect your massive multilingualism) but since you have run a company for a while, I thought you might tell me something. To what extent do you think that maintaining contacts, and knowing names, and finding friends of friends, etc. is important to your business? Does this vary across cultures? In what ways? Thanks! Equinox ◑ 06:51, 24 May 2016 (UTC)

It is important. Most translating companies only have a few full-time translators (usually fewer than five or six), and the rest are called upon as needed (that is, they are subcontractors, free agents who act independently and usually work for several different translating companies). So anyone who takes in work to be translated needs to know a lot of translators, especially since there are so many specialties in translation (medical translations, electrical, hydraulic, petroleum, legal, financial, etc.; as well as those who specialize in written translation or oral interpreting, which is divided into simultaneous and consecutive). Most translations are technical, and technical translations can be very, very difficult, since many technical terms cannot be found in existing dictionaries, even technical dictionaries. A German-speaking translator who is doing a tough legal translation often needs to call on other German translators or German technicians working in that industry in Germany to try to pin down a difficult translation. It’s not unusual that a translator might take two or three hours or more on a single difficult word.

There are also translators who specialize in editing, correcting, and polishing translations done by others. Often there are special typographical needs, such as hyphenation, preferences in metrical units, and so on. In Japanese and Chinese, there are tricky situations that can occur from line to line (that is, not only must the editors have the proper sequence of characters in the line of text, editors must also be aware of nearby characters in the previous and following lines, because they can sometimes make unwanted words that would be obvious to readers of those languages). There is a lot going on in translating from one language to another that takes place after the translation proper has been done, and all of it requires the services of specially trained translators.

Besides the thousands of different languages, there are also all of the dialects, and there can be huge differences between a language that is spoken in its homeland (such as Polish in Poland) and one that is spoken by a group that has emigrated (such as Polish people in New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania). There are so many different kinds of translation, and any one translator is limited to only a few of the possibilities. For that reason, anyone accepting translation work either has to say "no" a lot or must have a database of many names, abilities, and specialties.

It can vary by country. In the U.S., translation is not as rigidly controlled as it is in Europe. In America, there are no licensing or education requirements, but in Europe there are strict requirements in regard to education and licensing. In America, almost all translators and interpreters were born and raised in other countries, regardless of whether they translate mostly into English or mostly from English; but in Europe, it is usually a requirement that translators only translate into their mother tongue. —Stephen ^(Talk) 07:30, 24 May 2016 (UTC)

Really interesting stuff. Thank you. I read something recently about the English/French/German versions of EU texts being the de facto versions despite the legal obligation to translate into all EU languages, because the translation delay means that member states just prefer to read the pre-existing versions rather than wait.

When I worked in software, we did the obvious localisations for the US market (e.g. kilometres to miles) but we also ended up doing terminological changes that weren't strictly necessary, like "zip code" for "postcode", and "center" for "centre". The feeling was that there was no barrier to comprehension, but it would otherwise have that faint alien/foreign feeling. (And I always wondered why nobody complained about the weird diagonally-split "English" flag in language selection menus, half US and half UK, since it's nobody's flag and doesn't cover a tenth of the parts of the world that speak English... mumble...) Equinox ◑ 07:55, 24 May 2016 (UTC)

June 2016

UT-interwiki-Bot

Hi Stephen G. Brown,

I assume, this vote should be completed. Could you occasionally be so kind and make a decision?

Greetings from Austria, --Udo T. (talk) 15:02, 2 June 2016 (UTC)

Hi Stephen G. Brown, may I ask you if there are any problems because of my bot account UT-interwiki-Bot? If so, please tell me. Greetings --Udo T. (talk) 22:17, 5 June 2016 (UTC)

Sorry. No, no problems. I thought User:Wikitiki had done it, but he had only closed out the vote. The bot flag is now in place. —Stephen ^(Talk) 17:30, 6 June 2016 (UTC)

You have to be a bureaucrat. That's why I pinged you on the vote page. --WikiTiki89 17:35, 6 June 2016 (UTC)

Unfortunately, the ping did not work. —Stephen ^(Talk) 17:38, 6 June 2016 (UTC)

RobokoBot

Hi,

I'm very sorry to bother you but could you please close this vote?

Thanks! --Thibaut120094 (talk) 12:42, 10 June 2016 (UTC)

July 2016

Telugu suffix

I have created some words with suffix -ట. Are the entries are correct. This is common practice to convert verbs to nouns this way. But some dictionaries (even the Brown's) are not including them (reasons are not clear). I want to make sure before continuing further.Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 10:42, 4 July 2016 (UTC)

Can I use this template : verbal noun of for these entries.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 05:46, 5 July 2016 (UTC)

Yes, I think that including words with -ట is a good idea.

And yes, you can use {{verbal noun of|x|lang=te}} for these entries. —Stephen ^(Talk) 08:16, 5 July 2016 (UTC)

Thank you very much sir. There are other verbal nouns (in Modern Telugu language) formed by adding అటం (aṭaṁ) or అడం (aḍaṁ) to different verbs; ex: తినడం (tinaḍaṁ), చదవడం (cadavaḍaṁ). I would like to create these noun pages also.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 11:09, 5 July 2016 (UTC)

Good idea. —Stephen ^(Talk) 13:15, 5 July 2016 (UTC)

Imperative conjugation of Spanish verbs ending in -venir

Hi, I have a question about the conjugation of these verbs. I believe the correct forms for venir, venirse, and circunvenir are as follows:

• venir: ven, venga, vengamos, venid, vengan
• venirse: vente, véngase, vengámonos, veníos, vénganse
• circunvenir: circunvén, circunvenga, circunvengamos, circunvenid, circunvengan

For *circunvenirse, would it be circunvente or circúnvente? Similarly for *revenirse, revente or révente? Thanks for any help you might have. DTLHS (talk) 21:14, 5 July 2016 (UTC)

• • You had it mostly correct. Regardless of the prefix, these verbs are all conjugated like venir, with the same syllable stressed for each person as is the case with venir. The only difference is that, by adding prefixes or a suffix, it may be necessary to insert an acute accent in order to get the proper syllable stressed. Ven needs no accent, but circunvén has to have the accent. Venga needs no accent, but véngase has to have one.
  • venir: ven, vení (vos), venga, vengamos, venid, vengan
  • venirse: vente, venite (vos), véngase, vengámonos, veníos, vénganse
  • circunvenir: circunvén, circunvení (vos), circunvenga, circunvengamos, circunvenid, circunvengan
  • circunvenirse: circunvente, circunvenite (vos), circunvéngase, circunvengámonos, circunveníos, circunvénganse
  • convenirse: convente, convenite (vos), convéngase, convengámonos, conveníos, convénganse
  • prevenirse: prevente, prevenite (vos), prevéngase, prevengámonos, preveníos, prevénganse
  • revenirse: revente, revenite (vos), revéngase, revengámonos, reveníos, revénganse —Stephen ^(Talk) 00:32, 6 July 2016 (UTC)

Bottom-left character in the logo

Hi. Do you know what is the bottom-left character in the logo? It looks like a superimposed X + I.

My best guess is that it could be 𝔛. ("MATHEMATICAL FRAKTUR CAPITAL X")

But I could be wrong. --Daniel Carrero (talk) 12:54, 6 July 2016 (UTC)

It's the Cyrillic letter Ж. Chuck Entz (talk) 13:20, 6 July 2016 (UTC)

That right. The letters in the logo are:

シ, श, 말

λ, W, ش

Ж, 维, ש

transliterated:

shi, sha, mal

L, W, sh

zh, wéi, sh —Stephen ^(Talk) 05:10, 7 July 2016 (UTC)

Thank you, Chuck and Stephen. I added the list to Help:FAQ, under the question: "What are the characters in the logo?"

Before you replied, I was able to discover most characters by perusing past discussions about the logo.

I don't speak Arabic. I had found ﺵ (a redlink) ("ARABIC LETTER SHEEN ISOLATED FORM"), and I did not know that instead I should use ش ("ARABIC LETTER SHEEN"). I learned a bit about the difference by reading Arabic script in Unicode. --Daniel Carrero (talk) 08:36, 7 July 2016 (UTC)

Business question

I'd like to ask you another business question. I understand that translators are subcontractors, free agents who act independently, and that your company would keep 50% of the translation fee, and pay 50% of the money to the translator.

Could any of your translators say to the client: "Next time you need translation done, just contact me, you don't need to go through the company."

Would this be something dishonest, unethical to do, having in mind that it would drive business away from your company? Or would this be something normal and expected that translators can do as free agents? --Daniel Carrero (talk) 11:57, 7 July 2016 (UTC)

Yes, that would be dishonest and unethical. I very rarely had that problem. I remember that I had a Chinese translator who was secretly trying to set up his own translation agency, and I had to fire him as soon as I found out about it. He was an excellent translator and I hated to lose him, but he would have had access to thousands of my clients and he would have known how much I charge and all of my personal contacts in the companies. It’s probably a good idea to have translators sign a noncompete clause (NCC). That way, if a translator ever went behind my back, I could bring a lawsuit against him. But I never did that, since most translators understand that they should not do it.

More often I had problems with my clients themselves. A motion-picture company tried to hire me independently of my company, so that he would only have to pay half price. Of course, I refused. I also had a federal judge try to make a separate deal with my Thai translator, where he would hire her and cut my company out. I blacklisted the judge and refused to accept any more work from his court. —Stephen ^(Talk) 12:13, 7 July 2016 (UTC)

Telugu script characters

There are some pages about the Category:Telugu script characters. For a few, there are no pages. Can you create these missing pages. I am fearing about any mistake, that might occur when I create these pages.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 12:05, 7 July 2016 (UTC)

Yes. Can you make a list of the missing letters? —Stephen ^(Talk) 12:15, 7 July 2016 (UTC)

Look at this : Appendix:Unicode/Telugu. Those in red letters. Pages need to be prepared for them. Sorry to give this trouble to you. Thanks.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 13:09, 7 July 2016 (UTC)

I have created this అనుస్వారము. I do not know which one is correct.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 07:48, 9 July 2016 (UTC)

Thanks. I’m sure that అనుస్వారము is the correct one. —Stephen ^(Talk) 08:26, 9 July 2016 (UTC)

Telugu rhymes

What are these rhymes. There are few languages, wherein these rhymes are created. Other than Category:English rhymes, in Indian languages, there are few Hindi rhymes for which categories are prepared. Can I create these rhymes pages for Telugu languages. What method to follow. Kindly guide me sir in proper direction.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 16:02, 9 July 2016 (UTC)

Yes, it would be nice to have rhymes. At w:Rhyme they talk about different kinds of rhymes, and mention Sanskrit rhymes and Tamil rhymes. In general, you could create pages such as Rhymes:Telugu/ప్పా (for words such as ఒప్పులకుప్పా, చిప్పా, కప్పా). Or you could show the rhymes in IPA as we do in English: Rhymes:Telugu/pːaː. Choose the method that you prefer.

Then on the ఒప్పులకుప్పా page, you would add:

===Pronunciation===

* {{rhymes|ప్పా|lang=te}}

or * {{rhymes|pːaː|lang=te}}

Then on the page for Rhymes:Telugu/ప్పా (or Rhymes:Telugu/pːaː), you would prepare it like Rhymes:English/aɪmz. —Stephen ^(Talk) 19:23, 9 July 2016 (UTC)

Thank you very much for a detailing the methods of creating the rhymes for Telugu language. Since many Telugu words does not have IPA ; it looks easier to use the first method Rhymes:Telugu/ప్పా. But none of the language rhymes in English wiktionary have used this method.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 02:11, 10 July 2016 (UTC)

Almost all of the language rhymes on English Wiktionary are languages that use the Latin alphabet. I think only Hindi and Russian are using IPA instead of their standard alphabet. The Greek rhymes are using the Greek alphabet for its rhymes. See Rhymes:Greek/έος for example. —Stephen ^(Talk) 07:13, 10 July 2016 (UTC)

Rajasekhar1961, I think you should also make a page called Rhymes:Telugu, similar to the English page named Rhymes:English. Rhymes:Telugu will describe Telugu rhymes (different languages often prefer difference rules for making rhymes), and how to add new Telugu rhymes, etc. —Stephen ^(Talk) 07:24, 10 July 2016 (UTC)

Thank you very much for a detailed explanation. I have created Rhymes:Telugu/ప్పా. The Categories are added. But how to create Rhymes:Telugu page.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 11:01, 10 July 2016 (UTC)

Can I add గొప్ప to this category.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 11:47, 10 July 2016 (UTC)

I don’t think that గొప్ప rhymes with ఒప్పులకుప్పా, does it? ఒప్పులకుప్పా has long a (-ppaa), but గొప్ప has short a (-ppa). గొప్ప probably belongs on Rhymes:Telugu/ప్ప. But you are the expert. If you feel that they rhyme, then add గొప్ప.

Rhymes:Telugu should have information about Telugu rhymes. See Section VIII: On rhyme... I think that it has coon information about Telugu rules for rhyming. —Stephen ^(Talk) 13:17, 10 July 2016 (UTC)

ఒప్పులకుప్పా is actually ఒప్పులకుప్ప meaning beautiful person. It is lengthened only in a poetic form used in "ఒప్పులకుప్పా ఒయ్యారి భామ" one of the children songs. Hence should I change this page Rhymes:Telugu/ప్పా to Rhymes:Telugu/ప్ప, so that I can add the other rhyming words like గొప్ప, చిప్ప, కప్ప, తెప్ప, పప్ప, మొప్ప etc. I have created some more rhymes also. Are they accurate.Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 15:14, 10 July 2016 (UTC)

No, it appears that both ఒప్పులకుప్పా and ఒప్పులకుప్ప are correctly spelled words. ఒప్పులకుప్పా rhymes with Rhymes:Telugu/ప్పా, and ఒప్పులకుప్ప rhymes with Rhymes:Telugu/ప్ప. They are like e'er and ever in English, where e'er is a poetic spelling of ever.

The rhyme pages look good, but each word such as ఒడ్డు also needs to have this:

===Pronunciation===

* Rhymes: -డ్డు

This links ఒడ్డు to the rhyme page so that a person can see what other words rhyme with ఒడ్డు. —Stephen ^(Talk) 12:34, 11 July 2016 (UTC)

In regard to Rhymes:Telugu, another helpful page that you can compare is Rhymes:Spanish. —Stephen ^(Talk) 20:06, 11 July 2016 (UTC)

I have created ఒప్పులకుప్పా and the related words also. Kindly look at these pages.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 06:00, 12 July 2016 (UTC)

I think ఒప్పులకుప్పా is good, but I have a couple of questions about ఒప్పులకుప్ప. In ఒప్పులకుప్ప, it is marked as a phrase. It does not seem like a phrase to me, but just a noun. Also, the definition of ఒప్పులకుప్ప is "an assemblage of beauty" (అందం సమాహారం, అందం ఒక సేకరణ??)... it is hard to understand it in English. —Stephen ^(Talk) 12:22, 13 July 2016 (UTC)

You are right. It is entered under noun only. I have changed it.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 13:32, 13 July 2016 (UTC)

I have started entering the IPA in the pronunciation section of the Rhymes:Telugu ex: Rhymes:Telugu/క్క. It helps me to pronounce the related words in that rhymes group. Kindly check for any errors. I have started writing the Telugu rhymes page in Rhymes:Telugu. I gave an example of కుక్క, మొక్క and చిన్నక్క. Can I quote పంచు and చూచు as a wrong example there. Thanking you.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 06:45, 15 August 2016 (UTC)

One thing I noticed: IPA can indicate the stressed syllable by inserting the ˈ mark before the syllable, like this: /kuˈkːa/, IPA for కుక్క. I don't know if Telugu also has a secondary (weaker) stress. Some languages, such as English, have a secondary stress, as in the word platypus (American English has a primary stress on "plat", secondary stress on "pus"). If Telegu has a secondary stress in some words, that weaker stress is indicated with ˌ, as in /ˈplætɪˌpʊs/. —Stephen ^(Talk) 13:28, 15 August 2016 (UTC)

Sorry, I am not knowledgeable enough about the Linguistics and Pronunciation of Telugu language. Can I continue to work in the IPA section.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 10:29, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

Yes, of course. I don't think that word stress is very important in Telugu anyway. People say that Telugu word stress does not affect meaning or understanding, and speakers disagree about which syllable should be stressed. Most people say that stress should be on the next-to-last or the last syllable, depending on word and vowel length. —Stephen ^(Talk) 15:05, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

Can I create Rhymes:Telugu pages for డు, ము, వు, లు, the case endings of Telugu language. They will be many pages ending with these letters.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 10:39, 19 August 2016 (UTC)

Yes, if Telugu poets use these forms as rhymes. It really depends on the traditions followed by native writers and speakers. In the Spanish language, there is a common verb ending in -ía (comía, vivía, había, etc.), which forms the conditional tense for some verbs. It is very common in the Spanish language, and Spanish poets say that writers should avoid making rhymes with verb suffixes such as -ía, because it is too easy. If a Spanish poem has rhymes with -ía, it sounds childish. So if Telugu poets like to use these case endings to create rhymes, then you should make pages for them. —Stephen ^(Talk) 10:54, 19 August 2016 (UTC)

There is a request for cleanup for Telugu rhymes. See the link here: [6].Is there any discussion earlier about Greek and other languages which are based on the local language.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 11:46, 22 September 2016 (UTC)

I don't know of any discussions about Greek, etc. IPA is needed for English because English is not spelled phonetically. For languages that are spelled phonetically (especially if there are different regional pronunciations), IPA does not makes sense. For example, Rhymes:Spanish/anθja is not very useful, since only a minority of Spanish speakers use that pronunciation. If it were named Rhymes:Spanish/ancia, then it would make sense for all regions of every Spanish-speaking country. Also, many letter combinations in Spanish can have different pronunciations according to need. For example, the ending -ado can be pronounced /aðo/ or /ao/; combinations of strong vowels such as /ae/ (two syllables) can be pronounced /ai/ (one syllable) and vice versa. So if the rhyme in a certain Spanish poem needs to rhyme with "Laos", every Spanish poet knows he can use a word that ends in -ados; but if in another place a rhyme is needed for -ados, the ending -ados still works. The same spelling can fit different pronunciations.

Using IPA instead of the Spanish alphabet means that words with the ending -ado will need to show multiple rhymes (for regional accents and for variant pronunciations). Also, there are several kinds of rhyme in Spanish, so the ending -ado will need quite a few more versions. In Spanish assonant rhyme, the words Juan, habláis, mar, más, and tomad all rhyme with one other. By requiring that Spanish use IPA for rhymes as English does, it makes providing rhymes in Spanish very awkward and unintuitive, and no one will do the enormous work needed to make it workable for Spanish.

So I would let the other editors who do not know Spanish or Telugu rhyme and meter decide on which they prefer. If they still want IPA, I think you should let someone do it who better understands what they want. That's what I would do. —Stephen ^(Talk) 03:43, 23 September 2016 (UTC)

Thank you very much for your details explanation. I would continue my work; because it is giving me an opportunity to link similar Telugu words.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 09:14, 23 September 2016 (UTC)

Sir, I have changed the page links from simple interwiki link ex: (చీమ) to language link ex: చీమ (cīma) in the Rhymes:Telugu/మ page. It appears to be better to understand for the non-Telugu speaking people, because of the transliteration. Is it O.K.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 08:52, 16 May 2017 (UTC)

Yes, that's a good idea. Thanks. —Stephen ^(Talk) 13:44, 16 May 2017 (UTC)

Please go through the Rhymes:Telugu/ప page. I have a doubt. Are the two words చెంప (cempa) and చేప (cēpa) really rhiming. Similar problem is there in other Telugu rhymes pages. Kindly clarify. If not, I would split them into two different pages.Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 10:32, 2 June 2017 (UTC)

I'm not sure if they are rhymes or not. Different languages have different ideas about rhyming. Try to think of two lines of poetry using these two words. For example:

అతను చెప్పాడు: ఒక చేప,

అతను ఆలోచన: ఒక చెంప.

When you say the lines, do they seem to rhyme, or not? —Stephen ^(Talk) 04:11, 3 June 2017 (UTC)

I have discussed with some linguists, the two words rhyme in poetic usage. The anusvara in Telugu language is part of the preceding letter, but not to the letter following it.Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 05:38, 5 June 2017 (UTC)

Unonyanyogona ipi

What is your most popular language u speak? Unonyanyogona ipi or rurimi rwaamai vako? User:Takudzwa Chaita 14:05, 10 July 2016‎ (UTC)

Ndine hurombo, handina kuona ichi pamberi. Chinonyanya yakakurumbira mutauro kuti ndinotaura (kunze Chirungu) ndiwo mutauro wokuRussia. Rurimi rwaamai vangu ndiye chiRungu. Ndakadzidza mutauro wokuRussia pandakanga ndiri muchiuto. Mushure muchiuto, ndakazonzwa mitauro wechiSpain, wokuFrance, wokuGermany, uye vamwe. —Stephen ^(Talk) 16:00, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

Verbs

In Spanish are they verbs which are transferred from English or it own verbs Takudzwa Chaita (talk) 13:36, 10 July 2016 (UTC)

Spanish has its own verbs, such as hablar (to speak). For a list of Spanish verbs, see Category:Spanish verbs. —Stephen ^(Talk) 13:42, 10 July 2016 (UTC)

English or Spanish

Yaa l agree with on that but you see l can speak or write English but at home and we usually speak Shona . Lm good at English in writing not in speaking so my mom hire me professional English teacher so he is working at me so l suggested to learn Spanish too T Chaita 13:55, 17 July 2016 (UTC)

Yes, a professional English teacher will be a big help for you. Many people can learn only one language at a time, but some people are able to learn 2 or 3 languages at the same time. Only you know if you are able to learn 2 languages at once. If you can do it easily, then by all means you should learn English and Spanish. The website that I gave you, https://www.duolingo.com/, is a good source for learning Spanish. —Stephen ^(Talk) 14:24, 17 July 2016 (UTC)

Telugu possessive pronouns

I have created pages for two Category:Telugu possessive pronouns : నాది (mine) and నీది (yours). Are they correct. There are other similar possessive pronouns : అతనిది, ఆమెది, etc., There are plural forms also like నావి and నీవి. What method of entry to follow for these plural forms. Kindly help me.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 13:37, 20 July 2016 (UTC)

Yes, they look good to me. Plural forms can follow the same method. For example, here is a plural pronoun in the Asturian language: nosotros (we); and in Spanish: nuestro (our). —Stephen ^(Talk) 13:49, 20 July 2016 (UTC)

I have created the suffix pages -ది (singular) and -వి (plural) that are used in these Telugu possessive pronouns. I am linking them to these pronouns through Etymology. Can you expand the Telugu pronouns table (in నాది) and include the 3rd person and singular and plural forms as is seen in nuestro page.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 04:54, 21 July 2016 (UTC)

Done. Please check నాది to make sure that I did it correctly. —Stephen ^(Talk) 06:10, 21 July 2016 (UTC)

You misunderstood me. I meant to include the Telugu 3rd person pronouns in the table; not the suffixes.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 08:03, 21 July 2016 (UTC)

Do you mean 3rd person singular masculine అతను, అతడు (he); 3rd person singular feminine ఆమె, ఆవిడ (she); 3rd person singular neuter ఇది, ఈ (it); and 3rd person plural వారు, అవి (they)? —Stephen ^(Talk) 08:14, 21 July 2016 (UTC)

I just saw a separate table for 3rd person pronouns. I do not know the need for two tables of Telugu pronouns.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 11:07, 21 July 2016 (UTC)

So, should the two tables be combined or kept separate. If separate, I suppose that I should remove the 3rd person from నాది? —Stephen ^(Talk) 12:25, 21 July 2016 (UTC)

Please keep them as it is. Sorry to disturb your work without knowing the facts.Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 03:04, 22 July 2016 (UTC)

I think that we need a second table of pronouns. In నేను (I, which is a personal pronoun), the current table {{te-personal pronouns}} is good. But in నాది (mine, which is a possessive pronoun), {{te-personal pronouns}} is not appropriate. —Stephen ^(Talk) 19:49, 22 July 2016 (UTC)

I have removed the personal pronouns table from నాది page. Thanking you.Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 04:17, 23 July 2016 (UTC)

Telugu interrogative pronouns

I have created few pages and expanded the other Category:Telugu interrogative pronouns. Please check their accuracy and for any mistakes.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 08:14, 24 July 2016 (UTC)

I made some changes to ఏది that I think are helpful. The other pages can benefit the same way. I also made some changes on the other pages, but I am not sure that my changes are correct. You probably need to correct my edits. —Stephen ^(Talk) 16:52, 24 July 2016 (UTC)

Thank you sir.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 17:01, 24 July 2016 (UTC)

Telugu superlative adjectives

పరమము means most, excellent. Can I include it in Category:Telugu adjective superlative forms‎. In పరమపతివ్రత; పరమ is a prefix or adjective. Can you tell me some other examples of the Telugu superlative adjectives. Thanking you.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 05:40, 26 July 2016 (UTC)

In most cases, Telugu does not have comparative or superlative forms (-er, more, -est, most). Instead, Telugu shows degrees of comparison like this: Than water milk is good (= better). Than that knife this is good. Among these horses this is good (= best). With Ramayya and Subbayya, Subbayya is clever (more clever).:

నీటి కంటే పాలు మంచిది. ― nīṭi kaṇṭē pālu mañcidi. ― Milk is better than water.

ఆ కత్తి కంటే ఈ మంచి ఉంది. ― ā katti kaṇṭē ī mañci undi. ― This knife is better than that one.

ఈ గుర్రాలు మధ్య ఈ మంచి ఉంది. ― ī gurrālu madhya ī mañci undi. ― This one is the best of these horses.

రామయ్యా సుబ్బయ్యా లతో సుబ్బయ్యా మేధావి ఉంది. ― rāmayyā subbayyā latō subbayyā mēdhāvi undi. ― Subbayya is more clever than Ramayya.

Here are some words that might be superlative adjectives, but some are probably not correct:

కనీసం

చెత్త

అతిపెద్ద

అతిచెడ్డది

బ్లాకెస్ట్

అత్యున్నత

చౌకైన

అతి తెలివైన

ఉత్తమ

అత్యంత

సన్నిహిత

అత్యంత శీతల

అధిక సాంద్రత ఉన్న

సులభమయిన

ఫిట్టెస్ట్

తాజా

హాస్యపూరిత

కష్టతరమైన

అతి బరువైన

అత్యధిక

హాటెస్ట్

ఉత్తమ

అతిపెద్ద

తాజా

పెను శబ్దం కలిగిన

అత్యల్ప

సౌమ్యమైన

పెద్దవాడు

సులువేమీ

అతి మృదువైన

అతి తేమగా

విశాల

పిన్న —Stephen ^(Talk) 07:07, 26 July 2016 (UTC)

What I understood, Telugu language has Category:Telugu adjective comparative forms but not superlative adjective forms. Can I create this category with the existing Telugu adjectives.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 02:52, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

I did not see this until now. Yes, that category seems good to me. —Stephen ^(Talk) 03:30, 25 August 2016 (UTC)

Literature and language-learning material in Navajo

Hi Stephen. A friend of mine will do research on American literature as part of her college graduation. She told me she is interested in focusing on the work of Native Americans. Do you happen to know of any good material for learning Navajo or literature written in Navajo; preferably something that is available or orderable online from Brazil. (Other native languages could work too, but as far as I know Navajo is the one with most resources available). Thanks! — Ungoliant ^(falai) 02:38, 28 July 2016 (UTC)

"Diné Bizaad: Speak, Read, Write Navajo" is good. She can get it from Salina Bookshelf. I am not sure about ordering from Brazil. Another one is "Diné Bizaad Bínáhoo’aah: Rediscovering The Navajo Language" (available at the same place). There is also the "Rosetta Stone Navajo", also from the Salina Bookshelf site.

Navajo and the other Athabaskan languages (such as Apache) are among the most difficult languages on earth, and few people have ever learned to speak one of them fluently as a second language. For that reason, the language materials that are available are actually intended for use by people who already speak the languages, but who want to study their own language. I don’t think there are any Navajo grammars written specifically for foreigners. She can also find some Navajo literature at the Salina Bookshelf.

She can get Comanche language books here. For Cherokee, she might like this one or this one. For Lakota language, try [this one]. It’s an old book (1939), but very good.

However, as I mentioned, I don’t know what difficulties there might be by ordering from Brazil. —Stephen ^(Talk) 04:38, 28 July 2016 (UTC)

Thank you so much, Stephen! My friend sends her thanks as well. — Ungoliant ^(falai) 13:37, 30 July 2016 (UTC)

Idiom or phrase

I have created నిండుకుండ తొణకదు. Is it an Idiom or Phrase. Please check for its accuracy.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 06:19, 28 July 2016 (UTC)

I think it is a proverb (నానుడి). Otherwise, it seems good. A proverb entry is like a watched pot never boils. —Stephen ^(Talk) 06:30, 28 July 2016 (UTC)

Thank you sir.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 07:59, 28 July 2016 (UTC)

Spanish combined forms

I have recently added an option to display some combined forms to the Spanish conjugation templates, and I would appreciate your feedback:

1. Are these forms correct? (particularly unsure of the second person plural forms on both axes).
2. Does it make sense to use "dative" and "accusative" in this way? If not how would you organize this table?

Thanks for your time. DTLHS (talk) 16:25, 31 July 2016 (UTC)

I think it’s pretty good, I don’t see any mistakes. There are complications surrounding the third-person le/les and lo/la/los/las, and I doubt that these complications can be addressed by us. Or at least, I don’t know how it could be done. Different regions sometimes have different rules. For example, in central and northern Spain, le/les are often used as indirect objects, so instead of saying lo vimos (we saw him), la vimos (we saw her), they say le vimos (we saw him/her...humans) and lo vimos, la vimos (we saw it...nonhuman). In the same region, le/les commonly are used as direct objects (male or female), though often they will use los for males and les for female direct objects (while in the singular, a speaker might change to lo/la).

Usually these le/les and lo/la/los/las complications also depend upon the verb used. Some verbs are often found with these differences, while other verbs are not. For example, some common verbs that may be heard with le/les as a human direct object include:

creer (yo le creo, I believe him/her)

disgustar (to displease)

gustar (to please) (les gusta, they like it)

importar (to matter to)

interesar (to interest)

llenar (to fulfill) (ser ama de casa no le llena, being a housewife does not fulfill her; but lo llena, he fills it up)

pegar (to beat) (su marido le pega a ella, her husband beats her)

Also, le/les are preferred for third-person human direct objects in certain other constructions in most parts of the Spanish-speaking world, but this really gets complicated and is a subject for an advanced grammar. Some very common cases of this are:

Usually after an impersonal se: se le reconoció (he was recognized) (se lo reconoció is also correct, but not usual)

Often when the direct object should be usted/ustedes, le/les is often used (although lo/la are also correct): Perdone, señor, no quería molestarle (excuse me, sir, I didn’t want to bother you)

Quite often if the subject of the verb is inanimate (neither human nor animal), le/les are often preferred as direct objects even by someone who would use lo/la in other contexts:

Le espera una catástrofe (a catastrophe awaits her), versus La espera su hermana (her sister is waiting for her).

These usages fluctuate in some cases, especially in Latin America. Colombian speakers especially prefer lo/la/los/las where others may use le/les. —Stephen ^(Talk) 21:22, 1 August 2016 (UTC)

This phenomenon is called leísmo and loísmo, should you wish to know. --Allkokf009 (talk) 00:15, 3 August 2016 (UTC)

August 2016

Wikisaurus

What is Wikisaurus (like Thesaurus). Can I create Wikisaurus pages for Telugu language entries. Is there any minimum number of synonyms, antonyms etc for any entry in Wikisaurus.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 02:56, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

Yes, it is like a thesaurus. I have not worked with Wikisaurus, so I don’t know much about it. Wikisaurus includes not only synonyms, but also antonyms, hyponyms, hypernyms, meronyms and holonyms. I don’t think there is any minimum number of synonyms, but as far as I know, we only have the English Wikisaurus. I think you could probably create a Wikisaurus for the Telugu te:విక్షనరీ. Maybe te:వికీపదకోశం. I do not know how Wikisaurus was created. You should ask for information about creating it at WT:BP. —Stephen ^(Talk) 03:48, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

Thank you sir.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 03:51, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

I have started working on Wikisaurus in Telugu language. For example: Wikisaurus:కుక్క. Thank you for referring me to the right person.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 15:20, 13 August 2016 (UTC)

Wikisaurus:కుక్క looks very good. —Stephen ^(Talk) 16:27, 13 August 2016 (UTC)

Telugu language - IPA

I have discussed with you earlier regarding IPA pronunciation in Telugu entries. You have linked to the w:Telugu_language#Phonology section from the Pronunciation template. Using that I am creating some pronunciations for Telugu entries. Can you check some of my entries. Can you compare this IPA link (particularly చ, జ, స, ష, శ, హ, య) with some other standard source.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 13:48, 24 August 2016 (UTC)

I made some minor changes. They look good to me. —Stephen ^(Talk) 03:28, 25 August 2016 (UTC)

Do you think w:Telugu_language#Phonology is accurate. How to pronounce ం is not clear to me.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 05:19, 25 August 2016 (UTC)

I don't think that Wikipedia explains how to pronounce ం. I can't find any source that describes ం well. We transliterate the anusvara as ṃ, but other sources may transliterate it as ṁ or ṅ. I don't think it can be represented in IPA all by itself. When it is used in a word, such as కం (kaṁ), maybe it could be written in IPA as /kã/. —Stephen ^(Talk) 07:12, 25 August 2016 (UTC)

Thank you sir.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 08:42, 27 August 2016 (UTC)

/ɔːˈθɒɡ.ɹə.fi/

sodaIPADOTSshowdaSPOKNsylabls?(dad'd=WOULDmakesens..213.49.48.38 10:09, 30 August 2016 (UTC)

To translate (since I've learned to understand this guy): "So the IPA dots show the spoken syllables? That doesn't would make sense.". To replay: Yes, periods are used to separate the syllables; however, the syllabification of spoken English is highly disputed and not very meaningful, except in certain circumstances. --WikiTiki89 11:30, 30 August 2016 (UTC)

guesi(finaly)getit:SPOKNsylabls><RITN1s(hyfenatn,ta!213.49.48.38 14:58, 30 August 2016 (UTC)

To translate: "Guess I (finally) get it. Spoken syllables ≠ written ones (??), thank you!" --WikiTiki89 15:05, 30 August 2016 (UTC)

The biggest difference in etymological vs. syllabic hyphenation is whether a syllable has a long vowel or a short one. A long vowel is indicated by an open syllable (syllable ends in a vowel), and a short vowel is indicated by a closed syllable (syllable ends in a consonant).

• Short vowels: tap, bet, pick, bog, rug.
• Long vowels: ba-by, Re-no, hi-ho, no-go, boo-boo.

If you hyphenate according to etymology, you would get this, which breaks the rules of pronunciation:

geo-graph-y, tele-phony, know-ledge, bio-logy, pre-sent (noun or verb).

Sometimes it is necessary to break up an etymological morpheme to get a needed long or short vowel:

geog-ra-phy, teleph-ony, knowl-edge, bi-ol-o-gy, pres-ent (gift), pre-sent (verb). —Stephen ^(Talk) 01:22, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

September 2016

Your advice on expanding my horizons

Hi. I've come to you for advice for this because you're very well-known here for being able to translate stuff in almost any language I can think of.

I would like to expand my linguistic horizons a bit. Not saying I want to completely learn more languages, but just want to get a basic understanding of more languages. Right now the languages to my highest knowledge compared to others are English, Danish, Scots, and a bunch of Romance languages (not including Romanian and Latin).

If you'd like a list of languages that particularly interest me, they're these: Armenian, Dutch, Finnish, German, Indonesian, Mongolian, Polish, Romanian, Russian, Slovene, and Tagalog.

How did you get such good understandings of all the languages you know? What would you advise me as far as getting a basic understanding of at least most of the languages I listed. My knowledge in Danish was from commitment, and the knowledge of the others comes basically from reading a lot in those languages and taking Spanish and French classes in high school. Thanks. Philmonte101 (talk) 00:17, 3 September 2016 (UTC)

I studied Spanish, German, French, and Russian in school, and my military MOS was Russian linguist, which I used while stationed in West Germany. I continued to live and work in Germany for a number of years, and later also in France, Spain, and a number of other countries. Then I managed a translation company for many years. We had around 200 translators, and besides the regular proofreading that every translation went through, I also ran my own eyes over every translation before it left our office. Having one eye on the source text and the other on the target text, it’s amazing what errors and omissions you can catch after a little experience. As I read all those texts in numerous languages over the course of decades, side by side with the English, it gradually soaked into my brain little by little.

You should study the languages that interest you to learn the basic grammar and how they work, and to pick up at least a basic vocabulary, and then if you will do a lot of reading (it helps, I think, to have the same text in English and the language of study). Some languages are easy to pick up this way (most European languages, and also some others, such as Arabic and Khmer). If you are interested in certain technologies (such as medicine, petroleum exploration and refining, finance, law, civil engineering, automotive, and so on), you can often find trade magazines produced in English and other languages, and after you start learning the vocabulary and phrases used in a particular trade, you will find that it makes understanding texts concerning that trade pretty easy. Otherwise, national and international news articles (newspapers, magazines) are easy to understand, since you can find the same news articles written in English so that you already know about the matter being discussed. Things like that make texts in a foreign language easy to understand, and it allows you to pick up the language surprisingly easy. —Stephen ^(Talk) 01:27, 3 September 2016 (UTC)

Proto-Athabascan convention

Hi Steven, I saw that you replaced my former *deŋ with *denʸ in the root -DÍÍN of Navajo. I know that this is how Young writes it, but my understanding is that because of the typesetting limitations (he was basically using a good old typewriter...), nʸ was his best guess for a replacement of ŋ. In the beginning of the etymological section, he does give the actual real shape of the intended proto-phoneme (ŋ), which appears manually written in the printed book itself. That's why I wanted to modernize these awkward spellings with Leer's original intentions. What do you think ? Julien Daux (talk) 14:06, 13 September 2016 (UTC) As a reference, there is this old entry in the Proto-Athabascan section of Wiktionary that already uses ŋ : *-ləŋ. Julien Daux (talk) 14:22, 13 September 2016 (UTC)

I was not sure about that. There is also the symbol ɲ (like ny) in addition to the symbol ŋ (like ng). I see now that he did say it meant /ŋ/. It still seems odd to me that he would use nʸ for /ŋ/ instead of nᵍ. If you are satisfied that it really means /ŋ/, then that's fine by me. —Stephen ^(Talk) 11:53, 15 September 2016 (UTC)

I agree, this is pretty weird. I don't know myself if a /ɲ/ was intended. I'll do some more research on that.

Side note : I don't know how Wiktionary notifications works, but I wasn't notified of this answer of you, just saw it by chance. In case the same thing happens to you, I replied to you on my talk page, regarding roots and the rest. Regards, Julien Daux (talk) 14:47, 19 September 2016 (UTC)

I often have trouble with automatic notifications, too. As I understand it, it requires two things: the addressee's name, such as @Julien Daux, and the 4 tildes that sign the comment, all in the same paragraph and saved simultaneously. If the addressee's name and the 4 tildes are saved in separate actions, it won't work. I try to do it correctly, but sometimes it still seems to fail. —Stephen ^(Talk) 00:37, 20 September 2016 (UTC)

The diff tool has to recognize the ping and the signature as being in "new" paragraphs rather than replacing old paragraphs. So if you are replacing some content, as here for example, it won't work; in such situations, you have to do something like this instead. --WikiTiki89 14:52, 20 September 2016 (UTC)

Oh, I see. They don't have to be in the same paragraph, they have to be in a new paragraph. Tricky. —Stephen ^(Talk) 04:32, 21 September 2016 (UTC)

October 2016

naháashtą́?

Hi Stephen, I was trying to make some order in the sidá/siké/naháaztą́ entry, and I saw an example with the plural-sitting stem used in the singular, reading : Áłchíní bił naháashtą́ (I sat / stayed with the children), with an emphasis on the 1sg -sh- prefix used along with the plural stem.

As far as I can see, the si-perfective 1st person singular prefix is sé- or sis-. The form should be: Áłchíní bił nahísístą́ .

Is that a colloquialism or just an error? Thank you, Julien Daux (talk) 01:09, 1 October 2016 (UTC)

Not a colloquialism, but I don't remember the precise explanation. The verb in this sentence used the 3rd-person naháaztą́, but with the 1st-person -sh- (naháashtą́. What you wrote is correct as well, but there might be a slight difference in the meaning. I think I read it somewhere, but after all this time I don't know where. —Stephen ^(Talk) 20:18, 1 October 2016 (UTC)

Thanks

I wanted to thank you for changing my username to 'amin'. It made my day. Amin (talk) 22:01, 1 October 2016 (UTC)

dibéłchíʼí

Is it really a verb/adjective meaning "(to be) brown", or isn't it rather a noun meaning "a brown sheep"? Julien Daux (talk) 04:50, 2 October 2016 (UTC)

It's a noun. It can mean a brown sheep, but usually it just means brown. —Stephen ^(Talk) 08:37, 2 October 2016 (UTC)

అట్టి, అటువంటి

I have created two pages for అట్టి (aṭṭi) and అటువంటి (aṭuvaṇṭi). In different dictionaries, they are Categorized as Adjectives, Pronouns. I have given their Brown link also. Kindly clarify their accurate status. Thanking you.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 05:41, 4 October 2016 (UTC)

They used to be called adjectives or pronouns, but the modern term is ===Determiner===. —Stephen ^(Talk) 07:48, 4 October 2016 (UTC)

I have changed their category to Determiner and also created the new Category. Thank you very much.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 12:29, 4 October 2016 (UTC)

cocimiento

How would you translate this sentence?

The definitions I've found say "poaching" or "slow cooking", which doesn't seem to work here. DTLHS (talk) 21:55, 7 October 2016 (UTC)

I believe it should be "conocimiento" ? Julien Daux (talk) 00:03, 8 October 2016 (UTC)

Yes, conocimiento. The translation is:

It is common knowledge that the incidence of this cancer has increased significantly. Thus it is believed that one out of nine women has had, now has, or will have the disease during their lifetime. —Stephen ^(Talk) 05:49, 8 October 2016 (UTC)

Haigééd

Thank you for filling the missing root. When I reviewed my previous day's changes, I was totally unaware that you had filled the root and gloss part, and thinking I did it, I decided to change the gloss from "dig" to "stick". I didn't mean to "revert", "override" or "supersede" any of your edits, I just thought I wrote it. On another note, I'm still split between dig and stick as the main gloss, stick seemed to be closer to the original meaning. Julien Daux (talk) 06:15, 9 October 2016 (UTC)

No problem. Stick maybe, but stick is clear only as a noun. Although stick could be a verb, it is very ambiguous as a verb out of context. If we add it as a verb (in the sense of stab, poke), it will probably be understood by most people as attach, fasten (stick a stamp on the envelope), or some other meaning of stick. I believe that the verbs pierce, poke, or thrust are better understood, or to "act with a rigid, elongated object". I agree that dig is not the best choice. —Stephen ^(Talk) 08:40, 9 October 2016 (UTC)

Yes, "stick" is problematic... I'll try think of a better one-word gloss. Thank you! Julien Daux (talk) 11:52, 10 October 2016 (UTC)

Telugu statistics

How to analyze the work done in Telugu language in English wiktionary. Can you guide me the methodology to assess my work in Telugu language in an yearly or mothly wise. I would like to know, whether my work is progressive, so than I can plan future work. Thanking you.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 12:53, 10 October 2016 (UTC)

I added a couple of links to your user page that should be useful for this. I have not explored them much, but there is a lot of information there. And they contain other links that you can visit. Experiment with these links and see what they will show.

However, these links are based on data dumps that someone at Wikimedia performs from time to time. I don't think they do it every month. Updated perhaps 4 times a year. —Stephen ^(Talk) 14:37, 10 October 2016 (UTC)

విక్షనరీ: సంఖ్య ౪౬

వికీపీడియా: సంఖ్య ౩

aflaj

Hi! You speak every damn language so could you please look at aflaj? Someone requested a proper ety and I found the word, but I think I found falaj (because aflaj should begin with the alef), so it might be very faintly wrong. I can't just put an alef on the beginning because probably some other vowels might be modified. Thanks! Equinox ◑ 21:18, 12 October 2016 (UTC)

أَفْلَاج (ʔaflāj) is one of the plurals of فَلَج (falaj). --WikiTiki89 17:38, 13 October 2016 (UTC)

Wikitiki is right. In Arabic, the pattern vccVc (such as ʾaflāj) is a very common plural of nouns in ccc (such as falaj). —Stephen ^(Talk) 03:34, 14 October 2016 (UTC)

I think what you mean is that ʾaCCāC is a common plural of CaCaC. --WikiTiki89 15:03, 14 October 2016 (UTC)

Right, it is ʾaCCāC (specifically those vowels and not any others). —Stephen ^(Talk) 15:18, 14 October 2016 (UTC)

Telugu poetic forms

There are some early forms of Telugu nouns like ఉత్సాహంబు (ఉత్సాహము), మత్సరంబు (మత్సరము), రాముండు (రాముడు), విహంగంబు (విహంగము) and వీర్యంబు (వీర్యము). Can I consider them as the poetic forms of their actual words written in brackets. I do not think they are the alternative forms. Please clarify my doubt. Thanking you.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 15:24, 18 October 2016 (UTC)

Yes, I think so. Poetic and maybe archaic. —Stephen ^(Talk) 15:32, 18 October 2016 (UTC)

Thank you. I have created page for రాముండు. Is it fine. How to link them to the main page రాముడు--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 04:48, 19 October 2016 (UTC)

It looks good. I think you could link to the main page under either ====See also==== or ====Synonyms====, or possibly ====Related terms====. Choose whichever you prefer.

As for alternative forms, I think that ===Alternative forms=== should be placed after the definitions. —Stephen ^(Talk) 22:55, 19 October 2016 (UTC)

I thought of adding them as Synonyms. The Alternative forms section is at the beginning of the page after the language section. I am following this link: Wiktionary:Entry layout. As for the poetic forms, is there any need to give an example of a stanza in a poem as a reference.--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 14:04, 20 October 2016 (UTC)

You can give an example of a stanza in a poem if you want to. It's not necessary though. —Stephen ^(Talk) 14:25, 20 October 2016 (UTC)

Stems edits

Hi, I saw you slightly updated the stem entries I recently added. If you want me to update the grammatical mistake on "occurring", I can do it, you don't need to go over all the entries yourself. I'm sorry I did this mistake.

Additionally, I saw that you added a slash after the <br> marker (as <br/>) , I wondered what this was for? Regards, Julien Daux (talk) 16:32, 20 October 2016 (UTC)

Thanks, it's not problem. As for br_/, I am not an expert on html, but as I understand it, this is the standard form used in HTML 5. Please see this question and answer. It will explain it better than I can. —Stephen ^(Talk) 16:38, 20 October 2016 (UTC)

Well, I skipped through the link, and all I can say, is that I understand even less than before ;). Seems everyone has their own take on it... Julien Daux (talk) 17:17, 20 October 2016 (UTC)

Yes, it seems that every combination is good. I see some admins correcting br to br_/, but that question/answer site makes me more confused. —Stephen ^(Talk) 18:09, 20 October 2016 (UTC)

At any rate, all stem pages are now fixed with your 2 observations. Julien Daux (talk) 19:06, 20 October 2016 (UTC)

Thanks!

Thank you for creating the page for грейхаунд. Much appreciated.

Accidental edit

My apologies for одинокий. I didn't even mean to edit the page. Pariah24 ┃ ☏ 22:09, 24 October 2016 (UTC)

Farsi yeh

Hey, I've noticed that discussions about this topic occurred a few times on your userpage so I figured you're the one to ask. Would it be a good idea for our link module to convert Arabic yeh and kaf into Farsi variants? I found a case in which one is used in the link and the other in the entry thus failing to link and I imagine this is a reoccurring problem. Crom daba (talk) 10:13, 26 October 2016 (UTC)

Yes, it would be a good idea. Up until about ten years ago, Persian yeh and Arabic yaa’/alif maqsurah were considered the same letter (with minor variations). The Unicode Consortium broke the unified Arabic alphabet into separate alphabets, and people were slow to accept this change. That's why we still find Persian written with Arabic kaf and yaa’, and even the Arabic numbers (٠ ١ ٢ ٣ ٤ ٥ ٦ ٧ ٨ ٩ (instead of) ۰ ۱ ۲ ۳ ۴ ۵ ۶ ۷ ۸ ۹). So it would be useful if the Persian module could check for and fix those letters. —Stephen ^(Talk) 16:01, 26 October 2016 (UTC)

@Crom daba: That would be a very bad idea. All these cases need to be fixed to use a Farsi yeh in the wikitext itself. Converting links only hides the problem rather than fixing it. --WikiTiki89 17:12, 26 October 2016 (UTC)

Does the problem really exist though? In non-final contexts (in which I imagine that most of these mistakes happen) the characters are rendered the same. Another plus is that this would make it impossible for incorrectly written entries to be linked to, making their discovery faster. Crom daba (talk) 17:42, 26 October 2016 (UTC)

Maybe a tracking category could be created. —suzukaze (t・c) 19:03, 26 October 2016 (UTC)

Yeah, I'd rather go with a tracking category than with "correcting" the links. By the way, this problem is not unique to Persian. We've had cases of people using Latin i in Ukrainian (instead of Cyrillic і). Or even more sporadic cases of various other Latin characters in any Cyrillic-script languages. The correct solution is to track them all down and fix them and not to automatically redirect links. --WikiTiki89 20:15, 26 October 2016 (UTC)

acoderar

How would you translate this verb? It's in the RAE, but I don't know what the nautical equivalent would be in English. Here's a quote:

DTLHS (talk) 20:19, 29 October 2016 (UTC)

acoderar means to bring the broadside to bear, or anchor broadside on.

You can get there by yacht, boat or sailboat from any coastal area, bring your boat broadside to the anchor, walk, enjoy a meal, or just have a hot cup of coffee in the company of the river breeze. —Stephen ^(Talk) 20:45, 29 October 2016 (UTC)

Thank you. DTLHS (talk) 21:03, 29 October 2016 (UTC)

November 2016

nayiiłniih

Thank you for spotting the mistake! the "baa nahaniih" example was meant to be the passive of the "buy" meaning, not from the "sell" one. I fixed it already. Julien Daux (talk) 07:09, 5 November 2016 (UTC)

matraquero

How would you translate this word? It's something from Venezuelan politics:

Thanks. DTLHS (talk) 16:31, 13 November 2016 (UTC)

In Venezuela, matraquero is a word for an extortionist, blackmailer, or commission agent (someone who wants extra money to speed things up). Related to matraca (pestering). The word petrovivo is not familiar to me.

That would allow a sort of “transitional justice” that would avoid retaliation and permit extortionists, commission agents and [petrovivos] to seek tolerant shelters or edens. —Stephen ^(Talk) 13:51, 14 November 2016 (UTC)

I assumed "petrovivo" meant someone who made their living from the petroleum industry, but that's just a guess. DTLHS (talk) 20:21, 14 November 2016 (UTC)

Doesn't sound right to me. It could be Latin, "the living Saint Peter." But I still can't make sense of it. Or it could be a misspelling for something else. —Stephen ^(Talk) 13:24, 15 November 2016 (UTC)

Ligature or adjective

Kindly see this entry క్రొ (kro). Is it Ligature, Adjective or both. How to categorize it. Whether the Usage notes is accurate. Thanking you.Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 12:49, 18 November 2016 (UTC)

I think you have it right. Looks good to me. There is one word there, క్రొం౛ాయ, with the letter ౛. I can't see that letter in my font. I looked for information about it, but I couldn't find anything. Is it a correct letter? —Stephen ^(Talk) 18:44, 19 November 2016 (UTC)

pailebote

Another nautical term- does English have a word for this type of boat? Based off the Spanish wikipedia article I don't think pilot boat is the correct translation, even though the word was borrowed from English. DTLHS (talk) 15:37, 22 November 2016 (UTC)

I think it is equivalent to (1) a pilot boat or (2) a small schooner. —Stephen ^(Talk) 16:28, 22 November 2016 (UTC)

Talk pages

Hi Stephen, I was wondering: how can I monitor changes done to talk pages of Navajo entries (Navajo lemma or Navajo verbs)? I know how to see the last changes done to main pages of a given category, but to not their related talk pages... I saw that "watching" the page will show changes done to the talk page, but this would require adding all entries to my watchlist, one by one... Thank you! Julien Daux (talk) 19:24, 27 November 2016 (UTC)

Hi, Julien. When you add a project page to your watchlist (an entry), you also add its corresponding talk page. It's done automatically, so you should see talk-page changes for any entry that you have edited. Is this what you meant? —Stephen ^(Talk) 14:38, 28 November 2016 (UTC)

Here is a Wikipedia page that addresses some of this: w:Help:Wikipedia: The Missing Manual/Editing, creating, and maintaining articles/Monitoring changes#Adding pages to your watchlist. —Stephen ^(Talk) 14:53, 28 November 2016 (UTC)

That's what I feared. I need to add all pages to my watchlist, one by one... I was more looking for a way to pull up all discussions of a given project space (all Navajo verbs for instance). Let's say someone adds a discussion to a verb I'm not "watching", I will never be aware of it... Julien Daux (talk) 17:05, 28 November 2016 (UTC)

In the Wikipedia article, w:Help:Wikipedia: The Missing Manual/Editing, creating, and maintaining articles/Monitoring changes#Multiple watchlists, it talks about multiple watchlists. I have not tried it, but it looks like you can add all the Navajo pages to a user subpage, and then use the "Related changes" in Tools (left side of your screen) to see changes in the list of entries. I have a lot of Navajo pages listed at User talk:Stephen G. Brown/text3 and User talk:Stephen G. Brown/text3a. Or you could copy all the entries from the lemma and verb categories. But, as I said, I have not tried this, so I am not sure about it. —Stephen ^(Talk) 17:26, 28 November 2016 (UTC)

I just now tried using "Related changes" on my User talk:Stephen G. Brown/text3, and it showed me this:

28 November 2016

(diff | hist) . . bí‎; 15:35 . . (+9)‎ . . ‎Angr (talk | contribs | block)‎ (→‎Etymology 1) [rollback 1 edit]

(diff | hist) . . m atłʼó‎; 00:17 . . (0)‎ . . ‎Julien Daux (talk | contribs | block)‎ (→‎Etymology) [rollback 1 edit]

27 November 2016

(diff | hist) . . hooghan‎; 11:03 . . (-9)‎ . . ‎Julien Daux (talk | contribs | block)‎ (→‎Navajo) [rollback 1 edit]

26 November 2016

(diff | hist) . . god‎; 01:50 . . (-34)‎ . . ‎70.36.254.137 (talk | block)‎ [rollback 1 edit]

(diff | hist) . . ahigą́‎; 00:33 . . (+10)‎ . . ‎Julien Daux (talk | contribs | block)‎ (→‎Navajo) [rollback 4 edits]

and so on. —Stephen ^(Talk) 17:31, 28 November 2016 (UTC)

When I tried the "related changes" on the Navajo verb space, it only shows the changes to the page, not to the talk page. For instance, you answered by question on náasee's talk page, but this doesn't show up on the "related changes" page, as far as I tried. Julien Daux (talk) 17:38, 28 November 2016 (UTC)

Right. In the Wikipedia article w:Help:Wikipedia: The Missing Manual/Editing, creating, and maintaining articles/Monitoring changes#Adding pages to your watchlist, it shows this illustration:

So you would have to add talk pages to the list, like this:

• atłʼó‎ - Talk:atłʼó‎ —Stephen ^(Talk) 17:47, 28 November 2016 (UTC)

December 2016

WT:Translation requests

Hi Stephen, why is it that there are lots of requests coming from different parts of India (usually)? And some of them are bogus? I think you should consider maybe being more stricter and making sure only requests for an actual cause be done. And also make sure they use correct grammar when you can. Surely that will make your life easier – AWESOME meeos ！ ＊ （「欺负」我） 11:22, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

Most of the Indian stuff is from native Indians. In many cases, they simply can't write good English. In other cases, they got the English somewhere and can't understand it. There is no use asking for good grammar, they can't manage it. Asking for explanations or better English, or for more information is never successful. On a couple of occasions, I have talked to some of the Indians on Facebook and they seem desperate for some help. I just do the best I can. When I can't, I ignore. Most of the translations to Afrikaans are for people writing to their friends and family, and they can speak it but can't write it (also can't write English). So different languages tend to have different sorts of users making the requests. Spanish is often to girlfriends or potential girlfriends. Sometimes requests are for someone who wants to understand a comment or make a comment on a talk page or on Facebook. Sanskrit is usually for tattoos. Japanese and Chinese are frequently for tattoos. Sometimes we get requests that are obviously homework, and we don't do homework. Sometimes we get material that is clearly commercial, and we don't do that, because it impacts professional translators. —Stephen ^(Talk) 12:01, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

This sounds so true! Yet, lots of them don't even specify target languages! – AWESOME meeos ！ ＊ （「欺负」我） 21:45, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

Well, a lot of them think it's an automatic computerized translation arrangement. They try it to see how it works, and when it doesn't work at all, they leave. —Stephen ^(Talk) 22:18, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

How many languages??

Just another question. How do you know how to write in so many languages? Have you been to the countries where they speak it? – AWESOME meeos ！ ＊ （「欺负」我） 21:50, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

I was a professional translator/interpreter for many years and I operated a couple of translation agencies for a long time. I proofread many thousands of translations in a lot of languages. Now I'm retired. Yes, I've been to most of the countries where they speak it. Lived in a number of them. Some countries, such as the Soviet Union, I could not visit at all, because of my security clearance. —Stephen ^(Talk) 22:24, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

Have you been to modern-day Russia (post soviet era) May I call you a polyglot? – AWESOME meeos ！ ＊ （「欺负」我） 01:01, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

No, I have never been there. I'm sure I could legally go now, but responsibilities make travel almost impossible. —Stephen ^(Talk) 16:56, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

pautaje

Do you know what this is? It's something related to advertising in Ecuador (page 17), or

DTLHS (talk) 17:58, 16 December 2016 (UTC)

I reckon it's just from the verb pautar. So something like "laying down a norm". Or simply "to advertise". --Derrib9 (talk) 18:10, 16 December 2016 (UTC)

It's used strictly in Ecuador and is not widely understood by most Spanish speakers. I have not seen it in dictionary, but it seems to mean something like: ads, advertising, and also guidelines, logging. I will ask some friends what they can tell me about it. —Stephen ^(Talk) 05:14, 17 December 2016 (UTC)

តើអ្នកបានទៅកម្ពុជាមុន?

Hi Stephen, if you can understand the question above, can you answer it! (My answer is no.) – AWESOME meeos ！ ＊ （「欺负」我） 07:28, 19 December 2016 (UTC)

My answer is also no. —Stephen ^(Talk) 07:39, 19 December 2016 (UTC)

St. Stephen's Dayuh?

ta4uredits!:)213.49.62.10 13:49, 26 December 2016 (UTC)

Think nothing of it. —Stephen ^(Talk) 17:24, 27 December 2016 (UTC)

Help to Telugu language

I am very thankful for your timely help and clearing my doubts in creating and expanding the Telugu language entries. You helped me in 2012 in creating Index:Telugu. Can you help me in expanding it by adding the entries till now.Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 07:03, 28 December 2016 (UTC)

I will try to obtain a list of all the Telugu lemmas. I have left a request at Wiktionary:Grease pit/2016/December#dump. —Stephen ^(Talk) 07:44, 28 December 2016 (UTC)

Thank you very much sir. Can I update the existing Index:Telugu adding the new pages? May I follow the same system?--Rajasekhar1961 (talk) 03:42, 29 December 2016 (UTC)

Yes, that sounds good. —Stephen ^(Talk) 03:45, 29 December 2016 (UTC)