Using ellipsis character (…) instead of three dots (...)

• Dec 29, 2018 - 08:08

User iseya (Ja) and Óvári (Hu) commented in strings like “Save as…” we should change the source language from 3 separate dot characters to the ellipsis symbol (…) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ellipsis#Usage_in_menus to indicate a dialog box behind a menu entry.

To identify all strings using three dots, use the search string
text:...

To get a string count, tick the “select all” tickbox (it does not have a label) to the left of the search box. 98 strings use 3 dots ...

I can think of the following reasons not to change it...

a) If you change it in a brown-fields environment (one with existing translations), the replacement strings will become untranslated.
b) It is difficult to tell the difference between the two. It depends on the font, and the only way I can tell them apart is by selecting the character if I select all 3 dots in one go, it is the ellipsis). Transifex will not point out that you are using three dots when the source is using ellipsis and vice versa. Qt Linguist will https://musescore.org/en/handbook/administrative-guidelines/translation…
c) The ellipsis symbol is not a standard keyboard character, e.g. users will have to know how to find it in their character map or copy and paste the character from the source string.

On the other hand, in argument for the ellipsis…

a) the ellipsis is more correct. As a mature software project I would like for us to follow the established conventions and standards.
b) this is what translators expect to find in other projects.
c) For languages that had the old string translated, there will be a Suggestion (from the translation memory) that will match the previous string around 99%.

Personally, despite the disadvantages of changing it, I would want us to change all three dot occurrences to Ellipsis.

Any thoughts?

Comments

• Dec 30, 2018 - 02:07

Use Unicode characters over their ASCII counterparts when possible

Strings should use directional quotation marks when possible.

  • U+2018 and U+2019 (\u2018 and \u2019 in JavaScript) are the left and right single quotation marks, respectively. The right single quotation mark should be used as an apostrophe.
  • U+201C and U+201D (\u201c and \u201d in JavaScript) are the left and right double quotation marks, respectively. The pair should be used to surround statements and references to user input.
  • Example: You have chosen a keyword that is currently in use by “%S”. Please select another.
  • Example: Search %1$S for “%2$S”

Non-directional single, and double, quotation marks should be used in reference to HTML code, or other languages where ASCII character usage is required, such as HTML. HTML does not prefer one over the other, and our codebase uses them interchangably as of March 2016.

  • Example: This web page at has been reported as an attack page and has been blocked based on your security preferences.

U+2026 (\u2026) is the horizontal ellipsis character. This character should be used in place of three consecutive periods.

https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Localization/Localizat…

Also, the convention for English strings is “Save As…” not “Save as…”
https://transvision.mozfr.org/?recherche=save+as&repo=gecko_strings&sou…
Capitals occur in more than one place for English strings that are used as Menu Items, Buttons, etc. This is not the case for Hungarian strings.

MuseScore could leverage the localization (eg. translation) resources of the Mozilla applications at:
https://transvision.mozfr.org/

What do you think?

Thank you

Reply

• Jan 1, 2019 - 08:27

Hi mirabilos, thanks for the info.

Hi jojo, if "not that easy (to do)" is the only reason not to do it and what mirabilos suggests will make it easier or easy enough, is it OK if I go ahead and log the Issue for the string correction?

Do you need the file location for each occurrence? I can provide it in the issue, e.g.

bash-3.2$ IF=for_translation_musescore_musescore_af.ts
bash-3.2$ grep -B1 '.*...' $IF | tail
> Time Signatures...
>--
>
> Symbols...
>--
>
> Start Center...
>--
>
> Customize Toolbars...

## 17 files containing the 98 strings

bash-3.2$ grep -B1 '.*...' $IF | grep cpp | awk -F" " '{ print $2 }' | sort | uniq
filename="../../fluid/fluidgui.cpp"
filename="../../mscore/downloadUtils.cpp"
filename="../../mscore/editstyle.cpp"
filename="../../mscore/fotomode.cpp"
filename="../../mscore/loginmanager.cpp"
filename="../../mscore/musescore.cpp"
filename="../../mscore/palette.cpp"
filename="../../mscore/paletteBoxButton.cpp"
filename="../../mscore/pluginCreator.cpp"
filename="../../mscore/propertymenu.cpp"
filename="../../mscore/scoreBrowser.cpp"
filename="../../mscore/scoreview.cpp"
filename="../../mscore/shortcut.cpp"
filename="../../mscore/updatechecker.cpp"
filename="../../mscore/workspace.cpp"
filename="../../omr/omr.cpp"
filename="../../zerberus/zerberusgui.cpp"

Reply

• Jan 1, 2019 - 13:14

Riddleling the code with "\u2026" is not a good idea IMHO. Entering that ellipsis itself is not easy, it isn't available on any keyboard. Invalidating 98 strings, with the need to retransmit, and the effects that this would be incompatible with the current version of MuseScore adds to the problems.
In short: I'm not a fan of this.
Translators that prefer this can do so in their translations.

Reply

• Jan 1, 2019 - 10:23

Hi Óvári

Thank you. Please note - this thread is for the three dots to ellipsis issue. All the other issues, you raise, although we appreciate them, are not relevant, and this is what is commonly referred to as (email/forum) thread hijacking. It may cause the original topic to lose focus, and end up that your additionally subjects are not covered. Much more successful is to
a) raise a separate thread/message on the forum for each topic
b) justify why you thing 3 dots is wrong, ellipsis is correct (that's what I tried to do with my original post)
c) provide a reference

I recently started expanding the MuseScore style guide based on issues found in the strings.

w.r.t. the items you raised, I won't be able to address all.

1 Strings should use directional quotation marks when possible. NB: please start a new thread
RVN> Please provide justification for this statement, online references for your argument and arguments against the way it is currently done. (Personally I find the non-smart quotes a lot easier to keep track of than the directional ones.)

2 Also, the convention for English strings is “Save As…” not “Save as…”
RVN> This is already the case in the MuseScore strings, and is covered in our style guide under capitalization Please check yourself and start a new thread if you think this warrants a discussion

3 Capitals occur in more than one place for English strings that are used as Menu Items, Buttons, etc. This is not the case for Hungarian strings.
RVN> Our Style guide states explicitly that aspects around language are for English only. Translators need to follow the rules of their respective rules. If anything gave you the impression that you need the English language rules for Hungarian strings, please point it out to us.

4 MuseScore could leverage the localization (eg. translation) resources of the Mozilla applications at:
https://transvision.mozfr.org/
RVN> I have added both URLs page to our Translation Instructions page, #Resources

Thank you for participating and the input.

Reply

• Jan 2, 2019 - 12:40

See https://github.com/musescore/MuseScore/pull/4527, it is quite large.
It also includes some strings that are not translated (in 5 files), but even without those it is still quite a lot more files that you counted, 33-5=28 vs. 17? Ah, I see, you left out the ui files...

I'm still not a big fan... now mainly because of the strain we put on translators, just shortly after a release.

Reply

• Jan 2, 2019 - 14:31

> a) the ellipsis is more correct. As a mature software project I would like for us to follow the
> established conventions and standards.

What is your argument for saying that the single-character ellipsis is "more correct"?

> b) this is what translators expect to find in other projects.

I don't think translators of other projects have any expectations. There is little consistency in English source texts w.r.t. which type of ellipsis is used.

As a professional translator, when I translate from English, I use a punctuation style that is appropriate for the target text language, regardless of what style is used in the English source text, although my decision on what is most appropriate is sometimes influenced by the style used in the source text.

Reply

• Jan 7, 2019 - 16:09

I base my statement that other translators are expecting this, on the two translators who initially raised this issue in Transifex.

I could find the following justification / motivation for Ellipsis over three dots

https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Localization/Localizat…

U+2026 (\u2026) is the horizontal ellipsis character. This character should be used in place of three consecutive periods.

#

http://xahlee.info/comp/unicode_ellipsis_use.html

Why Use Ellipsis Instead of Dot Dot Dot?
...the char's sole purpose is to indicate omission (or other similar purposes). However, using 3 dots for the same purpose is in some sense a hack and creates certain complexity and ambiguity.

#

Some translations are already using ellipsis. A number of strings in our Afrikaans translation are using the ellipsis character. If you mix in a translation or do not have it consistent between source and destination, the Translation Toolkit flags it as a mistake (or false positive, depending on your perspective)

What I will do, is ask on the translation forum, since that is one cause for concern / objection (e.g. one would not want to inconvenience the translators with what some might see a trivial correction where the effort exceeds the benefit.

Reply

• Jan 7, 2019 - 16:41

“sole purpose is”… is not entirely correct: in menus, the ellipsis is also used to indicate “does not directly do anything; first, something else follows”.

Example for this, in most programs: “File” → “Save” immediately saves, whereas “File” → “Save as…” first has a dialogue box asking for the name of the file to save.

Otherwise, agreed.

“Some translations are already using ellipsis. A number of strings in our Afrikaans translation are using the ellipsis character.” ⇒ this is not a problem. Here, the topic is the source strings (i.e. the English strings found in the code). The target strings (including the translation into English ☺) should always use ellipsēs.

In favour of having them in the source: easy for translators to just copy/paste from there.

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