Re: Emacs i18n

[Alexandre Garreau <galex-713@galex-713.eu>]

Le mercredi 21 juillet 2021, 07:24:36 CEST Emanuel Berg via Users list for 
the GNU Emacs text editor a écrit :
> Thibaut Verron wrote:
> >> Anglo-American beat French to world dominance, accept it.
> >> It happened everywhere, including diplomacy,
> > 
> > Don't diplomats have interprets?
> 
> They used to speak French, now they speak English.
> 
> We see traces of this in for example the Euro Vision Song
> Contest where they tell the score in English and French.

you are trying to demonstrate english is the most dominant language, 
*that* is embarrassing: why are you trying to demonstrate the obvious 
while everybody already agrees? it would be as embarassing as someone 
trying to demonstrate very hard that north america + europe is more 
powerful than the rest of the globe combined… okay, so what? is there any 
pride in it? nobody even *questioned* it here.

> Please, just deal with it and go on, this is so embarrassing
> every time it comes up :(

you are not the final authority on what is supposed to be embarrassing u.u

> > You've clearly never been to France. :)
> 
> I've been to France, I've been to Belgium, I've met French and
> Belgian programmers, French and Belgian students, French and
> Belgian activists [1] (that has nothing to do with computers,
> even), they _all_ speak very good English! Just like you two
> guys do!

you’ve been mostly with educated people, not with people who struggle 
learning, or are in less educated portion of society.

but you could ignore them in two ways: saying “enough people know about 
computer science, we don’t need more” (many people will disagree), and 
saying “emacs is only for programmers” (same…).  But this is getting 
repetitive, you are purposedly avoiding relevant arguments u.u

> > More seriously, a lot of people in China and Japan,
> > including in the software industry, do not speak English.
> 
> Wrong! They do, and they do even more and better for each
> year, and the very small group who don't,

no really try going to these places, most of people really don’t.  it’s 
logical you’ve been to europe, but there is even worse.

Actually, try even to go to eastern europe: the situation is “better” than 
in eastern asia, but still a looooot “worse” than rest of europe.

> well, they have
> a HUGE problem that should be fixed by them putting ALL their
> efforts learning English as soon as possible - it is
> *impossible* to be a tech/science person 2021 and not knowing
> English

it seems to me both of you are mixing two different matters: tech/science 
people and general people.  general people most often don’t master english 
as good as us, and of course the situation is better for english in tech/
science.

now I know I’m not the only one who believe it’s not bad that it’s 
possible to do science/tech without english.  I mean people in the 
influence spheres of china and russia do that commonly.  and yet I’m for 
globalization, but this is some sort of dogmatism that seems weird to me… 
why imposing stuff to people? if something is so important, the compressed 
version of it will eventually be translated to english and reach the wider 
world anyway…

> - luckily, this isn't the case, but if there were more
> people like you translating stuff not even then could you
> ever, ever do it to any extent that would mean a positive to
> those very few who don't know English, it would be a NEGATIVE
> since they would only have access to a small fraction of the
> material available,

a fraction that would not have been available before, I don’t see how 
that’s negative

> Luckily this isn't the case at all - French tech people and
> French people in general have no problem whatsoever mastering
> English,

of course we don’t, 75% of your vocabulary comes from our language, the 
only issue is when you need to speak it aloud… once you become fluent at 
it, you just resign to your eternal inferiority at not being able to 
distinguish 22 different vowels (and french is not really better with 17 
vowels among whose 4 nasals), added to the common stress, insecurity and 
other psychological issues that are really common among frenches about 
languages in general

> they want to do it, they benefit from it, everyone
> else benefit from it, and most of all, it is the REALITY that
> we have that everyone needs to accept for their own benefit!

so it is… so why do you need to claim it so loud and verbosely? I’d really 
like to know, I’ve never observed that reaction yet

Is it that you are particularely afraid about translation? does it sound 
like something obscurantist to you?

> > And all over the world, a lot of students who do not feel
> > confident with English treat the lack of available
> > translations as a significant hurdle, or even a barrier.
> 
> 100% incorrect.

how do you know? I mean yet asserting something may need a little proof… 
denying it (as the existence of anything) would need a lot more than that: 
how can you be so assertive about it?

> > Your replies in this thread strike me as unusually hostile.
> > Why is it such a big problem that some want to translate the
> > emacs help and manual?
> 
> Yes, because I've heard this so many times before, all the
> incorrect arguments, and it is bit provoking that it is ALWAYS
> the French who brings this up no matter what e-mail list or
> what tent on G8 in Rostock you are on! Every meeting, start
> with a vote which the French guys insist on (despite speaking
> English), French people propose French as the language (what
> a surprise) and then get voted down 21-4, 14-3, 45-11
> every time.

this is really hillarous (I’ve heard it so many times but never saw it 
myself yet), it recalls me some really hillarous excerpt from some czeck 
writer, Kundera.

> Why aren't the Russian, German and so on people who are also
> part of huge language and language groups making this "French
> case" you think?

why german? I would have said russian and mandarin and spanish.

especially russian actually.

actually it happens, but around russia.

it’s weird it happens more often for russian than spanish, while spanish 
is considered easier, and simpler to speak.

> Can it be that they are a bit more modest with respect to
> their own language? Or do they simply understand like everyone
> else what a huge benefit it is to them _and everyone_ with
> a common langauge for science and technology,

there always have been a common language, don’t worry, be it greek, latin, 
english, there always will be one, that’s natural, there’s nothing to be 
afraid about.

> Which, BTW, is exactly like the French are, so why on Earth
> keep up with this charade?

good question, do you think they’re aren’t the same french? what are the 
sociological differences you noticed between each groups?