@lidialab and I have been working together on the Polyglots Handbook reorganization effort. The goal is to propose a new order of the Handbook that will, hopefully, improve the user experience and to update any pages that may be out-of-date or missing. 

To begin, we identified five different “user types” to identify the types of people who might use the Handbook. Those were:

• Individual/new translation contributors
• Editors (General Translation EditorsTranslation Editor Translation editors can approve translations for projects. The GTE (General Translation Editor) and LM (Locale Manager) roles can add new users with the "Project Translation Editor" role that can approve translations for specific projects. There are two different Translation Editor roles: General Translation Editor and Project Translation Editor and Project Translation Editors)
• LocaleLocale 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/ managers
• Polyglots Global Mentors
• Developers (theme and 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 authors)

We decided to approach the changes by identifying which pages in the Handbook were related to which user type. If you’re curious, you can see how we did that in our Google Doc here.

Proposed reorganization

At this point, we’ve come up with an outline for the proposed new order of the Handbook pages. There are a few new pages that we will need to write, and all the existing pages would benefit from having someone review them for any updates or improvements. Here’s what we propose for the new outline:

• Introduction to the Translators Handbook 
• About the Polyglots Team
  • What We Do
  • How We Work 
  • Roles and Capabilities
  • History of the Team (reference)
  • Get Involved
    • Logos and Graphics
• Translating WordPress
  • General Expectations 
  • First Steps (Revise to include introductions, getting in touch with local team members)
    • Glossaries and Style Guides per locale 
  • Projects to Translate
  • Translate.wordpress.org
    • Types of Messages 
    • Poedit 
    • Other Translation Tools + Tools
  • After Your Contribution (+ add “PTE Request by Translator“) 
  • Current Translation Teams 
    • Local Slack Teams 
• For editors * 
  • Translation Collaboration and Team Building Tips
    • Organize a local event on Global WordPress Translation Day
    • Getting Started at a Contributor Day 
  • Building a Glossary & Style Guide (Revise to encourage new 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/ to use Pascal’s glossary as a template)
  • Skeleton for the locale-based PTE Onboarding process
  • Working with WordPress Core  
  • Releasing WordPress Packages
    • Automated Release Packages
    • Working With the Translation Repository
• For locale managers * 
  • General Expectations
  • Rosetta Sites & Forums  
• Setting Up Your Local Site  
  • Adding New Users  
  • Translating the Interface
  • Theme and Plugin Directories  
  • Modifying the Showcase  
  • Rosetta for the Community  
  • Team o2
• Polyglots global team leads and mentors 
  • Locale, Sites, and Forums Deployment  
  • Background material for locale research
  • Adding a New Locale – Template  
  • Adding locale support forums (with HelpHub)  
  • Adding locale team site  
• Plugin/Theme Authors Guide  
  • Gettext + general “Guide to InternationalizationInternationalization Internationalization (sometimes shortened to I18N , meaning “I - eighteen letters -N”) is the process of planning and implementing products and services so that they can easily be adapted to specific local languages and cultures, a process called localization. This is the process of making software translatable. Information about Internationalization for developers can be found in the Developer’s handbooks.” referencing related methods from documentation
  • Project Translation Editor (PTE) Request (Note: Remove PTE Request by Translator to include in the “After Your Contribution” document instead.)
  • How to contribute to Polyglots * 
• FAQ
• Glossary
• Credits

Call for feedback and volunteers

For next steps, we’d like to:

• Ask for any feedback on the proposed reorganization of the Handbook. Have we missed any user groups? Would one page fit in a better section? Would a section benefit from a new page?
• Simultaneously, we would like to open a call for volunteers to help with reviewing and writing documentation. (We will post more information below.)
• Once all the documents have been reviewed and updated, we will add and publish any changes live on the site.* 

Our target deadline is June 30th, 2020, which will give us an entire month for feedback and volunteers. At the end of the deadline, we will post an update and revisit next steps.

How to Help

If you’re interested in helping, we’ve created this spreadsheet for volunteers to sign up. Please type your WordPress.orgWordPress.org The community site where WordPress code is created and shared by the users. This is where you can download the source code for WordPress core, plugins and themes as well as the central location for community conversations and organization. https://wordpress.org/ username next to the page you would like to work on. 

• To edit existing pages, please copy the content into a Google doc. Add your Google doc to the Polyglots Handbook folder (pingPing The act of sending a very small amount of data to an end point. Ping is used in computer science to illicit a response from a target server to test it’s connection. Ping is also a term used by Slack users to @ someone or send them a direct message (DM). Users might say something along the lines of “Ping me when the meeting starts.” @lidialab or @evarlese if you need access). Then, use the Suggesting mode to make edits/changes so it is easier to track changes. 
• For new pages, please write them in a new Google doc and save to the Polyglots Handbook folder.

WCEU Contributor DayContributor Day Contributor Days are standalone days, frequently held before or after WordCamps but they can also happen at any time. They are events where people get together to work on various areas of https://make.wordpress.org/ There are many teams that people can participate in, each with a different focus. https://2017.us.wordcamp.org/contributor-day/ https://make.wordpress.org/support/handbook/getting-started/getting-started-at-a-contributor-day/. is June 4th (don’t forget to register if you haven’t already!) and we would love for anyone to work on this during that time. If you are new to Polyglots, support Polyglots but don’t speak another language, or if you would like to contribute to Polyglots in a new way, we would appreciate your help. Both during contributor day, and before or after Contributor Day!

* As a note: while we will change the order of the Handbook, we also want to maintain the permalinks for each page as much as possible. (Props Lidia for thinking of this!) Before publishing new pages, we will need to set up redirects so that links to the old URLs continue to work seamlessly.

#handbook-reorg