Sunday, August 21, 2005

Working on the Logos website

You may apreciate that I have been spending time to learn how the Logos interface works. As the data has been worked on only by professional translators I am honoured that I am allowed to be an editor for the two languages I know best. With the content that I have available to me in Wikionary many translations in many languages are available to me. I have been adding words and translations like "gebarentaal" and the most recent one I worked on was "vakman". Now vakman is a tricky word; it is very imprecise in the translation and it has five different plurals. Now I have been looking how to deal with that in the Logos website but also to understand how it can be done in the Ultimate Wiktionary.

The differences between the current Wiktionary and Logos are profound. In Wiktionary anyone, even anonymous users can edit almost everything. In Logos an anonymous user can add words that are checked. When you are a professional, you edit translations in the languages that you know best. The thing that I missed were the talk pages; a place where you can discuss an individual word. I missed the IRC channel where I can discuss issues about words or meanings.

I understand the differences, they make sense because it shows where you are coming from. Logos provides very much a tool for translators by translators . Wiktionary is very much a tool for people who care about words/lexicology and share this in their mailinglist, IRC-channel and talk pages.

What kind of a community would result when these two communities were to merge? What kind of content? It would be an intersting experiment.

Thanks,
GerardM

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