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Unclear English original strings

Posted: 07 Aug 2017, 17:16
by Looxoor
Hi!
I'm currently working on the Swedish translation when I found an oddity in the English strings
#36607 and #36608.
They're called file modify time and file change time respectively, which of course is essentially the same.

In the description text for the setting where those are two of three options however, change is called creation instead which makes a lot more sense.

I'll translate change to creation and modify to modify which I guess is what's intended in English as well.

Just thought you should know.

Also, there's a string called SMB stat, #36625.
Is it supposed to be stat as fast, short for status/state or is it just the name of the function?

Re: Unclear English original strings

Posted: 07 Aug 2017, 18:04
by davilla
used in system/settings/settings.xml

#36607 is correct, "Modify" or mtime if mtime is valid, otherwise use ctime (create)
#36608 is also correct "File change time" -> use newer datetime of the file's mtime and ctime


#36625 is also correct. "SMB Stat" is a specific SMB function.

Re: Unclear English original strings

Posted: 07 Aug 2017, 18:18
by Looxoor
davilla wrote:used in system/settings/settings.xml

#36607 is correct, "Modify" or mtime if mtime is valid, otherwise use ctime (create)
#36608 is also correct "File change time" -> use newer datetime of the file's mtime and ctime
Ok, I guess I'm stupid but if modify prefers mtime but uses ctime as fallback and change uses ctime, unless a newer mtime exists then in most cases there's really no difference between them?

But that wasn't my concern really, rather than you using a different word (creation) in the description.
If you read the description first and try to look for a creation date option and only find three options, two of which in regular meaning are synonymous and none is creation date, you'll be highly confused.

Re: Unclear English original strings

Posted: 07 Aug 2017, 18:27
by davilla
Looxoor wrote: 07 Aug 2017, 18:18
davilla wrote:used in system/settings/settings.xml

#36607 is correct, "Modify" or mtime if mtime is valid, otherwise use ctime (create)
#36608 is also correct "File change time" -> use newer datetime of the file's mtime and ctime
Ok, I guess I'm stupid but if modify prefers mtime but uses ctime as fallback and change uses ctime, unless a newer mtime exists then in most cases there's really no difference between them?

But that wasn't my concern really, rather than you using a different word (creation) in the description.
If you read the description first and try to look for a creation date option and only find three options, two of which in regular meaning are synonymous and none is creation date, you'll be highly confused.
The difference is slight but important. mtime could be bogus yet valid as in it decodes into a proper date/time string.

So 1st choice is specific, use mtime or ctime if mtime is not valid.
2nd choice says to use the newer of mtime or ctime.

1st if you prefer mtime, 2nd if you only care to use the newer of the two.


I suspect these two settings came in from some platform returning goofy results at some time in the past.

Re: Unclear English original strings

Posted: 07 Aug 2017, 18:34
by davilla
or in better wording for english

#36607 -> "Prefer modify over create time"

#36608 -> "Use newer of modify/create time'

Re: Unclear English original strings

Posted: 07 Aug 2017, 19:46
by Looxoor
davilla wrote:or in better wording for english

#36607 -> "Prefer modify over create time"

#36608 -> "Use newer of modify/create time'
Ok, I understand now and the improved wording is much clearer! I'll use those as the basis for my translation.

Perhaps to clean up the look we could simplify the names of the options and expand more on the differences in the description, using other similar cases from the other options as a template.
In that case the four involved strings could look similar to this:

#36605
Sort library items by date/time with three different sources of the times:[CR]
[Current time] Uses the date/time when the item was added to the library.
[Modified time] Uses the date/time the file was last modified, otherwise uses creation date/time of the file.
[Most recent time] Uses the most recent time of either file creation or file modification.

#36606
Current time

#36607
Modified time

#36608
Most recent time

What do you think?

Re: Unclear English original strings

Posted: 07 Aug 2017, 19:59
by davilla
seems sane :)

Re: Unclear English original strings

Posted: 07 Aug 2017, 21:28
by Looxoor
Great! I'll use it in the Swedish translation then.
BTW, how often do you sync with the edited language files into the apps? Cause I've made some progress but I'll only have time for maybe a hundred a week and it'd be a shame to wait for the entirety to be ready before seeing it put to use.

Re: Unclear English original strings

Posted: 07 Aug 2017, 21:33
by davilla
sync'ing translations is a new process for us :) maybe once a week during active testflight cycles.

Re: Unclear English original strings

Posted: 08 Aug 2017, 09:22
by Looxoor
All right, seems reasonable!