On Sat, Sep 22, 2012 at 11:57 PM, Sascha Cunz <sascha-ml@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> As I know how hard translations can be, esp. with that much technical terms
> inside, I'm usually expecting _not_ to yield the same result when translating
> a software's translation back to English.
>
Yeah, I think the goal is not making translations which are looking nearly the
same when somebody translates them back to English in the first place.
> However, git-rebase just threw these two sentences at me (And though i know
> their meaning, i couldn't get the meaning from the message, it gave). Both are
> in context of starting a rebase while one is already in progress.
>
> first is:
>
> Original:
> ... and I wonder if you are in the middle of another rebase.
>
> German git translation:
> ... und es wäre verwunderlich, wenn ein Neuaufbau bereits im Gange ist.
>
> And a re-translation back to English from my understanding as native German
> speaker:
> ... and it would be astonishing (=i'd be surprised), if a rebase was already
> in progress.
>
We try to avoid translating terms like "I wonder if.." and similar as
"ich wundere mich", because it's very unusual in German messages
of computer programs. Translators should have the freedom to reword
terms a bit to make a more optimal translation, but the meaning must
not be lost, and I can't say that this is the case.
Translate the term "in the middle of" word-by-word would result in
"in der Mitte eines", which can be interpreted as a place somewhere
or that an action is in progress. To avoid a possible confusion, we
decided to translate this term as "im Gange sein" ("be in progress") in
the whole translation. I also think that "in der Mitte einer Zusammenführung
sein" doesn't sound really good. It tends to mean a place, not an action.
> And second:
>
> Original:
> I am stopping in case you still have something valuable there.
>
> German git translation:
> Es wird angehalten, falls bereits etwas Nützliches vorhanden ist.
>
> I wanted to point out that "etwas Nützliches" is more "something useful" that
> "something valuable". But the more I thought about it, the more it started to
I've been thinking about possible different translations, and the only
one I have in
mind is "wertvoll". But translating "valuable" as "wertvoll" ("bereits
etwas Wertvolles
vorhanden") sounds a bit like "we've found a treasure", instead of
something which
has a value in the meaning of content. I think having a translation
which is more
like "useful" than "valuable" does also hit the point of the message,
doesn't it?
> confuse me (even the original text) - and now I feel like I don't understand
> the meaning of the last sentence at all; neither in English nor in the German
> translation:
> After removing the directory with all rebase-information inside it, WHERE
> should something valuable still be left over? Is it referring to my working
> tree?
>
Yeah, I think it means the working tree and/or the index which would make
sense.
Ralf
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