Invitation to translators
Welcome! Buonas Díaz! Bonjour!
I have built up numerous free tutorials on the web. I fear, however, that I only speak one language.
(I also write and distribute freeware and shareware. Most of what I say below also applies to that, modified, of course, for the nature of those things. I even have programs which are engines "running on" data files. The engine can stay in English, and you could write data files in other languages. See, for instance, my program for helping learners with vocabulary work.)
I'd be delighted if you would be willing to do a version of my site in your language! I'm afraid I would only be willing to pay you what everyone else pays me for the tutorials... nothing... but you would be allowed to include some advertising for your sites. What I say below can also inform people who would like to make my pages available on intranets, or CD for use where internet is not easily available.
If you want the license to do any of those things under my copyright, the following explains what I would like. By all means email me if you want to discuss alternatives... this is not a "take it or leave it" offer.
My suggestions are as much directed at making your pages work as at protecting my creations. And what I suggest is based on years of maintaining web pages. What I propose will, I hope, be a workable system... for you as much as for me.
I would be delighted to put links on my pages to your pages, if they follow the guidelines, and once you have translated a main page and two or three of the subordinate pages.
Before turning to translations of my work, if you merely wanted to distribute it on CD or intranet, please visit my answers to FAQs on that.
Here is my "cunning plan"....
I would ask that you to translate/ copy my pages as faithfully as possible, with three exceptions....
- Add a small header (details follow)
- Change links, slightly (details follow)
- Add a small footer(details follow)
The header should only take a little bit of screen height. It would consist of something like the following, in your own language...
====
The following is a translation of some pages
originally ON THE WEB IN ENGLISH. Translation by
(put advertising for YOUR OWN WEB PAGES here.)
Please see DETAILS. Contact EDITOR of the translated
version. Contact EDITOR of original, who only knows
English.
====
... where each word in capitals is a link to the obvious thing. (The details link would take people to an expanded version of the header, with, in particular, more space for advertising whatever you want to advertise, and with some information on my other web offerings. It would also be the palce where readers were warned that the translated page is secondary, and that the English original may have been edited to incorporate improvements, corrections, etc.)
The link changes in my pages would take people to the right pages, but see below for more on this.
The footer would be similar to the header.
I think you will find it much, much easier to do a maintainable copy of my site if you put all of your translation pages in a sub-directory of there own on your server, and use the same page titles (URLs) as I have used.
Let's take my Map Making pages as an example.
Before you start... check with me... has someone already started translating this part of my web presence to your language? He or she may have started recently, in which case there may be no link to their work... yet.
If no one has started translating, start with the table of contents for that section of my work. In this case, that would be http://www.arunet.co.uk/tkboyd/mm1.htm. (If you click on that, it will open in a new window, so you can get back here easily.)
Start your edition with a translation of all of that, even pages you do not plan to translate soon.
If you plan to do the Simple Hypothetical Example page soon, then leave the link to it from the table of contents page unchanged.
For pages you do not expect to translate soon, change the links from things like....
<a href="mm1r.htm">A real example.</a>
... to...
<a href="http://www.arunet.co.uk/tkboyd/mm1r.htm">
A real example. (Link to page in English.)</a>
(The URL has been changed to be fully specified, not relative, i.e. not merely "mm1r.htm" which looks for a page of that name in the same folder as the page you are on was found. Secondly, the "(Link to page in English.)" was added.)
If you approach the job this way, you will have a foundation upon which you can build easily. It takes just a little work to get started this way, but that effort will be repaid as you begin to translate the pages the table of contents page points to.
As you create each translated page, you will only have to change a link on the table of contents page, and most of everything else will be taken care of. (There may be some cross links in pages which will need attention.)
I would ask you to do an "all or nothing" job of translating my pages. Not the whole site!! Just as many pages as you choose to do! (We may eventually get to a stage where we have main language editors, i.e. one person in charge of, say, the Spanish version of my pages, and sub-editors taking care of individual pages. This will work easily, though, because of the way I set up my pages. The main language editor would maintain the table of contents pages, and manage the links to the sub-editor's work.)
What I was trying to say before I went off ojn the subject of sub-editors is: If you undertake to translate a page, I would ask you to leave the contents more or less as I have written them. Not perfect, I know!... but if you want to write your own pages, do... but "my" pages, even in translation, need to retain whatever consistency of approach and policy as I have managed in the English version.
Another thing: If I give you a license to use my copyrighted material, that would come with a license for me to use the work you've done. Let's say you translate 5 pages, and then decide you don't want to do any more, and you don't want to put the translated versions on your server any more. I would then want to put your work on my server, and your license to work from my pages is conditional upon your permission to use your pages thus.
Not (very) negotiable: If you want the license under my copyright to use the material, even if you choose not to do it "my way", you must contact me first, and you must make clear on your site that it is a copy of my site, and give people links to the original. Remind them that I update my site from time to time, and that a page on your site may have been created before one of those updates.
When you have a couple of pages done, I'll be delighted to provide a link to your pages from mine.... which will do neither of us any harm at all at Google! :-)
I hope this goes forward... thank you for reading to here. If you email me, please give me a little bit of information... nothing too "personal"... about where and who you are? It makes "working for you" more interesting!
Click here
to visit editor's freeware, shareware page.
How to email or write this page's editor, Tom Boyd
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