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Allow different users to translate the same topic independently
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Pginer-WMF
Jan 8 2015, 10:46 AM
Referenced Files
F28034948: CX-multiple-other-translation.png
Jan 25 2019, 10:57 AM
F27990731: CX-multiple-new-details.png
Jan 22 2019, 1:14 PM
F27990729: CX-multiple-new.png
Jan 22 2019, 1:14 PM
F27990741: CX-multiple-other-translation.png
Jan 22 2019, 1:14 PM
F27990198: CX-multiple-new-one.png
Jan 22 2019, 1:14 PM
F26961: cx_entry-new-warnings-ongoing-trans.png
Jan 8 2015, 10:46 AM
F26952: cx_translate-other-draft.png
Jan 8 2015, 10:46 AM
F26964: cx_translate-warning-another.png
Jan 8 2015, 10:46 AM
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Description

Currently, two different users cannot start a translation for the same topic across the same languages.
This means that a user is not allowed to translate an article X if another user has started a translation draft before. This is problematic since we are making users unable to create content.

Allowing users to start translations about the same article also brings some challenges to avoid effort duplication. So we can:

  1. When creating an article, show a warning in the "new translation dialog" indicating that another user started a draft with an option to view it. (T214380)
  2. If the user views the other person draft (through 1) or accesses it by guessing the URL, the user will get a message about the draft author and options to either create a new draft based on the current content, or start a translation from scratch (check "View other persons draft" mockup of the design notes).
  3. When editing an article and another user starts a draft, a warning will be shown on top in the usual way warnings are shown in the translation editor (providing access to the other person draft).

Specific work for the different parts will be captured in sub-tickets.

Important disclaimer
This is not about collaborative editing. We are not proposing multiple uses to work at the same time on the same draft. We are proposing multiple users to be able to work on independent drafts on the same topic. Supporting the former brings lots of other complications.

Design details

Scenarios supported
T214416: Update the data model to allow translations by different users for the same topic and languages

New translation warning
T214380: Communicate that other users started this translation on the "new translation" dialog

CX-multiple-new-one.png (345×692 px, 47 KB)

Warning while editing your translation draft
T214411: Communicate other translations were started for this topic when editing your translation

CX-multiple-new.png (720×1 px, 217 KB)
CX-multiple-new-details.png (720×1 px, 246 KB)

Viewing other persons translation draft
T214409: Display in-progress translations

CX-multiple-other-translation.png (720×1 px, 228 KB)

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One more issue related to this was reported here: a user unable to pick a topic to translate during a campaign.

This comment illustrates a user having trouble to find an article not already being translated by someone else.

Hi, two news reports : on my talk page about one of mine translation draft, and on MW site Talk:Content translation.

And one more. I seem to remember a brief period when creating your own translation was possible? Was that an experiment or do I just remember wrong? Currently there is no way to do this as far as I can see

Another issue in which the user is same but forgot the password of old account.

Why is the tool breaking one of our most important, long standing and cherished policies, namely https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Ownership_of_content, and allowing the first mover to take over some level of ownership and control of an article in translation.

Also, the tool is abysmal, it does nothing but churn out error after error. I've no idea why it's enabled in Beta Features, because it looks like it's barely into Alpha let alone out and into Beta.

Why is the tool breaking one of our most important, long standing and cherished policies, namely https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Ownership_of_content, and allowing the first mover to take over some level of ownership and control of an article in translation.

This is a limitation of the current data model that we plan to resolve. This ticket captures a proposal for doing so.

Also, the tool is abysmal, it does nothing but churn out error after error. I've no idea why it's enabled in Beta Features, because it looks like it's barely into Alpha let alone out and into Beta.

Content is very different from wiki to wiki. The tool has been very useful for many users on different wikis while others have experienced different issues on some articles on different wikis. We are working on a new version of the tool that is intended to provide a more solid editing experience. Since we cannot test all combinations of article × source language × destination language individually, it is very useful to hear about specific examples of the issues. Feel free to report any issue with the new version (the old one will be deprecated soon) in the project talk page or here in Phabricator.

the old one will be deprecated soon

We've been hearing that for at least 2 years, during which the tech ambassadors had to do the tech support that the team refused to do.

Do you at least plan to test bugs filed against v1 on v2, so we don't have to report the same issues again?

the old one will be deprecated soon

We've been hearing that for at least 2 years, during which the tech ambassadors had to do the tech support that the team refused to do.

As mentioned in T204817#4842893, the new version is being used for 45% of the translations. As new improvements are made we have been exposing the new version more prominently, and we plan to make it the default during next January. The new version replaces the editing surface used in version 1 (the browser default editing surface) with the Visual Editor one (more apt to deal with wikitext), which required to significatively refactor the different tools that manipulated the editing surface. So it has been a significant change and we wanted to expose the new version gradually.

Do you at least plan to test bugs filed against v1 on v2, so we don't have to report the same issues again?

Yes. We are already doing so. We have a process to review reported issues where we either (a) check that they are resolved with the new version, or (b) confirm that the issue still affects the new version. Recently we have been reviewing tickets related to references and templates which were the focus of the recent improvements in the new version, but we'll be covering other areas.

I just noticed one user complained they can't create an article which is already started in CX by another user (while that user retired, so it's highly unlikely they'll complete that article). Currently, we're forcing them to wait 455 days for the draft to be automatically purged, which is crazy. Can this be prioritized?

The main limitation for translating an article that someone else started was removed in T298244: Remove technical limit that prevents different users to translate the same topic. Now there is just a 24h block time for a topic someone else started. This seems to be providing a good balance between preventing to step on each others toes and avoiding articles to get blocked for long periods of time. With this, a more elaborate approach as the one described in the ticket may no longer be needed.