Post , Issues etc ....

Hi All,
This is only an effort to focus on usability of Drupal.org documentation for those new visitors, newcomer and even longtime Drupalist that are not native english.

From the Mon, 05/19/2008 it toke me 20 day to start the list of example
for finding the right issue from where to start my listing. So please forgive me if this toke that
much time. But consider that my efforts to help out goes hand in hand with my efforts to learn
to use Drupal from the point of view of a foreign language member of Drupal.org.

What I mean can be easily understand with this example:

the issue Theming the node teaser ,
on Theme developer's guide is a perfect example where newcomer
will struggle and waste time in finding out how one of the Drupal version works!

    Explanations
  1. Search:
     

    I start with a search with google: " node is displayed as a teaser site:drupal.org "

    Result: Theming the node teaser

    So I click on the first result that google propose me, that's always the case for beginner!

    2.  

  2. Teaser : not defined
     

    As a longtime student I know that good manual have always an index

    for the new and most used vocabolary and acronyms, or in this case a link to it!

    3.  

  3. Breadcrumbs : confusing
     

    on this page : Drupal 4.6.x . Drupal 4.7.x . Drupal 5.x

    Anyone that have spent ours, days, weeks and almost years like me,

    knows how confusing and disorienting is this. Thats is because i will not go further

    in this.

    4.  

  4. Testimonial 1
     

    Members want to help but it toke there a lot of time to find out what's going on!

    This one took me hours to figure out....

    5.  

  5. Abbrevations:
     

    BTW : shuold every newcomer, visitor or even foreign language

    Drupalist, know what that acronyms should mean or stand for?

    6.  

  6. Testimonial 2
     

    This also took me hours to figure out...

I could go further in listing issues of this type and on my homepage i still will collect examples like that, but keep in mind, I know Drupal.org members helps out on a free and volonteers basis and we all are very gratefull to their dedication in making Drupal growing and make it the best Open Source CMS (Content Management System) of the world.

Thank you all, for your attention

For those who want to know more about my motivations:
Reference on my efforts on my Homepage

Comments

dman’s picture

dman CreditAttribution: dman commented

Um, what is your question?

Do you want a link to a Drupal Glossary? (A glossary is a different thing from an 'index', which may be why you had trouble finding what you wanted)

It is a good point that "teaser" is not adequately explained there. (It may be elsewhere) It's a term used in publishing, advertising and CMS, but not invented by Drupal. However, if you haven't already just looked it up and figured it out,

Teaser - a short enticing phrase about the asset (page) to encourage readers to visit the full story. By default, the first paragraph or two of the page content, usually displayed above a "read more..." link.

Drupal documentation may use some terms or acronyms that are unfamiliar to people who haven't used the internet or email before. But it's not the documenters job to explain to you what an FAQ is, or how to RTFM. Spend an evening reading the Jargon File or one of the thousands of Internet guides and you will get up to speed with common internet terms pretty quick.
It's true that some of the documentation could be worded a little more formally in in places, but I quite like the casual style of writing - targeted at educated friends and peers - that makes the documentation more approachable. Approachable to people who already work with computers anyway.

"Breadcrumbs" is a term used in Internet architecture for years. It's new the first time you hear it, but that's what you are reading documentation for - to learn new things.

Basically, the is a learning curve in getting started with web development in general (not just drupal).
It's also certainly possible for some of the documentation to be worded a little clearer in places... as time goes by. But most docs in the handbook are there to describe how to extend or use functionality, not just describe core concepts. EG, to be reading the page "Theming the Node Teaser" it's most likely that the person that wants to do this already knows what "Theme", "Node", and "Teaser" mean in the Drupal system. If they don't, then this is not the page that will tell them that.

You are able to clarify (and add cross-references) to the handbook pages in the comments. If you can raise specific questions about individual pages that you found confusing, please continue to do so by adding documentation issues like you have done here. Some of us have documentation rights that can update those pages as needed, but this will happen best if you are very specific about just which bit you didn't understand from a page, and how it could be improved.
I'm sorry, but I couldn't tell from your list above just what could be done to fix the problems you had.

Remember, just because you didn't understand a word yet doesn't mean the docs are wrong. But if a doc mentions a new topic or concept that's not described well, it's easy for us to add a cross-reference to somewhere it is. But it's unlikely that many of the pages will need to link back to common jargon like 'node' or 'teaser' or 'HTML' when talking about them.

Simply clicking on the first Google result doesn't mean that you have found the best place to start learning about something. Nancys Beginners cookbook holds your hand a lot more, and introduces ideas step-by-step. Maybe starting there would help.

Good luck. You'll need it!

.dan.

Wolfflow’s picture

Wolfflow CreditAttribution: Wolfflow commented

Hey Dan,

really a great Thanks to you for answering and all the usefully explanations. Of course i have to read it with more care and do some additionally learning hours but that exactly what I wanted to do, and you gave me some good directions.

Of course i will try to describe and indicate much better where and what I find it could be corrected or explained in a much simpler manner. I know that this will cost some time more spending in writing down such Docs pages in the Manuals here, but in return we all get much motivation to share our acquired Knowledge and post it on Drupal.org.

I did not yet follow all of your references , but sure I will and report here my experience.
Again a big Kiss for your posting and Help

Cheers

dman’s picture

dman CreditAttribution: dman commented

It's very easy for documenters to add links to better pages when some concepts need better information. Often those better pages do exist, but also ... often those pages are hard to find for beginners who don't have the right words to look for. It's a bit of a trap.

Drupal handbooks do not have much of an ordered structure, and this is unfortunate. This happens from the 'wiki' style of contribution and because of many different editors and different times. People will find it hard to start from the 'beginning' and read to the 'end' as some topics are treated very deeply, and some very lightly, and many are categorized in inconsistent ways.

Certain areas - like the theming handbook or the cookbook are well structured. But it's true that many starters with Drupal have difficulty knowing where to begin. Instead they often find themselves looking at chapter 3 (or chapter 15) without seeing chapter 1 & 2!
And it's also true that most of the interesting contributions from the Drupal community editors are in the 'advanced' section, and not a lot of beginner stuff gets reviewed too often.
MANY folk do make contributions at that level - most often with the screencasts, videos and the Drupal Dojo. But each of these are stand-alone lessons, often half on really basic concepts, then quickly going into very specific things.

At this point, I guess I can only recommend one of the actual books which has been put together by a real writer and editor to provide a structured guide.
Everybody on the team knows that the handbooks can be improved, as long as the suggestions are positive and not just complaints :-)

But as I say, the easiest way to contribute to getting the docs better is to suggest a few "Related Links" at the bottom of existing handbook pages. Links into useful forum discussions are OK too, and the good forum topics occasionally get made into pages! That discussion on "What is a teaser" I linked to above probably should be rewritten into a handbook page (if it hasn't already).

.dan.

thomas23@drupal.org’s picture

thomas23@drupal.org CreditAttribution: thomas23@drupal.org commented

Hi There.

Thanks, wolfflow, for putting this up!

Dan, your post and extensive explainations (thanks for that!) will definitly be of help for new drupalists -- if they find them. And I guess that's exactly the point. It's not a matter of existense but a matter of how to get hold of the truely countless explainations, examples and what-nots!

Drupal documentation may use some terms or acronyms that are unfamiliar to people who haven't used the internet or email before. But it's not the documenters job to explain to you what an FAQ is, or how to RTFM.

Eventhough you are completly right in what you say I don't understand why there is need for exaggeration: It's not their job to help people learn the internet, true enough, but that's not the people we are talking about here, is it. What harm would it make to, e.g., have common drupal terms like node -- or even "internet technologiy terms" like blog for that matter -- automatically processed to show them in a acronym-like link style right in-place, right there where people read the documentation? One could follow them or just ignore them if they are allready familiar with that term.

I'm thinking link them to one of either a common internet glossary/enceclopedia like wikipedia, drupals glossary (as you pointed out nicely -- I didn't know that and I've seen quite a bit) or even as search keywords for one of the many search engines out there. A possible interface for documentainers could use drupals taxonomy to "tag" an article only that those tags will not be displayed in the node's header section but rather be used as "use these words for acronym links"-set. Again, this is not the perfect solution. But as you pointed out correctly I, too, like drupal.org's casual way of doing things focusing on getting things done. This would be a solution and, so I propose, one way to ease drupals steep learning curve for beginners or "converters". One, of course, could go further and constrain which target is used based on the term in question but this would indeed be a greater project.

I guess you know Dies' talk at Drupalcon Boston and will be aware of his three main goals for D7? One of them is about usability and improve access for new drupalists and redesigne drupal.org. In my opinion this would be one of many possible starting points.

While I'm at it I'd like to add my opinion (and solution proposal) regarding these Drupal 5.x, 6.x, 4.x tags in the documentation section. I often find, while looking for D6 solutions, that I'll end up on 5.x or 4.x pages with no hint for 6.x. This might as well be because D6 is not that old, yet, and noone has written anything for 6.x. Anyway, I really like the tab-style used on api.drupal.org. I'd really like to see that applied to the documentation section. Even for the case there is no "translation" for the specific topic for 6.x, yet, so people at least get that information through the 6.x tab saying "not ported yet" or similar. So one doesn't have to spend hours looking for the right location drupal.org if there is none and go look elsewhere. This could be another toehold to keep frustation at a minimum. Let me add that I even thought when I started with drupal that missing a 6.x tag implies this doesn't apply to D6! Which, of course, is sheldom the case; only an easier solution might exist for version 6 in addition to the "D5 way".

And yet another though that comes to my mind: Why not let readers/users do some work as well and make use of the voting API to community-tag or vote on "helped/needs work/don't know what to do with this". If my suggestion above is not that far off using community tagging could even let readers add terms they are not familiar with "on the fly": Below the node could be a form label "List terms you are not familiar with:" and you do

  1. add term/tag not farmiliar
  2. hit enter and thereby reload the page
  3. same text but terms now are linked like I suggested

The documentation team could then focus on a. manage the tags integraty and b. act on the requests in a maybe more contemporary fashion? I'm just guessing on this since I have no inside in who the doc-team works! So excuse me if this goes to far.

Cheers.

P.S. As this might not be the right place for such a discussion, does anyone know a drupal.group where that could go?

dman’s picture

dman CreditAttribution: dman commented

I think that the documentation team will see the issues here just fine. It's in the right queue. I also don't think I've said anything they don't know already.

Apologies for the hyperbole, but the example in point was "BTW". I don't think that that is Drupal-specific terminology, and for that reason I don't personally see it fits in a Drupal glossary. "PHP"? "CSS"? maybe, for completeness, but not "BTW" or "FYI".

At this point I'd rather encourage readers to get up to speed (read the Jargon File) than encourage the writers to talk down and stop using the "proper" (or at least appropriate) terminology. Which was the request I was responding to.

Now, using a glossary module or modified version of it like you suggest may be possible, but I dunno If I'm a fan of the idea. I certainly don't want to read a technical doc that provides a definition of 'node' embedded on every page! Your suggestions may mitigate this effect somewhat, but probably at a cost. It's hard to see the best compromise there.

There are ongoing discussions on tagging the docs better. I dunno if that's getting anywhere.

.dan.

Wolfflow’s picture

Wolfflow CreditAttribution: Wolfflow commented

Wow,
that means now a lot of writings for me (in a foreign language) to continue giving some info and answer to some points of views mentioned above. 1st Thank you Thomas23 , I liked very much your proposal about TAGGING really great. But let me say first that apart of :

from Dan:

Do you want a link to a Drupal Glossary? (A glossary is a different thing from an 'index', which may be why you had trouble finding what you wanted)

IMO (In modest Opinion) this Drupal Glossary is a desperate try from someone (sorry that I do not know who wrote that, but thank you for that! ) that wanted to help out with , i suppose, the same motivation of all that Drupalists that are so impressed from the great and broad potentiality of Drupal that trying to Feedback happens instinctively.

What really is for me not very simple to understand is that with so great contributed Modules like Glossary from Moshe Weitzman that might be applied on Drupal.org like Thomas23 mentioned above, there are an infinity of other solution and ways to direct Newcomer, Visitors, Drupalist etc. to the right source of information needed; That are not implemented here.

WHY NOT ?

and yes Dan I know very well Nancys Beginners cookbook and she was, some month ago, that gave to me a fundamental help that boosted my orientation in the immense Jungle of Information that exist already on Drupal.org !! And I will never stop to thank her for that support.

I'm sorry if with in my writings here I did give the impression of wanting to complain, that is not and will not be my way to contribute here, if i did so I beg your pardon and understanding for that. Again I am writing in a language that it's not my mother language.

from Thomas

I guess you know Dies' talk at Drupalcon Boston and will be aware of his three main goals for D7? One of them is about usability and improve access for new Drupalists and redesign drupal.org. In my opinion this would be one of many possible starting points.

Yes Thomas i watched the Video Keynote of Boston and have read mostly any issues regarding this argument and I am really happy that Dries did point focus on that, now that we all insider know very well that Drupal is going to boost in the World of Open Source towards great GOALS. About this I would love to write more but it's not here the right place. On my Homepage I'll try to reorganise all what I have wrote about my experience with Drupal since about 2 years 1 week of my membership on Drupal.org. (hopefully my efforts will not went to collision course with Drupal.org staff, one Day!)

from Dan:

...... (A glossary is a different thing from an 'index', .....

of course I know the difference, and again a referred to the word "index" in the meaning of a simple list of commonly used word on Drupal.org that from the point of view of a newcomer (and with newcomer I do mind also someone who never have heard about Drupal before and have very base internet surfing experience, like older aged people)

from Dan:

I'm sorry, but I couldn't tell from your list above just what could be done to fix the problems you had.

I did not have a specific problem, dear Dan, I get confused in reading that post and it toke me some ours to define every thing for myself. In addition i want to mention that i found a great help in learning the English language using the Google define tool!!

(for those not confident with all Google little helps: in the google search field write: define: followed by the word you want to get a definition.) note, this is only for english words.

So thank you again for your feedback and of course I invite all to help out in find a solution that can help any kind of type of Visitors on Drupal to find a central place where to be able to be directed to the unbelievable quantity of resources posted from thousand,>em>(maybe 100.000) i guess, and that I will continue to search, discover and read carefully here on Drupal.org.

Cheers

dman’s picture

dman CreditAttribution: dman commented

OK, Because you now can use google define: (it is cool, I know)...
And because knowing the right words is helpful...

the word "index" in the meaning of a simple list of commonly used word on Drupal.org ...

No sorry, that's a glossary.

define:glossary

glossary : An alphabetical list of abstruse, obsolete, unusual, technical, or other terms concerned with a subject field, together with definitions.

define:index

index : An alphabetical directory at the end of a book that references names and subjects discussed in the book and the pages where such mentions can be found.

... importantly, an index doesn't contain any information, definition, or explanations at all - only pointers to multiple places where the word is used.
An "index" on the word "teaser" for the drupal.org website would be a list of links to all 500,000 pages that the word "teaser" appears. So that's why we call search indexes "search indexes".
One of the pointers in an index probably is a useful definition, but it won't always be the first one in your search results.

What you want, what you asked for, what you need, and what you found, is a glossary.

I don't want to be pedantic, because I really do sympathize with the language difficulties - but if you know the right word to search for, your searching will be easier and better!

Wolfflow’s picture

Wolfflow CreditAttribution: Wolfflow commented

You Are Right

Yes you are definitly right, and I apology, first because i forgot to think that as a multilanguage educated person I used the word "Index" in it's Latin base definition that is: "List" . My mother language is Italian and I had Latin in the High School. Second because I did not check out point by point, and word by words all what I have wrote. I thank you for your patient and very helpfull (for me) specification.

Let me again say that for someone like me , it will never sound or read pedantic what a person like you write to us in order to help out with Knowledge and references. This is the greatness of Drupalist and of all Work that every day
you and all do here.

Of course it's not easy to have all that imputs ordered and structured in a way that everyone get satisfied. I my self am sure that in some post I wrote , did not contribute to help but have even confused the readers more then necessary.
You sure Know what I mean, because you will have seen that many time here on Drupal.org.

But exactly this point is that of what I WANT TO FOCUS ON. give us the possibbility to correct our mistakes in our postings and so making our own process of learning more usefull and constructive.

From time to time I read again on my "Recent Post" and try to correct my own errors. like : Broken Links, false
or erroneus statements etc.

Cheers

Wolfflow’s picture

Wolfflow CreditAttribution: Wolfflow commented

Hi Guys,
Well there is no good news for all Newcomer here at the moment. I will try to resume some of the last
activity I tryed to start over a way to collaborate to help out the Problem of not having
a really efficient place where Newcomer may get informed about the right direction to start over finding
there way of getting oriented on Drupal.org.

  1. I started to apply for a Group.Drupal.org project proposal for: Documentation Task Force that I did not awaiting to be accepted and was refused with this statement:

    Your Group entry entitled "Documentation Task Force" has been denied by our content moderator. Our group guidelines are posted at http://groups.drupal.org/node/add/og. The content has been deleted from our site.

    Note:
    This looks to be duplicate with this existing group:

    http://groups.drupal.org/beginner-documentation

    please join and work within that group

    Regards,
    The groups.drupal.org team

    this is the content of the aswer e-mail that i received

  2. Here is another exemple of misleading Information what I foun at:
    Comparison of CCK/Taxonomy Modules
    What the HELL have the Philosophy link : There is more than one way to do it at the beginning of the Article that try to get a general idea about CCK/Taxonomy Modules! Every one a bit expert in Internet-surfing from a point of newby knows that he will click
    over the first LINK because "IT'S THERE that why I should follow!!".

    Every one just a bit informed about the way to write Documentation that have the task to clarify a bit about some Concept, Knowledge and Priciples in General will never put an Argument that leads out of the presumed Goal to achieve at the beginning of a report!

    3. Ok You will ask me : Why You do not apply for a Documentation Team account ?
    My answer: What can I do if my intention to build a general knowledge Thesaurus like, from the point of view of a not native english speaker ( with the DOCUMENTATION TASK FORCE group project) so to start to collect all
    terms, noun and words that can be just defined so that a NO native english Drupal Newcomer can undertsand, was rejected without any further request or back query about my intention and goals I wanted to achieve?

    Filnally , of course I am really disilluded and sorry that there is (at the moment!) no sinn for trying to consider deeply the potentiallities of the 1000s of non english Drupal.org users and members and specially for those ones who really wnat to help and contribute.

    Cheers

dman’s picture

dman CreditAttribution: dman commented

I don't want to be discouraging - because I know you are looking to contribute something you see as useful, but:

#1 You applied to start a brand new group to work on documentation for beginners.
... and were told no, to instead try using the existing group that's there working on documentation for beginners.
There are already several documentation teams, and I don't think calling any one a "task force" makes a difference.
Raising a task to enhance the thesaurus is a good job and can/should be done within the existing teams. Or by anyone.

#2 You look at a page entitled "Comparison of Taxonomy Modules" and are distressed because it contains a link that discusses why different solutions exist. Comparison is about how there are multiple approaches, and that link is about why there isn't just one answer. TMTOWTDI is not a goal of the report at all. It's an introductory disclaimer explaining why the report was ( or had to be) written. "Motivation" often does come at the beginning of docs.

But I guess we all take different things from our reading of the wording. But it's just two sentences.

I feel that your problem again is expecting the first result you find to be the best and only answer to whatever you were looking for. Or, as you describe your own web-surfing habits - you click on the first link you see.
I certainly don't think that an expert internet surfer would be clicking on the first link instead of reading the article. Just the opposite.
This may be a problem with how you are expecting to find things.

The doc teams have many projects that get worked on (slowly) and additions to the thesaurus can be added to the task list.
As above, I don't think we need to start from the beginning and define 'BTW' and 'FYI' when other better internet dictionaries already exist. But the existing list of definitions can certainly be added to (or simplified) if needed.
And then it's a matter of whether anyone will read it bnefore complaining that they don't understand :-)
... but your suggestion of having some words automatically defined in the HTML has some advantages, so there is maybe a way forward.

OK... to be constructive - I know you are trying to do the right thing here!
We are already in the documentation issue queue. This is a good place to be.

How about: Would you like to list here some of the words or terms that you think need better explanation, and we will commit to integrating them into the current glossary if they have special meanings within Drupal, or add at least give you a reference to online dictionaries if they are just general internet terms that aren't part of English.
Just by raising the issue here you are becoming part of the documentation 'team'. But you don't get any badge or uniform :-(

zirvap’s picture

zirvap CreditAttribution: zirvap commented

I see we have two different glossaries: http://drupal.org/node/937 and http://drupal.org/node/122018. I think we should focus on http://drupal.org/node/937. It's easier to use since the words are listed alphabetically, and it's more complete.

dman’s picture

dman CreditAttribution: dman commented

Very cool. Yes.

Wolfflow’s picture

Wolfflow CreditAttribution: Wolfflow commented

Thank you zirvap for your advice, I really appreciate that I get some imputs to get a bit oriented in this. let me just add that I started to post also in Begginner Documentation just for focusing on the project of building a really dedicated Group entry entitled "Documentation Task Force" to build such a group of Drupalist and Newcomer and Visitors who might help to solve this great Task that alot of us want solved but few care really about.

Thank you very much!
Cheers

P.S.

The existence of two different sources of a kind of a Vocabulary on Drupal.org demostrate the fact that there is really a chaotic management of the Documentation here.

Wolfflow’s picture

Wolfflow CreditAttribution: Wolfflow commented

Just before you DMAN posted this i HAVE PUBLISHED my contribution to the mentioned group. and if you consider my posting offensive that is OK just tell me , I will continue my effort to get helped and oriented in a manner that can be usefull for NEWCOMERS right on my own HP only.

Thanks for pointing about my little efforts here before you investigate, I try just to get more people help us in accomplish a big and not easy to solve task.

Cheers

dman’s picture

dman CreditAttribution: dman commented

I've just gone in and added link anchors to all the terms found in that glossary - to make it easier to link directly to the definitions.
Link away!

Wolfflow’s picture

Wolfflow CreditAttribution: Wolfflow commented

Dear DMAN

Just for your information:

The Drupal.org staff, that here I just will report as "STAFF" named this page HANDBOOKS. Lets go shortly to the english definition of a "Handbook" provided by Google (the define tool):

    I chose 4 of the many definitions you get:
     
  1. A reference manual usually consulted for quick fact-finding or for a concise and authoritative survey of a topic.
  2. A collection of informational pieces on one or more subjects, arranged for the quick location of facts.
  3. A reference book that provides concise, useful data and other information on a specific subject.
  4. A handbook is a small manual, reference work, or other collection of instructions, intended to provide ready reference. A vade mecum (lat. "go with me") or pocket reference is intended to be carried at all times. ...

So let us now resume the basically principle and definition that might be applyed for defining a
possible new Drupal Documentation project. Despite the fact: that a small amount of knowledge can cause people to think they are more expert than they really are, i will list my short personal opinions about the DRUPAL HANDBOOKS page here.

Preface:

We all know if not I will go to reply and report for those who does't , internet special arguments related Communities tend to build their own slangs. I would try to theorize that the word "Slang" can be compared easily to the word "Idiom", just to simplify the range of concepts I'm trying to focus on here.

The first misstake that the writer of this page did is viewable at the first sentence:

  • The Drupal handbooks offer a reference for those interested in Drupal whether novice or experienced, users or developers.

    • Novice ? & Experienced ? together?
    What for a gambling. That is one basically reason IMO because it comes to a such chaos of documentation on Drupal.org.
    The next sentence shows up where the invitation and suggestion to collaborate to this project
    lost control.

  • All content is supplied by volunteers, please contribute where you see a need

    • Volonteers can be any kind of visitors with different language, different level of knowledge about theirs language, different level of knowledge about Drupal and finally different level of personal pragmatism (the doctrine that truth is the practical efficacy of an idea.) applyied in writing their documentation contributions.

    Wow just as I was writing and also publish a copy of this article in : Beginner-documentation - Article - for a new Drupal Documentation Project I get some very interesting postings about the existence of two different Glossary sources on Drupal.org:

  • Terminology
  • T. Glossary

    • What for a confusion!!

    Wolfflow’s picture

    Wolfflow CreditAttribution: Wolfflow commented

    That is really great of you. Thanks a lot DMAN ,for this tecnical adds, it will surely help out more any newcomer that want to consult and find the right definitions and explanations for terms !!!

    I guess that before a new Drupal.org / Drupal Association redisign , a lot more can be make easely on Drupal.org. I name of all Drupalist and Visiros thanks!!

    Cheers

    dman’s picture

    dman CreditAttribution: dman commented

    Yes, I was able to follow your link. But not your point in that big post. I'm actually trying hard to read through the language thing, but most of what I'm translating is rhetoric.

    Is your problem that there was no explanation of some words on Drupal.org when reading advanced docs?
    Or that there are more than one handbook pages explaining words you find unfamiliar?
    Or that you couldn't find either of them when you searched a bit and only clicked the first result?

    I'm trying to help you make progress in the right direction here - I'm volunteering to help add useful bits to the glossary. Just tell us or the group what's missing and we'll try to fill in the gaps.

    Wolfflow’s picture

    Wolfflow CreditAttribution: Wolfflow commented

    Hi Dman,

    Really appreciate your dedication and help with my concerne.

    Yes I understand that all my writings are not easy to intreprete in the right way or better say for the meaning I only have in my brain, and for that I can only apology but go over and over to be more clear.

    Yes there is a real problem for some one like me (NNE) to read often throughout all the documentations and find words that are not directly of Drupal Glossary type but that every reader have to clarify and define before being able to understand the meanings.

    And Yes, whay do you have not only one Glossary that resume all terminology of Drupal and reply some term of technical degree that often are used to explain Drupal's functionalities? I know that I can really not figure out of what for an ammout of data volume you gays have to do with on Drupal.org, but consider that in the HANDBOOKS exist documentation about 4 Drupal Versions (if we do not go deeper). Each of the different version with a quantity of new functionalities that sometime you really get fever in finding their incopability one's with another.

    You better know, that I know, what is going on there, so excuse me if I can just say that I know that in the meantime I have to continue finding the right answers as I and many thousends do with the Google search utilities and not with a clear structurated HANDBOOK on Drupal.org.

    Thank You for your efforts but I am aware that only You cannot solve the problem or let say the handicap for NNEs.

    Cheers

    dman’s picture

    dman CreditAttribution: dman commented

    The people that write the docs are like you and me. As you've seen from reading the docs, there's not an Us and Them. Not everyone can write clearly all the time, so your criticisms of someones sentences don't help unless we can say ways in which it could be better.

    I can't answer the question about why there are (at least) two different pages with definitions. But my guess is:
    Someone though "gosh, the word 'breadcrumbs' might be confusing" and decided to write a page to help people! (instead of complaining about it ;-)

    I also guess that maybe they didn't search well enough before deciding that a page like that didn't exist.

    You thought the same, right?

    Interestingly, those two lists are mostly quite different words!
    Also, it's possibly that the "Beginners guide" works better with a short list of useful words. It doesn't need to talk about CCK, CVS, core contributions and views. It might be better that way!
    And this is maybe a reason why I don't want the Drupal Glossary full of another hundred common internet jargon words because someone may not have heard it before. I say keep it focused. That's actually easier for beginners than making it complete.

    Anyway, my constructive question to most folk that find it hard to find things in the handbook is:
    Where did you first look? Where did you expect to find the list of terms?
    This one was in :
    Getting Started » Before You Start » Overview » Terminology

    Where would have been a better place? In many places the handbook structure can be improved, so where is a better place in the structure of things that beginners should read than "Getting Started"?

    Where did you look before complaining that the explanation didn't exist?

    So we can find the place you expected to find the right info, and at least put a link from there to the right place. That is a productive way forward.

    .dan.

    Wolfflow’s picture

    Wolfflow CreditAttribution: Wolfflow commented

    Then , Dear Dman,

    ... (instead of complaining about it ;-) ....

    refer comment #20

    Instead of saying or defining my personal opinion and discussion as a COMPLAIN which in facts is not, you know that there are many assertions spread overall the Drupal.org documentation an postings that refer to contradditional information and difficulty to understand and to find. Despite the fact to respect every volonteers work here I do not understand why:

    There is NO DOCUMENTATION TASK FORCE that focus on correction and filtering all the precious work here, like WIKIPEDIA do?

    cheers

    zirvap’s picture

    zirvap CreditAttribution: zirvap commented

    There is NO DOCUMENTATION TASK FORCE that focus on correction and filtering all the precious work here, like WIKIPEDIA do?

    Yes, there is. It is called the "documentation team".

    Here's a list of all members
    Here's information on how you can join

    Wolfflow’s picture

    Wolfflow CreditAttribution: Wolfflow commented

    I appreciate very much

    your address to the link mentioned, but I know them very well,

    therefore I ask myself why with so many Members (WOW!) in that Team you have so limited resources to correct
    or possibly complete, erroneous little items in postings, or simpify the way newcomers can find reference to definition information etc etc.?

    just to precise: This is a Question!

    Sorry Dman but I really do not want to polemize with you, it's a FACT that newcomer and NON ENGLISH NATIVE get in trouble whe they start over in Drupal.org. Be onest and admit that even Dries knows and have focused that something must be done about and I follow the many different places where a discussions about drupal.org documentation should be reviewed is taking place.

    Cheers

    Wolfflow’s picture

    Wolfflow CreditAttribution: Wolfflow commented

    I want finally make just 2 examples:

    Is there any page in the HANDBOOK that describe in simple words all the link you get in the Member-Menu
    are for and what you can do with?

    Is any organisational page that explain what kind of utilities you have disponible when you apply for a Documentation Team account?

    Is there any page That summarise a bit all the structure of Drupal Org such as a MAP of Site?

    Is this query usefull for you?

    Cheers

    dman’s picture

    dman CreditAttribution: dman commented

    "task force" = "documentation group" = "documentation contributor" = "Documentation Team" = "handbook maintainers"
    All of these hundreds of people are contributing to correcting, organizing and writing the docs you see.

    I don't know what you think the difference between a "documentation task force" and a "documentation team" is. Maybe there is a difference, but I think they do the same job.

    If I seem to get a bit argumentative here, it's because you keep saying that all these groups are not enough, and that we need another label.
    I think that we do have a lot of people who are doing things to make things better where they can, and that a new, different, group is not going to solve anything. Often individuals will take the time to review and refine an entire chapter. More often fixes get applied when they get seen, or when something changes.

    If I get offended (and my language may show it a little sorry) it's because you always saying that there is no "task force" is like saying that these contributors are not already doing useful things. There are dozens of small improvements made to the handbook each day. Two have already been made today just from this thread.

    Complaining = saying "this is bad, this is not good enough"
    Contributing = saying "here is something that is better"

    If there are contradictions - please point them out individually and they may be fixed, or explained better.
    But saying "there are lots of contradictions" without giving a link to what you are talking about ... is just complaining.
    ... or at least it sounds like it.

    This is why I've been asking you several times - what pages are the ones that you say are confusing? How could they be better?
    After you've read the beginners guide and the cookbook, exactly what needs to be explained more and what should it have said?

    You have said there are many errors in the docs, but you've not linked to one! Therefore nobody knows what it is that you think is wrong! And the things you say are confusing or disorganized mostly seem to be about the way you search. Often answers exist, but in a different place from where you were looking. This may be partly the organization fault, but partly yours.
    Just link to a page you think is in the wrong place and say where it should be! Or add a comment to it with a cross-reference for people to use.

    This stops being complaining and becomes contributing!

    I've said many times, each fix is easy, we are happy to see more cross-references. Just point out which ones you think need changing. Preferably as separate issues in the doc queue (not this thread).

    .dan.

    dman’s picture

    dman CreditAttribution: dman commented

    OK, that's a specific question that can be answered.
    The answer is: I don't know where a handbook sitemap is! I can see one in the drop-down on this page http://drupal.org/node/add/book But that's not a good answer.
    Post this as a new documentation issue and someone on the webmaster may be able to give you some feedback.

    I don't understand question #2, but I think what you want to know is:
    Documentation team members get the ability to edit all existing handbook pages, and shift pages around, and a little more HTML control than normal. Yes, it's not much different from a wiki. But anyone can add handbook pages already! Just not edit other peoples ones.

    [edit] ... and because your question (a good one) is about where is the page that explains it it's here: http://drupal.org/contribute/documentation

    Join the documentation team if you would like to edit existing handbook pages -- to fix typos, to clarify confusing sentences, or to move pages around in the hierarchy -- or if you have many contributions to offer. Substantial changes, such as major re-writes and changing top-level page organization, should be discussed on the documentation mailing list first. The documentation handbooks are written in HTML and use the Drupal Book module, which provides easy wiki-like editing functionality, allows the content to be easily organized, and automatically generates a navigation block.

    I'm not sure about the member-menu either. Do you mean the user menu on your Drupal site or your account on Drupal.org?
    On your own Drupal site you'll find module support under admin/help.

    heine’s picture

    heine CreditAttribution: heine commented

    In order to get something useful from this thread please provide:

    - a clear objective
    - ideally, a list of actionable items.

    zirvap’s picture

    zirvap CreditAttribution: zirvap commented

    Is there any page in the HANDBOOK that describe in simple words all the link you get in the Member-Menu are for and what you can do with?

    No, not yet, but you are working on it in #257819: Registered Drupal Users Block Table, aren't you?

    That issue is a good example of how the documentation is improved: You saw that something was missing. You started working on fixing the problem. You posted an issue, and got some comments. Maybe you agree with the comments, maybe you don't -- that is, of course, OK :-) When you are satisifed with what you have written, you can make a handbook page and post your content.

    When it is placed in the handbook, all members of the documentation team can edit it. So maybe someone else will improve it, and maybe someone else will think of a better place to put it. If you like, you can become member of the documentation team and help improving other pages.

    Sometimes you may post an issue but don't get any comments. What I've done in a situation like that is to wait a reasonable amount of time, and then (if the change is not too dramatic) just do it. (Like I did in #249778: Documentation writer's guide: How to handle unsupported versions.)

    And sometimes, you may decide to just add a new handbook page without opening any issue about it. For instance, I didn't make an issue about http://drupal.org/node/254214 -- I had wanted a page like that myself, and was pretty sure what it should contain, so I just posted it. (Of course, anyone in the documentation team can change it, if they see ways that it can be improved.)

    Wolfflow’s picture

    Wolfflow CreditAttribution: Wolfflow commented

    Hi, All casual readers, but especially Hi Dman. Really I want to specify something really important for you and me.

    About one of the first sentence of your really expnded answers, that I will read more carefully after this:

    If I get offended (and my language may show it a little sorry) it's because you always saying that there is no "task force" is like saying that these contributors are not already doing useful things.

    Please do not understand that I want to complain about you or any other volonteer that make a Incredible Work here and that all for the same kind of passion you develop for Drupal. Really please, forgive my ignorance of the english language and grammar that may cause that what I want to express and notify in my way to write comes different of what I really think and appreciate of all Drupalist on Drupal.org and out there in the World.

    Give me just a little time to try to summarize this posting that really have completely another target as might appear. I thank you for all the dettailed answer and I promise you I will get clear a good an Interesting Report
    so to show that behind this discussion is more then only long term Drupal member like I am and You Member of the Documentation Team

    Thank You for your understanding
    Cheers

    Wolfflow’s picture

    Wolfflow CreditAttribution: Wolfflow commented
    Assigned: Unassigned » Wolfflow
    Status: Active » Closed (fixed)

    Hello , Dman, Zirvap, Thomas, Heine and all other interested in discussing further about this Argument.

    I have open a new Discussion on Article - for a new Drupal Documentation Project in the Group.Drupal.org : Beginner Documentation Group !!

    So I will continue there my efforts to build with your help too a kind of Report for a Plan or what ever something like that can be titled, I do not know. Sure you have the right definition for. I will appreciate any comment suggestion and collaboration on that. Thank You all for this here and again my apology if I have offended involonterely in any way
    the Community, the Documentation Team.

    Cheers
    Wolfflow
    ;-)

    P.S. I closed the Issue but feel free to reopen by need!

    Wolfflow’s picture

    Wolfflow CreditAttribution: Wolfflow commented

    Hi Dman, First wish you a good Day !

    Ok , I jump from time to time to the Handbook and read throughout the pages.
    I have found out that you are really posting many suggestions and this is really great and helpfull for
    the community. Reading one of yours at Some more Suggestions I just come up with an Idea:

    For better filtering the great quantity of posting in the Support forums and many other different places could not be yousefull to put in the Comment submit Form some field that the user/poster have to fill before sending
    the comment or post like:

    Drupal version: 4 5 6 7 type > Checkboxes
    Theme Name: --------- Select List
    User experience Level: Beginner Experienced Webdegigner etc... Select List or Checkboxes

    Maybe there can be other pre-submit Question to answer.

    I think , but sure I do not know how yet, this could filter a lot better all incomeing posting and issues on Drupal.org.

    Of Course for registered Members that could be applyed in their account-pages in from of a profile-class that
    in case of subcription as a contributor all issues can be authomaticly be filtered as of information/qualification supplyed.

    It's just an Idea- Thank you for your Work and See You!
    ;-)

    dman’s picture

    dman CreditAttribution: dman commented

    I appreciate your suggestions. This is certainly what I meant when I asked for constructive, actionable suggestions.

    OK.
    So we have already got Drupal version selection for Issues, Handbooks and Topics. I do not think that adding that function to each individual comment will help a lot. This would be a bit of extra work for every commenter .. or most likely wrong if they selected a random one. Also, I haven't seen any comment threads where the version changed in the middle. ... unless that was important and worth writing about. Putting it in the details is maybe not a useful thing.
    But it was a reasonable idea to think about.

    From the hundreds of support threads I have helped with (And I think that Sepeck and VeryMisunderstood have done many more than me) only a few times has the theme been the root problem. Sometimes it HAS, for sure. But mostly then it was a modified or unique theme that had some problems. It's true that often the problem goes away if they switch back to a default theme, so that is a useful troubleshooting step. Maybe we can add that as advice.
    I hope that if someone is using a custom theme they will be helpful enough to say so!
    BUT I don't think that making everyone else choose a theme from a list will help much. maybe maybe for topic thread starters, but not for each comment. And the way that Drupal development goes, it's important that we don't branch on different support for different themes - all of the well-made ones should behave the same with their features. If they do not, then it's an error with the theme, or a problem unique to the developer.
    Special support for different themes must be kept inside the theme issue queue. I hope that people can tell the difference between a theme problem and a functionality problem. That's quite important.

    I do understand why it would be nice to have a user-level selector for both the commenter and the target audience. Sometimes I run out of patience and don't want to talk to people that don't understand the internet at all!
    But I can't see that working well. Already we have lots of people flagging their own silly problems as "high priority" and many people overestimate their understanding sometimes ... even if they do start with a 'noobie warning'.
    But I've seen many people who understand PHP or Internet development but are new to Drupal. I don't call them beginners, but it's true that there is some stuff to learn about Drupal. On the other hand, many of the problem threads I've seen are by people who think they know too much. And that's boring to read. Oh, too many assumptions.
    AND ... inside Drupal we have our specialities. Me, I think I'm really good at information architecture, Client-server tweaking, legacy migration, and 3rd party integration. I may be wrong. But I know that I don't know much about the internals of "views" or even CCK. I've done a lot with images, but not a lot with access control in Drupal. I still have noobie questions about theming views. I would have to use different labels in different threads.

    I think that those suggestions are OK, but better in normal comment text than from select lists. Any time someone asked my my 'level' with Drupal ... or any technology, I'd have to explain a bit more.
    And :-( in the Support forum, often we can tell better how competent someone is by their ability to ask a good question. It shows.
    There are such things as stupid questions...

    I'd like ways to 'filter' the comments also, or make them more directed, but that's not going to help if the folk still will not read the FAQ first!

    .dan.

    Wolfflow’s picture

    Wolfflow CreditAttribution: Wolfflow commented

    Yes, i begin aswering your last point: fully agree that the FAQs are the most important thing newby should read first.
    I can quietly state that all my modest experience (that started 2001) and self training in IT were beginning from the FAQs.

    And yes, it would cause to much confusion with Theme filtering, as you say a lot of people would not pay to much attention on that and it would only be an overload of processor work that will not bring the advantages that ones might need in filtering.

    I thank you again for your comment and add that I'm doing my home-work with Drupal Site Testing on a LAN and from step by step I go deep in the formal module structure and figure out how many genius code is under the hood of Drupal, I get more an more faszinating.

    It's really a proud for me to get more closer to the community and it will not take that long that I might contribute with a Theme or a small module. I have a little more learning and testing to do but I will keep in mind that without your patiente and devotion in this field Drupal and Drupal.org would not have reached the level it's now.

    wolf

    Wolfflow’s picture

    Wolfflow CreditAttribution: Wolfflow commented
    Component: User Guide » Correction/Clarification

    I very seldom praised myself during my 48 years, but after 3 to 4 month of starting a Battle (June 9, 2008 ) for helping out NENs to get a better reference page where to find Common english expression & acronyms used on Drupal.org that we of Drupal Site Maintainers and Documentation Team can not aspect every Visitor can understand, finally the Day (August 20, 2008) has come that I could start over with an approximate agreement of some Leaders of the Documentation Team this project.

    I'm working hard to settle as many Terms as possible and to provide good reference to easy and provide a "fast find doc resources" as to help anyone who wants to learn Drupal can have a better support, despite the mother language he or she have.

    Today I get my first confirmation that my strategy is valuable from an user that just registered on Drupal 3 Days ago:
    jwuk and that send me also an e-mail with thanks and acknowledgements.

    --- "Message:

    Many thanks, Wolf, that was quite an eye opener. I kind of imagined the
    docs being written by a bunch of high priests, nobody admitted until they
    have 10 years of Drupal behind them! It's wonderful to realise one can
    join the community and help out. Keep it up, I hope I'll be able to join
    in eventually, perhaps rather earlier than I'd supposed.

    Cheers, John

    -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    I warmly Thank John
    for supporting my strategy on Drupal.org Documentation

    Wolfflow’s picture

    Wolfflow CreditAttribution: Wolfflow commented
    Status: Closed (fixed) » Needs review

    @to all Member of Documentation Team

    Hi All, I post here because I do not want to get the impression of complaining, or be a graduate that seek to
    teach to the group something. My intent is always to help out with my modest student experience. I think that Drupal has a continuos growing community and Drupal it self is going to fill a very important development stage in the story of CMS and I believe this strongly.

    During this time I had the possibility to see and notice with my little support with taking care of a section for "Terminology" on the Drupal Handbook and reading throughout many posting that are being made in this stage of the redesign of Drupal.org Site and always I found terms that are not very common for "No native English" readers.

    Below I have insert an excerpt from a very interesting article from a university that points out the importance for
    building Terminology reference for easy the study of a branch of technology. Especially for Information Technology this look to be very important.

    So I publish here this article and hope this will be useful for our support here on Drupal.org

    Source: The importance of Terminology


    WHAT IS TERMINOLOGY?
    • A common problem of terminology work is that the importance and indeed the very nature of terminology is poorly understood. Thus many people simply have no idea at all of what it is, while others, searching for an explanation of some sort, end up associating it with "thermal science" and hence radiators. Related professions in the communications field, such as translation and technical writing, will often be aware of the word without having precise knowledge of what it entails (cf. Chapter 3.1: "Actors and Working Conditions " for a more detailed discussion of this point).

    In fact, terminology is a many-faceted subject being, depending on the perspective from which it is approached and the affiliations of the person discussing it:

    • a resource,
    • a set of methodologies and procedures to be used in creating this resource,
    • a factor in communication,
    • a community of actors, and
    • an academic discipline.

    To avoid confusion during its work, in particular when talking to non-specialists, the POINTER Project adopted a pragmatic definition of the word. In the context of this document and the POINTER Terms of Reference, therefore, "terminology" (or, in the plural, "terminological resources") has been defined as:

    • a structured set of concepts and their designations (graphical symbols, terms, phraseological units, etc.) in a specific subject field.

    Three major points need to be made here:

    1. Firstly, proper terminology is concerned with the relationship between concepts, and between them and their designations, rather than with designations alone or with the objects they represent. This point is essential if quality is to be achieved, especially with synonyms and in multilingual environments.
    2. Secondly, a designation does not necessarily have to be a word or phrase, although it often is. Thus terminological resources may comprise symbols, drawings, formulae, codes, etc. as well as, or even instead of, words. This point is especially important given the move to multimedia systems.
    3. Thirdly, terminology is inextricably linked with specialist knowledge and hence with special languages or languages for special purposes (LSPs).

    In addition, the word "structured" needs some explanation: it should be noted that, in practice, terminological collections may well contain not only well structured standardised terms and concepts, but also innovative, vague and unstructured conceptual and linguistic information.

    This basic definition of terminology is supplemented in this Final Report by two other terms:

    • terminology work - i.e. the work performed in the creation or documentation of terminological resources »

    and

    • terminological activities - a broader term which includes not only terminology work but also such areas as training, tool development, and organisational and administrative measures. »


    TERMINOLOGY AND LEXICOLOGY


    TERMINOGRAPHY AND LEXICOGRAPHY

    • One particular area of confusion highlighted by the POINTER Project is that of the differences between terminology and lexicology, and terminography and lexicography. Not only many non-specialists, but even many individuals working in such fields as language engineering and translation frequently confuse these concepts, and it is hoped that the explanations given below will contribute to a clearer understanding of the distinctions between these fields of activity.

    • While lexicology is the study of words in general, terminology is the study of special-language words or terms associated with particular areas of specialist knowledge. Neither lexicology nor terminology is directly concerned with any particular application. Lexicography, however, is the process of making dictionaries, most commonly of general-language words, but occasionally of special-language words (i.e. terms). Most general-purpose dictionaries also contain a number of specialist terms, often embedded within entries together with general-language words. Terminography (or often misleadingly "terminology"), on the other hand, is concerned exclusively with compiling collections of the vocabulary of special languages. The outputs of this work may be known by a number of different names - often used inconsistently - including "terminology", "specialised vocabulary", "glossary", and so on.

    • The work and objectives of lexicographers and terminographers are in many ways complementary, but there are a number of important differences which need to be noted.


    Method, organization and presentation

    • Dictionaries are word-based: lexicographical work starts by identifying the different senses of a particular word form. The overall presentation to the user is generally alphabetical, reflecting the word-based working method. Synonyms - different form same meaning - are therefore usually scattered throughout the dictionary, whereas polysemes (related but different senses) and homonyms (same form, different meaning) are grouped together.

    • While a few notable attempts have been made to produce conceptually-based general-language dictionaries - or "thesauri", the results of such attempts are bound to vary considerably according to the cultural and chronological context of the author.

    • By contrast, high-quality terminologies are always in some sense concept-based, reflecting the fact that the terms which they contain map out an area of specialist knowledge in which encyclopaedic information plays a central role. Such areas of knowledge tend to be highly constrained (e.g. "viticulture"; "viniculture"; "gastronomy"; and so on, rather than "food and drink"), and therefore more amenable to a conceptual organisation than is the case with the totality of knowledge covered by general language. The relations between the concepts which the terms represent are the main organizing principle of terminographical work, and are usually reflected in the chosen manner of presentation to the user of the terminology. Conceptually-based work is usually presented in the paper medium in a thesaurus-type structure, often mapped out by a system of classification (e.g. UDC) accompanied by an alphabetical index to allow access through the word form as well as the concept. In terminologies, synonyms therefore appear together as representations of the same meaning (i.e. concept), whereas polysomes and homonyms are presented separately in different entries.

    • In the electronic medium, similar considerations apply in principle to the organisation of entries with reference to synonyms and polysemes/homonyms. However, the retrieval of data still operates at present largely through the term (or a component ! of the term) rather than through the concept. Conceptually-based solutions for the representation and retrieval of data are being sought in the techniques of artificial intelligence.

    • Work organised conceptually may also be presented alphabetically, whereas the converse, i.e. the presentation of work originally organised according to the form of the word in a thesaurus-type structure, is highly problematic.


    Lexical meaning

    • In dictionaries, related but different senses (or "polysemes") of the same word form are usually presented within one entry, e.g. bridge (of a violin, crossing a river, over a gap in teeth); unrelated different senses ("homonyms") of the same word form are normally presented as separate head words or entries, e.g. pupil (of the eye) and pupil (in a school). Synonym relations are not always made explicit in dictionaries, and the division of word forms into different senses tends to vary considerably between dictionaries. This lack of clear division into senses reflects the "slippery" nature of general-language words, compared to the more precise nature of terminological meaning.

    • In terminologies, homonyms and polysemes within the same subject field are treated as separate entries in a terminology (because the definition of the concept is different), e.g. in Automotive Engineering emission (the process of emitting exhaust gases) and emission (the exhaust gases themselves). Homonyms and polysemes of other subject fields are excluded. Synonyms, on the other hand, are always included as a part of the same entry in a terminology (being alternative representations of the same concept), e.g. automotive catalyst, catalytic converter.


    Grammar

    • The "headwords" or rather "entry terms" in terminologies are all open-class words, i.e. nouns (the vast majority), some adjectives, verbs and adverbs. The headwords in general-language dictionaries cover all word classes, including so-called grammatical words such as modal auxiliaries (e.g. can, must), prepositions (e.g. on, with), articles (e.g. the, an), certain adverbs (e.g. very), and so on. In terminologies, such words may appear as a component of the term or be shown as a part of the term's phraseology (i.e. the usual pattern of its immediate linguistic environment), but never as independent entry terms.


    Usage versus regulation

    • Dictionaries of the general language are descriptive in their orientation, arising from the lexicographer's observation of usage. Terminologies may also be descriptive in certain cases (depending on subject field and/or application), but prescription (also: "normalisation" or "standardisation") plays an essential role, particularly in scientific, technical and medical work where safety is a primary consideration. Standardisation is normally understood as the elimination of synonymy and the reduction of polysemy/homonymy, or the coinage of neologisms to reflect the meaning of the term and its relations to other terms. Terminologies - the outcome of this work, often in electronic form as termbases - are then the principal means of dissemination. In other words, in certain circumstances, terminologists may attempt to regulate language (in this case, the vocabularies of special languages), whereas lexicographers describe the words of general language.


    Levels of communication

    • Lexicographers have at their disposal a number of "style labels" which aim to distinguish between, for instance, informal, slang, or vulgar expressions, archaisms, and so on. Terminologists also need to distinguish between different communicative situations, although in a rather different way. While traditional terminology work is concerned mainly with the terms which characterise communication between subject experts, a broader view also incorporates less abstract levels of communication, e.g. between technicians, or between expert and layperson (such as doctor-patient; lawyer-client). In high-quality terminography, such variants must also be labelled or assigned to a particular source in order to identify the appropriate communicative context for their use.


    Summary

    The following table summarises the above comparison: 
     
                         Lexicography         Terminography     
 
Variety of                                                      
language:                    YES                   NO           
general language           (YES as                 YES          
special language       special-purpose                          
                         lexicography                           
 
Subject matter:                                                 
broad areas of               YES                   NO           
knowledge                   (RARE)                 YES          
delimited domain              NO                   YES          
use of                                                          
classification                                                  
system                                                          
 
Method of working:                                              
word-based                   YES                   NO           
concept-based           (RARE EXAMPLES             YES          
                            ONLY)                               
 
Presentation to                                                 
user:                        YES          (YES if reorganised)  
alphabetical                (RARE)                 YES          
thesaurus-type                                                  
structure                                                       
 
Headword/entry                                                  
term:                        YES                   NO           
closed class                 YES                   YES          
open class                                                      
 
Presentation of                                                 
entries:              PRESENTED TOGETHER  PRESENTED SEPARATELY  
polysemes/homonyms        PRESENTED        PRESENTED TOGETHER   
synonyms in same          SEPARATELY                            
entry                                                           
 
Orientation:                               (largely depending   
Prescriptive                  NO               on domain)       
Descriptive                  YES                   YES          
                                                   YES

    Table 1 : Comparison between Lexicography and Terminography


    WHY TERMINOLOGY ?

    • A large majority of documents today are designed for specialist communication (including business and commercial texts). They are thus written in specialist language, 30-80% of which (depending on the particular domain and type of text in question) is composed of terminology. In other words, terminology (which as we have seen may also include non-linguistic items such as formulae, codes, symbols and graphics) is the main vehicle by which facts, opinions and other "higher" units of knowledge are represented and conveyed. Sound terminology work reduces ambiguity and increases clarity - in other words, the quality of specialist communication depends to a large extent on the quality of the terminology employed, and terminology can thus be a safety factor, a quality factor and a productivity factor in its own right.

    • The communication of specialist knowledge and information, whether monolingual or multilingual, is thus irretrievably bound up with the creation and dissemination of terminological resources and with terminology management in the widest sense of the word. This process is not restricted to science and engineering, but is also vital to law, public administration, and health care, to quote just three examples. In addition, terminology plays a key role in the production and dissemination of documents, and in workflow. Terminology as an academic discipline offers concepts and methodologies for high-quality, effective knowledge representation and transfer. These methodologies can be used both by language specialists and by domain specialists after appropriate training. In addition, they form the basis for an increasing number of tools for the identification, extraction, ordering, transfer, storage and maintenance of terminological resources and other types of knowledge.

    • Terminological resources are also valuable in many other ways: as collections of names or other representations, as the object of standardization and harmonisation activities, and as the input (or output) of a wide range of applications and disciplines, whether human or machine-based (see the Figure below). The range of applications to which terminology is of direct relevance was a primary motivating factor at the inception of the POINTER Project with its brief to analyse the situation of terminology in Europe, and to make concrete suggestions for a future infrastructure and activities.

    Only local images are allowed.Figure 1 : Terminology Applications and Products


    TERMINOLOGY AND THE MULTILINGUAL INFORMATION SOCIETY

    • This wide range of applications and products is all the more important given the current technological and political developments in Europe. The last few decades have been characterised by the exponential spread and implementation of the concept of "globalisation". Although international activities and multinational trade existed well before this date, a new quality has recently emerged. Not only are raw materials sourced, and products sold, on a supranational scale, they are now increasingly developed, manufactured, marketed and sold for a global audience. Global competition and global co-operation - both of which presuppose global communication - are now common concepts. In the cultural arena, too, we can trace the development of what is often called the "global village", with greatly increased social and cultural contact, both active and passive.

    • At the same time, rapid technological development in general, and the rise of whole new fields and industries in particular, has led to shorter and shorter innovation cycles and to an exponential growth in knowledge and the need for its rapid and effective communication. Thus the total amount of specialist knowledge is currently thought to be doubling every five to fifteen years, depending on the area concerned.

    • This explosion in communication has been facilitated and driven by the computing and telecommunications revolutions, which have provided cheap processing power and new technologies for document processing. Vast databases can now be processed efficiently, and their contents transported effortlessly across national and geographical boundaries. Information is now commonly regarded as a fourth production factor alongside property, labour and capital. The number of intangible products is increasing rapidly, in contrast to the number of tangible ones. The practical effects of this can be seen, among other things, in the vast increase in the creation, capture, processing, storage, archiving, retrieval and subsequent evaluation of documents. For example, the Danzin Report [Danz 92] estimated that the European economies (calculated before the latest enlargement of the European Union in January 1995) would spend 650 million ECU on this in 1994. Equally, the number of major different subject fields (or "domains") for which terminology exists is estimated at several hundred or many thousand, depending on the degree of detail of the classification system used. In turn, each of these domains contains between several hundred and over ten million (e.g. chemistry) terms, again depending on the granularity of the system. The number of terms in each of the highly developed languages is commonly estimated at 50 million, excluding product names, which account for roughly another 100 million terms.

    • A point to be remembered here is that specialist (and indeed general) communication is normally an iterative and multilinear process, since knowledge is generally created in an evolutionary process and in several different places at once. Thus potential sources of uncertainty and misunderstanding arise in the form of homonyms (i.e. words that are used to denote more than one concept) and synonyms (i.e. more than one word for the same concept). This problem is becoming particularly acute with the strong tendency to interdisciplinarity in important modern scientific disciplines such as biotechnology, environmental science and materials science (it is a paradox that in this age of increasing specialisation science is becoming more and more interdisciplinary). At the same time, the risks involved in failing to communicate unambiguously and in a timely manner have often increased dramatically (two classic examples of this are the aerospace and environmental industries).

    • For all these reasons, contents-based information management is a prerequisite for improving the efficiency of communication. In addition, it should be borne in mind that communication is not solely monolingual, especially not within Europe. In fact, there is a clear trend at the moment towards an increased awareness of multilingual issues, despite the predominance or at least lead function of English in the technical, business, economic, political and - to a lesser extent - cultural fields.

    • One factor influencing this trend is the concern of a number of national and regional governments to ensure the long-term viability of their official languages in the face of competition from English and to ensure equal access for all citizens and social and economic groupings to new ideas and other information. Other significant factors are product liability and similar consumer protection legislation, as well as a more general wish among enterprises in particular to increase efficiency by improving internal and external communication and information flows. In addition, consumer goods manufacturers in particular are discovering the competitive advantage which products can achieve (especially in saturated or highly competitive markets) when localised into the languages spoken by their target groups.

    • The importance of these developments for a multilingual political federation such as Europe with its eleven official working languages and countless lesser-used ones cannot be overemphasised. In fact, the European Commission sees itself as living in what it calls the Multilingual Information Society. Europe's dual position as a world player (and the original home of three world languages) and a multilingual collection of states means that effective multilingual communication on a vast scale is a prerequisite for both internal and external success. To quote only one statistic: the European Commission alone already has more than one million pages of text translated per year. Add to this the appropriate national figures for both the private and public sectors, and it soon becomes apparent that multilingual communication is already big business. However, it is equally clear that new, automatic methods and tools for multilingual information management (i.e. ones that go beyond current language-neutral ideas such as workflow, imaging and electronic document management) are urgently required if communication across linguistic, sector, regional and domain boundaries is to be optimised.

    • Since a great deal of this - specialist - communication relies on the vocabulary of a vast number of subject fields to convey its content, readily-accessible, up-to-date terminology will play an increasingly important role in (multilingual) information management in the 21st century.

    Only local images are allowed.

    Figure 2 : Terminology : A Key Discipline for the Information Society

    Wolfflow’s picture

    Wolfflow CreditAttribution: Wolfflow commented

    FYI:

    Trying a bit to centralize my documentation on the tasks I'm working to support a better "reference drupal.org index" on Drupal.org I just will remind here every Visitors, Drupal.org Members and all the "Folk" that want to help in this
    you may see Last summary of Wolfflow work

    I thank every one that have support my efforts and be happy to be now supplied and entitled as a site maintainer to
    develop further this "Drupal References Project"

    Kind Regards

    .Wolfflow

    Wolfflow’s picture

    Wolfflow CreditAttribution: Wolfflow commented
    Status: Needs review » Closed (fixed)
    Wolfflow’s picture

    Wolfflow CreditAttribution: Wolfflow commented
    Status: Closed (fixed) » Active

    I' sorry but this issue is still a valid and actual example of mismanagements and misunderstandings on behalf of a registered member that just tried in a very respectfully manner to:

    1. Ensure that Community continues to remain strategically opportunistic by continually evaluating & revising Community’s on line needs
    and outreach strategies, including both tools presently being used to emerging technologies.

    2.
    * A. Dive in and create profiles and making posts
    * B. Increase awareness of the use of Drupal tools across the Community.
    * C. Foster a sense of community that encourages visitors to use Drupal as well as feel comfortable in requesting support.

    After months of direct collaboration and contribution I saw my only choise to resign and start a Site with the intent to involve as much Community registered Members to start to confront and deal in finding a suitable compromise for this problematics.

    I invite you all to see that even in posting a simple "showcase" from my self leads to community mismanagement and misunderstandings.

    Association Developing Advanced Code_of_Conduct for Community Site

    add1sun’s picture

    add1sun CreditAttribution: add1sun commented
    Status: Active » Closed (fixed)

    Closing again since I can't really discern an actionable item here.