Support/Archive/2023/03

This is an archive page for the Support page. Do not post new threads here, they will likely not be read. If you wish to continue an archived discussion, start a new thread on the Support page and include a link to the archived discussion.

Visual / Source tabs

On Wikimedia sites, it's possible to go to Preferences -> Editing, to the Editing mode section, and use the dropdown menu to select the preference for tab display. I don't see it on translatewiki. Can we enable it here? I'd probably recommend making the source editor default (and allow changing it), but I'm open to other suggestions. Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 09:08, 28 February 2023 (UTC)

The default tab may be a question of opinions. For me the Visual Editor is probably a better default for talks (and it is needed for DiscussionTools), whereas for other pages (including in the Translation namespace for messages, the code editor would be better (notably because these messages are not always intended to be used nad parsed by MediaWiki: unfortunately, messages that are not to be parsed by MediaWiki and deviating in their syntax should not have the default "content type" set as a wiki page, but probably as "plain text", or some other if there are other parsers implemented here using different syntaxic rules). These content types are part of the page metadata, but many projects that import messages to be translated here do not set their content type: the Visual Editor is only suitable for pages using the MediaWiki syntax.

• could this be changed (and documented to help project maintainers when they import their messages, such as those using other i18n libraries in C/C++, PHP and Java, or other wiki syntaxes) ?
• can other parsers be developed and added as extensions on this wiki, and then a suitable content model added for use in page metadata (e.g. with Special:ChangeContentModel/Support), than just "wikitext" (MediaWiki), plain-text, CSS (with edit restrictions for some authorized users), SafeCSS (for any user, but forbidding scriptable/actionable CSS properties), Javascript (with user restrictions on page owners), JSON and GeoJSON ?

Such content model would drive the type of editor to be used. For example with editable tabular data: CSV and TSV, possibly with locale settings for separators; or for data schemata; or for JSON data (with additional metadata giving the page name of its schema) or for Lua scripts (not necessarily in the "Module:" namespace if they are inside "User:" pages or not intended to be for general use from any page when invoking those script without the default "Module:" namespace prefixing the script name. Some other useful content models could also come with converters (e.g. between HTML, MediaWiki, DOCX, OpenDocument). As well content models for editable vector graphics (SVG graphics for example can embed translated contents, possibly in several languages, with internal language selectability when rendered, or locale-sensitive colors or font styles and sizes; as well there are editable extensions that generate plots, graphs, timelines...). Verdy p (talk) 17:10, 1 March 2023 (UTC)

Please add these two new languages Gondi and Kolami

I would like to request to add the following languages to translatewiki.

1) Adilabadi Gondi - iso WSG (with Telugu script)

2)Kolami - iso NIT (with Telugu script)

Both of these languages are spoken in parts of India. Especially in northern part of Telangana.

These languages have started building their wikipedia incubators recently.

Nskjnv (talk) 07:08, 3 March 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for the request, @Nskjnv. It's now deployed. Please tell your translator friends to create accounts and to translate the "Most important" messages. Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 08:07, 3 March 2023 (UTC)

Note that "Gondi" alone indicates now 9 different languages in ISO 639, plus one that was retired (and splitted): you cited just one (wsg). See Languages by language family/Gondi or Glottolog.

For "Kolami", I suppose you speak about Naiki, you did not indicate which one (when I started replying here your message was incomplete and then Amire replied when I was typoing this), as there are two different Kolami-Naiki languages. See Languages by language family/Central Dravidian and Glottolog. Verdy p (talk) 09:16, 3 March 2023 (UTC)

Request for inclusion of Tausug (Sinūg) language (tsg)

Sinūg language is a major language used in the Province of Sulu, Southern Philippines as well as northeastern Sabah, Eastern Malaysia. This is needed for the Wikipedia incubator project to be done this year in collaboration between Filipino and Malaysian Wikimedians. -- Exec8 (talk) 06:50, 7 March 2023 (UTC)

@Exec8: The patch to add it has been merged, and the portal created. The patch should be deployed soon, after which translators can start translating. Jon Harald Søby (talk) 09:49, 7 March 2023 (UTC)

Thanks, @Jon Harald Søby!

It's deployed now. Translators who want to contribute to the development of the Incubator Wikipedia should start at the Most important messages. Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 10:14, 7 March 2023 (UTC)

This language has two scripts (notably in the largest area in Malaysia, where it is also written in the Jawi variant of the Arabic script, along with the national Malaysian language). In the Philippines (only in smaller islands), it sems to be used only written in the Latin script (along with the national Filipino variant of Tagalog and with various other local Philippines languages; the Philippines had several other historic scripts, that did not extend into Malaysia).

Do you intend to support the Jawi script as well for that language in Sabah? Verdy p (talk) 21:49, 7 March 2023 (UTC)

How to stop a talk page using LiquidThread?

As an adminsitrator, you've successfully converted a few talk pages to stop using LiquidThreads. However, its impossible for alsmost all pages if you are not a site admin: it's still impossible to move the existing LiquidThread page to an archive subpage (along with all its subpages stored in the LiquidThread space and using the same base pagename). Moving a user page to a subpage is not possible (even when keeping the same namespace and the same base page name, by the user owning that page himself.

And there's no bot available to help that migration.

So Discussion Tools are enabled but still impossible to use on any talk page excep the few that you managed specifically to convert manually. LiquidThread cannot be disabled (and so new talks are still posted using LiquidThread, no one uses Discussiontools, and not even standard MediaWiki talks that DiscussionTools just needs and uses with the VisualEditor).

How do you intend to make the migration? Is there a bot allowed to run to do the necessary moves for archiving (it would then need to post in the eixsting talk page a link to the talk page, living its existing header after removing the LiquidThread header). Then the talk page would be managed by their respective owners. Verdy p (talk) 14:57, 27 February 2023 (UTC)

There is a patch in the works for this here. In the meantime, you (or anyone else, of course) can request pages you want to migrate here on the support page. Jon Harald Søby (talk) 15:54, 27 February 2023 (UTC)

So please migrate it for me. My previous attempt to do it was revert (move needed but not performed), I thought it would work instantly after changing the special tag, when LQT was announced to be deprecated and to be replaced by DiscussionTools (using the standard MediaWiki "User talk" namespace and the VisualEditor). Thanks. Verdy p (talk) 17:32, 27 February 2023 (UTC)

 Done Jon Harald Søby (talk) 10:35, 28 February 2023 (UTC)

For now, the proposed patch just will allow any "autoconfirmed" user to move any page. This is probably not what you want, and an additional "AntiAbuseFilter" should restrict it to "User" and "User talk" namespaces, preserving the namespace and the base page name (the user name), and only within their own user pages if they are not admins (or authorized bots) that may keep all freedoms of moves ; but beside that users could manage their archives and splitting their own user pages as they want with the subpage names they want (for user pages and user talk pages, these restrictions should be applied by default in Mediawiki). Verdy p (talk) 17:39, 27 February 2023 (UTC)

I’d also like a migration from LiquidThreads please, thank you. Thibaut (talk) 20:08, 8 March 2023 (UTC)

@Thibaut120094:  Done Jon Harald Søby (talk) 08:53, 9 March 2023 (UTC)

Linter

How often does Special:LintErrors update itself?

I think that all the errors that are currently listed there are already fixed, but they still appear there.

And I've intentionally put a <center> tag on my user page to see if it causes a lint error, but it doesn't appear. Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 15:18, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

I've searched these reports and did not find any one of the listed issues, so yes I think that they are not updated. Some background job or bot is not running, or has stopped working successfully with its runtime environment and configuration. Verdy p (talk) 21:37, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

I suggest to ask the maintainers of the extension. I don't have a clue why it reports some issues for some pages but not others. Nike (talk) 16:12, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

There are some messages at the top of :mw:Extension talk:Linter that look like they could provide an answer. Can anyone who deals with extension configuration try these solutions? @Abijeet Patro @Nike Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 15:08, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

We already have: https://codesearch.wmcloud.org/search/?q=wgParsoidSettings&files=&excludeFiles=&repos=translatewiki.net

I am not planning to spend my time to install Parsoid as a separate extension just to get Linter working. I'd rather just wait until they fix it to work out of the box. Nike (talk) 15:39, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

What does a guy have to do to regain editing access to /en pages in the MediaWiki: and Wikia: namespaces?

I was wondering whether it would be possible for select translators to regain editing access to pages in the MediaWiki: and Wikia: namespaces that end in /en. Since English is the only language that I'm fluent in. And therefore it is the only language that I'm comfortable translating in. The problem is that ever since this abuse filter was created, I haven't been able to submit translations in the MediaWiki: and Wikia: namespaces.

This puts me at a huge disadvantage, with the Wikia namespace especially, since the FuzzyBot no longer seems to update those. If you check my contributions, you'll see that I have no intention of submitting any translations that are incorrect. And I've even reverted a couple of translations by translators who have accidentally updated the wrong language messages.

I understand that the abuse filter has been setup to prevent translators from submitting incorrect translations. But it would be great if certain translators could be granted the ability to edit pages ending in /en, provided their edits are monitored to make sure they are submitting the right translations (I have no intention of submitting incorrect translations, as the faith that others have in me is too important to me for that)

I understand that we are now supposed to suggest changes to translations rather than make the translations ourselves. But some of us are a lot happier being able to submit the translations ourselves, even if they have to be on specific conditions. Otherwise it takes away our feeling of freedom, trust, and independence. I'm not saying that I disagree that translators shouldn't be able to edit certain pages by default. But I am saying that I feel that there should be an opt-in process for translators who can be trusted not to make any incorrect translations. ― C.Syde (talk | contribs) 23:51, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

Unfortunately, you seem to have misunderstood how we work. We don't have two way synchronization for the source language (usually English). Those changes never went anywhere. In addition, we have not supported Wikia in seven years. See Translating:Wikia. Nike (talk) 06:23, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

What do you mean by two way synchronisation? Also if those changes never went anywhere, then how come it was previously possible to update English messages? ― C.Syde (talk | contribs) 09:26, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

It was never possible to "translate" into English here. English is the source language. English messages are not edited on this site. They only come from the source code. If you want to update English messages, make a patch (usually in Git) or discuss it with the extension developers. Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 15:10, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

A bunch of messages are missing from the following extensions

A bunch of messages are missing for the following extensions. I was going to add them myself, but recent circumstances have made it impossible to add or update anything in the source language:

• LiveChat (list of messages)
• MWUnit (list of messages)
• UTurn (list of messages)

― C.Syde (talk | contribs) 10:14, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

See above—adding and changing English messages is done in source code and not here. Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 15:11, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

None of these extensions are registered in translatewiki.net. I didn't the other two, but LiveChat one doesn't have the required message documentation. Nike (talk) 15:32, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

Please add me to the group `offline`

Hi there,

`sh-cyrl` should be derived from `sh` / `sh-latn` using a transliteration script. Please add me to the above group to allow me to import after running this script locally.

Thank you in advance.

Kind regards,

Denis Deni (talk) 09:52, 19 March 2023 (UTC)

"Problematic link" in GlobalBlocking

I'm trying to translate this: https://translatewiki.net/w/i.php?title=Special:Translate&showMessage=globalblocking-blockedtext-all-wikis&group=ext-globalblocking-user&language=he&filter=&optional=1&action=translate

I am quite sure that it's correct, but I keep getting this error:

Following link is problematic: [[m:Special:MyLanguage/Global blocks|בכל אתרי הוויקי]]

Is something wrong in the translation, or is it a bug in the validator? Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 12:05, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

I think I see the issue: when I look at it in TUX, the source message is shown as Your IP address has been [[m:Special:MyLanguage/Global blocks|blocked on all wikis]]..

But when I look at it in the classic editor, I see the source message as Your IP address has been blocked on all wikis..

Some caching issue?.. Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 13:01, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

@Amire80: You should note that I have already filed bugs in Phabricator about this message group, and the link is in the "/qqq" of the concerned message. This is definitely not a problem of cache but a conflict of message IDs between messages that are different (but should not) between two messages group. One of the two groups ("Global Blocking - User interface" and "Wikiemdia Messages") included no link, the recently added group "Wikimedia Messages" has reused the IDs but changed the source messages to contain a link. The reverse has also occured (inconsistently) between these conflicting groups.

There's message ID conflicts between the previous messages in production, and the new developments that are trying to reduce these messages and unify them; this "blocking" module for example has been partly moved to "Wikimedia Messages" without changing the message IDs or the namespace (they both use the "MediaWiki" namespace here). So this is a bug in development sources and incorrect submission of related message groups on this wiki. This tentative unification is unstable, with those long messages going forward and backward. The fault is entirely from MediaWiki developers of these modules, with missing checks and incorrect planification of their changes and deployments. See https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T332519 and https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T332619 (or more generally https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/project/profile/315/ for bugs in the "GlobalBlocking" project and its ongoing https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T332401 task).

Note that messages with links do not work with the legacy code that uses the incorrect formater. As well the link is not tunable (there are different wiki farms, not all in Wikimedia, so their global blocking support page may not be the same if they use different policies or are manged with different rules, e.g. in Miraheze or BlueSpice, or other private wikis farms for enterprises: these links will not go to Wikimedia MetaWiki... and not even necessarily hosted on a wiki page, but to an external URL such as a corporate or customer support support page, possibly mapped with another interwiki code than "M:"). So these messages should use a "$1" tvar parameter for the wikilink target, without hardcoding the link inside the translatable messages itself within these extensions. Customizing these links should be done separately, in distinct messages (possibly translatable if needed, but then inside separate message groups for Wikimedia, Miraheze, BlueSpice, etc., or using their URL resolvers or the "Special:MyLanguage/" prefix after their own interwiki code in wikilinks, to link to their appropriate translated support pages).

The way the new development for global blocking is done is that it assumes everything belongs to Wikimedia, but these messages are part since long of core Mediawiki extensions and should be independant of Wikimedia-supported public wikis. This may explain why these messages are updated backward and forward every few days, incosistently, with or without links, and possibly with different wording (specialized or generic). The older code did not need those links inside messages and were generic. As well they did not require using a more complex message formater, they were just basic unprocessed strings displayed as is.

If Wikimedia intends to tweak the generic extension with their own specific messages, the "Wikimedia Messages" should not be within the "MediaWiki:" namespace here, but in a distinct namespace (where "M:" will be appropriate, such as references to the "VRT" team (specific to Wikimedia) or other related policies, support pages and contact links (in that case there will no longer be conflicts of message IDs). This way, Mirahez or BlueSpice will be able to tune and translate the appropriate messages (even if they all import these translated messages in their local "MediaWiki:" namespaces on their wikis). But the default messages translated in "MediaWiki:" on this TWN wiki should be independant and generic, only used as a default when there's no customization for specific farms (they can then be overriden by more precise farm-specific messages, translated or updated independantly here). So I would suggest to Wikimedia developers to contact and ask you for a specific namespace in TWN, and document how other wiki farms can customize these messages and update their messages groups to the appropriate place in TWN (Miraheze, BlueSpice will setup these themselves, they already have their own namespaces for that in TWN, nicluding for their own MediaWiki extensions, libraries or applications).

Verdy p (talk) 11:52, 21 March 2023 (UTC)

Please grant me translation-adminship

Posting the request here per advise by @Amire80. I'm already a translation admin on Commons, Meta-Wiki and Wikidata and would like to offer my help as well. Thanks ─ The Aafī ^(talk) 16:49, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

Request for inclusion of Haryanvi language

It is used by over 10 million people,which includes mostly rural population. भारत्पराक्रमि (talk) 07:37, 8 March 2023 (UTC)

@भारत्पराक्रमि: Hi! Are you or any native speakers you know planning to translate into this language here on Translatewiki? Jon Harald Søby (talk) 08:38, 8 March 2023 (UTC)

yes, i am. भारत्पराक्रमि (talk) 08:45, 8 March 2023 (UTC)

@भारत्पराक्रमि: Excellent! Amire80 is adding the language now. Jon Harald Søby (talk) 08:56, 8 March 2023 (UTC)

Thanks! भारत्पराक्रमि (talk) 08:58, 8 March 2023 (UTC)

Hi @भारत्पराक्रमि,

This is now enabled.

If you're interested in developing the Wikipedia in this language, the best contribution you can do here now is to translate the Most important messages. See also the list of links I've added to your user page. At the bottom of the list, there are links to guides for translation. Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 14:56, 8 March 2023 (UTC)

thanks for helping भारत्पराक्रमि (talk) 15:33, 8 March 2023 (UTC)

@Amire80 Could you also enable bgc-arab? Being one of the languages spoken with an overlapping region with Punjabi and Hindi/Urdu, it has the same situation where there are at least a million speakers in Pakistan who are only familiar with the Perso-Arabic script. (See here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rangri_dialect_(Haryanvi)). At this point I have quite a bit of experience transcribing Brahmic scripts to the Indic variety of the Arabic script, so I would be able to transcribe anything @भारत्पराक्रमि translates quite quickly. Bgo eiu (talk) 17:30, 10 March 2023 (UTC)

Is the Arabic script actually used for Haryanvi anywhere, or would this be the first attempt? Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 06:44, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

@Amire80 All speakers in Pakistan use the Perso-Arabic script yes. For example, see the titles on this channel for "Haryanvi TV": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vg84PRw_1zQ Or here it can be seen in this video filmed in a Haryanvi-speaking village in Pakistan https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dD4v014cA48

There are a number of other examples online taking a look around, so this would definitely not be a first attempt. Bgo eiu (talk) 18:47, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

And here is an interview with a writer of Haryanvi books in the Arabic script https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_WKNLCj6eig (it is easier to find info about this sort of thing on YouTube a lot of the time) Bgo eiu (talk) 18:55, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

OK, it satisfies the "living language and a general purpose language" requirement. However:

1. Do you actually speak this language, or are you planning to transcribe from Devanagari? We also have the "at least one person with native or comparable proficiency willing to translate into the language" requirement.
2. I suspect that there are issues with the current Haryanvi translations. See @भारत्पराक्रमि's talk page.
3. Do you plan to do anything with these translations, like starting a wiki?

Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 14:22, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

@Amire80

1. I plan on transcribing from Devanagari, I am not a Haryanvi speaker and likewise do not intend to come up with translations without consulation from @भारत्पराक्रमि or other native speakers first. I will add though that I would be doing this with what I consider relevant context for reading and recognising the language - in the dialect continuum formed between Punjabi and Hindi/Urdu to the east of Punjab, Haryanvi is one of the languages in between and as such shares most features in its grammar and lexicon with both of these languages. Punjabi, which I am more familiar with, has been influenced to Haryanvi to a certain extent through borrowing and not just cognates (an interesting historical aside - the way ergative constructions are formed in both modern Punjabi and Hindi/Urdu is a recent change in the grammar of these languages brought about by Haryanvi).

2. I also noticed some issues with the translations in taking a look and was planning on recommending some adjustments accordingly. However, I think these issues are are understandable and fairly easily fixed and I would say that the problem is largely with how poorly translated the Hindi (and Urdu) messages are - if one was using just Hindi as the assistant language, it would be misleading. In the Hindi translations in a number of places there are nouns used where verbs should be used, avoidance of native plural endings in favor of English "s," and rather fanciful vocabulary which would not be understood by most speakers. Hindi being a "prestige" dialect, what I describe as errors here are likely intentional (mimicing English over the language's native tendencies being a facet of that prestige), and I am not really equipped to step into the can of worms that fixing those translations would involve. So the recommendations I would make would be more in line with the way the Punjabi messages are done. The distinction between करें and करैं is likely conditioned by dialect (I know it is for their counterparts in Punjabi) and they would be spelled the same in the Arabic script anyway. As I understand it these are subjunctive forms which can be used as imperative; personally I would tend to use the polite imperative form करो which is the same in Punjabi and Haryanvi, but if the current forms make more sense that is @भारत्पराक्रमि's call. Overall, I think the translations are a good start and I like seeing that unique/language specific forms of verbs have been used throughout (like छिपाएँ for hide), and the use of more recognisable vernacular terms like बातें for "Talk" (not the same but cognate to the word used in the Punjabi messages) or झलक for Preview (same as Punjabi) instead of the unpronouncable word used in the Hindi translation. Without getting into every detail right now, the recommendations I would make would involve translating more of the messages like this and making sure it is consistent across the board like making sure फाइल is used for "file" as I see has been done in places and not चित्र used in the Hindi translations which is not a recognisable or pronounceable word even in Hindi (Hindi pronunciation prohibits word final gemination as seen in चित्र, which looks to be a Sanskrit word chosen because it seems more erudite).

3. I do not plan to start a wiki. My main interests in this are that this is quite a widely spoken and unique language that is even more under-resourced than Punjabi, so it would be nice to make these messages accessible to as many people as possible, and that because this language was just added, discussing the translations as they are worked on is a possibility (as opposed to sifting through an accumulation of translations done years ago and trying to figure out why something was done that way). Bgo eiu (talk) 21:31, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

I just saw your message @Bgo eiu.As for second point i will review the translations,however if some other native haryanvis could help it would be better as i shifted to haryana when a kid. भारत्पराक्रमि (talk) 09:41, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

"zero" in OpenStreetMap

In the translation of this message to Hebrew, if I use the "zero" value, I get an error.

It's not a very big deal specifically for Hebrew, because if I just omit "zero" and let the last form be used for zero, it will look like "0 reports". Nevertheless, it would be a bit nicer if I could write "zero=No reports", like in English.

Is it actually possible to use "zero" there, and translatewiki's validator is giving a false error?

Or is zero forbidden for use in Hebrew in OpenStreetMap? Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 10:45, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

I also noted that in French with the recent change, using a "%{count}" in English even for the "|one=" case, and droppring the "|zero=", so that it is now assumed that we can only use only one singualr form and only one default plural (this would be a problem for Hebrew, I agree, but also other Semitic, Slavic or Celtic languages, and others, that need more than two forms. Given that OSM does not seem to use MediaWiki here but another i18n library to generate its HTML pages for its website, it uses a different syntax (note that the {{PLURAL|}} takes no parameter for the effective count value to use, and this is a problem where several messages need different count values, one could be singular the other plural; not passing a parameter means that this syntax is unable to choose between variants if there are several occurence of PLURAL in the same message but not the same effective value. I don't know how this i18n is able to choose the appropriate form in that case, and as we should also avoid creating "patchwork" messages, I see no easy solution, unless there's some work added in the server-wide code supporting the i18n for the site

Note also that that form of PLURAL does not have a colon, like in MediaWiki, but its cases are named "zero", "one", "two", "few", "many", plus the final default form required. As well even the current validator may see a specified form for "one=", but a translation after it may be empty, but the validator does not accept it, so we need to pass at least one SPACE after it; also with the Mediawiki syntax, if any specific form is identical to the default last form, it should be dropped, leaving only the last default form (which can be empty, but not the other forms!).

So this is a problem of the local validator in TWN that makes an incorrect assumption here (but still requires us to set a value after "|one=", even if its empty, but must be set as a space, or even if it is identical to the default last form.

Now what the OSM site does and supports is unknown (just partly documented). But I don't think that its i18n library is coherent, so if it is fixed, it may now break with the current message validators used in TWN for that project, unless it is tweaked specifically to use different parsing rules and assumptions about how the default behaves, and why we still need to use only the form "one=" and not remove it or add another one like "zero=", "two=", "few=", or "many=" (see Arabic for example that needs at least 6 forms, but some of them may be identical and may default to another one, before falling back to the last default form which should be the same as the "other" form in CLDR data and needed ni all languages). Verdy p (talk) 14:54, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

Main menu Translation tool item

The "Translation tool" item in the main menu (on the left, in Vector skin) takes you to Special:LanguageStats. This should be Special:Translate, as the name says. Ponor (talk) 14:52, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

@Ponor: The reason for that is that the default "message group" you get when you just visit Special:Translate is the "Recent additions" group, which is a more or less random collection of things that happen to have been added or updated recently. Because of that, a lot of people were translating basically random things that weren't really that useful, especially for smaller languages. So the idea is that by going to Special:LanguageStats first, the translator will choose a group and there will at least be a bit more coherence to what they're tasked with translating. Amire80 has written down some thoughts about it in phab:T282374. Jon Harald Søby (talk) 23:01, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

Rename user

Hi, any bureaucrat can rename my user to "Galahad"? I want to keep the match between my user on Wikimedia projects and this one on translatewiki. Best, White Master King (talk) 21:35, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

 Done. Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 06:11, 31 March 2023 (UTC)

Find and edit a specific MW message

Say I want to edit the message MediaWiki:Newarticletext in Croatian (hr). How do I find and edit a specific message in Special:Translate without knowing its group? The filter there takes forever (javascript search through tens of thousands of messages). Also, where and how do I search for the exact message name? I searched at Special:SearchTranslations for a few words/phrases in the current translation, which did not return the message in question, or returned too many messages even when I required all search words (1 2 etc.). Ponor (talk) 14:42, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

@Ponor Just enter "Newarticletext/hr" in the search box and hit enter. The page will be loaded and you can edit it. Raymond 18:14, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

Thanks @Raymond. That helps... somewhat: I'd still like to know how to make that message show up in the tool Special:Translate. It helps to have it there so I can compare translations in similar languages and read about its context. Sometimes I edit the url of another message, but for that you need to know which group your message belongs to (unnecessarily, imo) Ponor (talk) 18:46, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

@Ponor: The way I do that is to use the method described by Raymond, but after clicking "edit" on the message, I click the message group, which is linked above the edit field (in parentheses after "Message definition"). That takes you to the Special:Translate interface, but (a bit confusingly), it only shows that message, and not the rest of the messages in that group. For that, you have to click e.g. "Untranslated" and then "back" to "All". Jon Harald Søby (talk) 22:55, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

@Jon Harald Søby, thanks to you too. It's a long and winding road, but that'll do. For anyone coming from the future:

• search translatewiki.net for the localized message by its name/slash/lang
• follow the link, then Edit source
• click the group name link in the parentheses next to "Message definition"

Ponor (talk) 13:12, 31 March 2023 (UTC)