A lot of water has passed under the bridge since my last blog entry. “Where in the world,” some asked, “is Atanu and why is he not writing stuff anymore?” For better or for worse, I am back from a brief round-the-world trip. Among the exotic far off places of the world, I was in Helsinki, Paris, London, Boston MA, New York NY, the San Francisco Bay area, Los Angeles, San Diego, and Seoul Korea. I flew Air France (which I call ‘Air Chance’), Delta (don’t ever make the mistake of flying Delta), and Korean Air. Met lots of interesting people and heard lots of great stories. One of these days I will write about them. But for now, it is back to the usual business.
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Month: August 2004
On Localization of Linux
An interesting press release was forwarded to the India-Gii mailing list this morning by Venky. He wrote:
IndLinux.org has launched a Hindi Interface for GNOME, the GUI for the GNU/Linux operating system. We request users to download the software from http://www.indlinux.org and give us their comments and feedback. Those interested in volunteering are requested to go through the web site–we need volunteers with technical skills as well as volunteers with skills in translating from English to Hindi, Gujarati, Telugu, Kannada and other languages.
I responded saying that it was a commendable effort. I had a look at the screen shots. I suppose that it is a work in progress and therefore the screen shots show a hybrid of Roman and Devnagri fonts.
Also, upon reading the press release I thought that the operating system was being localized by changing the language from English to Hindi. Upon viewing the screen shots, I realised that I was mistaken. It appeared to me that Devanagari is being used for transliteration of English words (mainly technical words) and held together in a sentence with Hindi syntax and structure. For instance, one information pop-up says:
“is folder ki sabhi executable files script menu mein dikhai degi. menu say koi file chunnay pur vuh chalnay lageygi…”
It feels as if our dear departed Rajiv Gandhi is speaking directly to us
“is country ki development kay liye, humay bahut effort laganey ki necessity hai”.
Hey, that’s a thought. Since Indians love to name every bloody thing after their idiotic leaders (Rajiv Gandhi this, and Indira Gandhi that, and Jawaharlal Nehru the other), perhaps this IndLinux should be named “RajivLinux.” And if and when a Hindi language OS (as opposed to a Devnagri font OS) comes about, it should be called “DesiLinux” or some such thing.
Seriously though, it is a great beginning and I hope this effort is successful in lowering some of the many barriers to entry to the world of IT for some Indian non-English speakers.
To which Rishab responded with
perhaps you would like to suggest a “truly hindi” alternative to this sentence? i don’t know if there is an extensive usable vocabulary among hindi-speaking computer users that has hindi alternatives for most technical words. after all, there’s no point inventing words of the kanth-langot variety.
I am neither a linguist nor do I play one on the usenet/internet/web. So I cannot suggest a ‘truly Hindi’ alternative to English technical words. But that does not mean that no one has the expertise to do so. Indian languages — Hindi included — have rich vocabularies and I am sure a rich mine of roots from which one can derive all the specific words that one needs to describe concepts that are new. What we have to do is to intelligently use the roots to create appropriate equivalents now.
It is important that we don’t repeat the idiocy of kanth-langotisms. That is a braindead attempt at translation of specific words into descriptive phrases. Such as translating the word steam-engine into the Hindi equivalent of the phrase humongous iron machine that runs on iron roads while puffing clouds of vapor and making loud clanking noise as it pulls wagons behind it.
There are alternatives to wholesale importing of English words on the one hand, and the silly unimaginative direct translations of descriptions into hindi on the other. For instance table tennis in Hindi should not be table kay upar, batti kay neechey, lay thaka thak, dey thaka thak. It could be a word that is constructed from some Sanskrit root (probably) or could be an entirely new word that enriches the language and is invented out of the blue but has some resemblance to the existing set of words in the language. Import the concept but localize it to fit into the existing scene, so to say.
Hebrew is an entirely reconstructed language and it not only serves the Israelis well, it creates a sense of belonging and ownership among them.
The time is now when we can have a discussion about what to do regarding this issue. The vast majority of Indians have little or no access to computers. We don’t have the burden of a legacy of the sort that is represented in the qwerty keyboard. We can, after due deliberation, decide to go one way or the other. It will be too late to change once about 100 million users with Hindi as their mother tongue come on board.
I cannot agree more with Mahesh when he wrote in the ensuing discussion that:
“I think there is a need to comment, to praise and condemn, to discuss and decide, to change opinions if we can. That’s why we’re here. Because we have this medium. And regardless of whether we can actually change things or not, we HAVE to try.”
The question of whether we can burden people with new words or not is not really relevant. If the made up Hindi word for ‘file’ is ‘limi’, then to a person who is learning the concept of a file, it does not matter whether the concept is called file or limi. It is too late to change the qwerty keyboard now. But it is not too late in the life cycle of the Hindi or other Indian language OS to discuss what should be done regarding technical words.
To which Venky wrote back to say
The challenge for us with localization is–How far do we go with keeping the language pure? If we take this to the extreme, we should call the computer “sanghanak” but even Hindi speaking people would wonder what a “sanghanak” is. At the same time, the example that Atanu pulled out from one of the Indlinux Hindi dialog box veers to the other extreme!
Always willing to help, I dug up an old piece that I had first seen in 1997 on the usenet. So here it is — for the record.
Windows Commands in Hindi version shoonya bindu shoonya ek (0.01).
Phile = File Kholo = Open Bandh Karo = Close Naya = New Khatara = Old Bachao = Save Aise Bachao = Save as Paise Bachao = Save money Bhaago = Run Chaapo = Print Dekh Ke Chaapo = Print Preview Paise Deke Chokri Dekho = Pay Per View Phirsay = Edit Kaapi = Copy Kaato = Cut Kato = Stupid Houseguest Chipkao = Paste Payshul Chipkao = Paste Special Goli Maaro = Delete Nazaara = View Bakwaas Nazaara = View From My Apartment Hatyaar = Tools Hatyaar Khamba = Toolbar Uh Buh Kuh Duh Thik Thak = Spell Check Isko Kya Kehte Hain = Thesaurus Khuli Chaadar = Spreadsheet Iska Bhi Naam Nahin Aaata = Database Futaas Ki Goli Kha = Exit
{Reposted from April 2003}
Numbers 5
The Business Standard of 12th Jan 2004 carries an item on page 3 with the heading 33 million more Indians in poor list in 2001-02. The percentage of people below the poverty line is estimated to be around 25. That is, India has about 250 million people who are so unimaginably poor that they can’t cross the poverty line that is set way below what can be considered necessary for a human existence. For all the progress India is supposedly making, we have increased the absolute numbers of the abjectly poor by 33,000,000 in that one year alone.
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