Re: @dircategory (Re: Translating Emacs manuals is of strategic importance)

> Date: Sat, 06 Jan 2024 09:37:03 +0000
> From: Jean-Christophe Helary <[email protected]>
> Cc: Stefan Kangas <[email protected]>, Vincent Belaïche <[email protected]>, [email protected], [email protected], [email protected]
> 
> >> Would @author be also used for the translator?
> > 
> > @author is a TeX command and goes into the printed version.  For
> > translation, we'd need a separate directive, I think, since a
> > translator is not the author.  Again, this is something for the
> > Texinfo folks to handle.
> 
> Legally speaking a translator is an author. Depending on the 
> jurisdiction (Anglo-Saxon right vs EU right for ex.), the translator 
> hold full copyright on the translation, unless it was a work for hire, 
> etc. That’s why there are contracts between publishing houses and 
> translators to allow or not the use of the translation is such and such 
> format. I am not an IP lawyer, but I know what’s written in the 
> contracts I’ve signed.
> 
> Creating another directive for the translation author seems like 
> splitting hairs. But maybe not using @author at all and just adding a 
> sentence in the text regarding the translation is the way to go.

I don't know enough about this to have an opinion.  I still think this
is a GNU-wide decision that should be addressed by Texinfo folks.

> >> Also, we will have to translate @node, because they appear in the
> >> Section index. I see that they were kept in English in the SES manual.
> > 
> > If we translate @node names, links from the doc strings and
> > cross-manual links will not work.
> 
> They will if they are translated in the other manuals. That’s what I’m 
> doing in the Emacs manuals at the moment.

That means no fallback for when a translated manual doesn't exist to
which the link points.  Not sure this is better or what to do about
that.  Again, something Texinfo should address, I think.

> > But, for such links to work, we
> > need a facility to tell the Info reader that when a link goes to a
> > manual named FOO.info, it should visit FOO-LANG.info instead.  Again,
> > something that involves a change in Texinfo and in all Info readers.
> 
> What are the practical cases where translating nodes would be a problem?
> 
> 1. I read a manual in English, there is a link with a node in English, 
> it directs to the other English manual.
> 
> It’s the expected behaviour.
> 
> 2. I read a manual in French, there is a link with a node in English, 
> it directs to the other English manual.
> 
> If the other manual exists in French, it is not the proper behaviour.
> 
> 3. I read a manual in French, there is a link with a node in French, it 
> directs to the other French manual.
> 
> If the other manual exists in French, it is the proper behaviour.
> 
> If it does not, we should have an error message that informs the reader 
> that the manual is not translated.

I think case 3 should fall back to the English manual instead of
erroring out.  Having a manual without translation to an arbitrary
language will be the usual case for quite some time, so an error
message sounds like a harsh punishment to me.