Glosario: African contributions

During the last 12 months, the African Carpentries Community and other global members have mobilised efforts to translate English data science terms into the online, multilingual glossary of terms called Glosario. Translations were done into, among many others, Afrikaans, Amharic, Bahasa Indonesia, Setswana, isiXhosa, isiZulu and Kiswahili. These efforts build on the successes of Hacktoberfest 2020.

The glossary has grown into 17 languages in the past two years, most languages spoken in Africa. What follows highlights the African Carpentries Communities’ efforts during 2021.

Contributions during Instructor training check-out

A cohort of instructors in Ethiopia shared their experiences of translating English terms into Amharic. As part of the checkout process, community members embarked on a two-week process of translating more than 300 data science terms. The main aim was to ensure that the translations retained the context of the term since direct translation might sometimes result in different meanings. What worked well was the use of dictionaries as well as translation software to assist with the process. One challenge was the time it took to do the translations, mainly to ensure the contextual relevance of the terms were correct. The guide on making Glosario contributions, also translated into Amharic, was helpful during the process.

Hackathon - African Carpentries Monthly meetup

During the October African Carpentries Meetup 2021, community members embarked on a Hackathon to translate as many English terms into other languages. The event started with a live demonstration of how to contribute to Glosario, hosted in GitHub. Afterwards, live translations were pasted into the etherpad to be uploaded onto the repository. In the days that followed, more translations were submitted through email and the etherpad. Many Hackathon contributions doubled as part of the instructor training check-out process.

We would like to thank all who contributed to the translation efforts; this increased the value of this resource to the whole community! To help expand Glosario even further, please define new terms and translate English words into other languages using the contribution guide. Contributions are welcome in any language, not only those represented in the document.