Due to the fact that we have two variants in Portuguese (Portugal, pt_PT), a new orthographic reform variant (AO90), which is not on translate.wordpress.orgtranslate.wordpress.org The platform for contributing to the translation of WordPress core, themes and plugins. yet, and the default pre-reform variant, and that we have offline tools to convert pre-AO90 to AO90, we initially thought of a way to still have only one publicly editable branch, the default variant, and the new one, that should only be edited by GTEGeneral Translation Editor A General Translation Editor (often referred to as GTE) is a person, who has global access to validate strings on all projects for a specific locale./PTEProject Translation Editor A Project Translation Editor (often referred to as PTE) is a person, who has access to validate strings on a specific project (for example BuddyPress, WooCommerce or Twenty Fourteen) for one specific locale. A project translation editor can approve strings that are added by translation contributors. Per project translation, editors are appointed by a general translation editor after a request by the project author or by the contributors themselves., that would import the converted versions.

This would make possible to maintain only one branch, and manually update the AO90 variant.

AO90 is only mandatory for official institutions, and is not ratified by all other Portuguese speaking countries. Set aside the controversy (https://jpn.up.pt/2016/05/05/novo-acordo-ortografico-manifestamente-inconstitucional/ or http://ionline.sapo.pt/510067), the Portuguese WordPress Community publicly voted (http://wp-portugal.com/2013/05/29/wordpress-em-portugues-sem-acordo-ortografico/) to maintain the pre-AO90 as the default language pack for WordPress pt_PT, so that no one is forced to use the AO90 version without opting-in. But as soon as variants became a part of coreCore Core is the set of software required to run WordPress. The Core Development Team builds WordPress., we’ve been struggling with the need to have a way to serve both variants, without duplicating the translation flows. We’ve suggested other ways to include variants in the GlotPressGlotPress GlotPress is the translation management software that powers Translate.WordPress.org. More information is available at glotpress.org. workflow (https://glotpress.trac.wordpress.org/ticket/432#comment:3), that would be useful for other localesLocale Locale = language version, often a combination of a language code and a region code, for instance es_MX denotes Spanish as it’s used in Mexico. A list of all locales supported by WordPress in https://make.wordpress.org/polyglots/teams/ also.

Having a read-only variant would make possible to use the available offline tools to do the automatic conversion. We’d maintain the default variant and import the converted language files to this second variant, that would be read-only or edited only by GTE/PTE.

In short…

As we talked with @ocean90 during WordCampWordCamp WordCamps are casual, locally-organized conferences covering everything related to WordPress. They're one of the places where the WordPress community comes together to teach one another what they’ve learned throughout the year and share the joy. Learn more. Europe, a “read-only” or GTE-only variant is not yet possible.

We shall, therefore, be doing this in phases.

First, we’re requesting a new variant for pt_PT, that could be pt_PT_ao90 or pt_PT_AO90 (I don’t actually know the rule for the suffix case), AO90 being the usually accepted acronym for Acordo Ortográfico da Língua Portuguesa de 1990.

We’ll also be suggesting portuguese language users who want to use the new AO90 variant to use a preferred languages pluginPlugin A plugin is a piece of software containing a group of functions that can be added to a WordPress website. They can extend functionality or add new features to your WordPress websites. WordPress plugins are written in the PHP programming language and integrate seamlessly with WordPress. These can be free in the WordPress.org Plugin Directory https://wordpress.org/plugins/ or can be cost-based plugin from a third-party, like the one from @swissspidy (https://github.com/swissspidy/preferred-languages), that will allow them to have a fallback in case the new variant still has no translations for a theme or plugin they use, with the default pt_PT version being the first fallback, for example.

On a second phase, If and when we can have a read-only variant, it’ll be easy to manage. In the meantime, let’s try not to get too many contributions in this new variant, alerting users to the automatic conversion process we’re going to do offline.

Thanks.

#locale-requests