friendly reminders

[Bruskiewich, Richard (IRRI)]

One of Pankaj's points raises a issue here: translation of the POC/GO into
international languages...

In principle, I don't see why we shouldn't be considering
"internationalization" of the POC (and GO) to accommodate ESL researchers in
other countries. I'm already considering such generality in designing our
next generation International Crop Information System, that is, trying to
split off the term "string" (in unicode, of course) from the concept
(indexed by accession identifier) and the term definition (which could also
be internationalized).

I think that the CGIAR plant crop centers (and the ICIS project, and the
Generation CP) can probably help out in this regard given our broad
multi-national constituency, and extensive network of ESL national research
partners. If we collectively design the schemata to accommodate such
flexibility, then perhaps national partners from major non-English speaking
research constituencies will offer to do the translation into their own
languages(?). Big task, I know, but doable...

BTW, though English is one of the world's most widely spoken languages, I
wouldn't automatically assume that American English is the dominant form...
Considering the size of some major ESL countries in the British Empire, like
India ;-)))

Richard 



-----Original Message-----
From: Pankaj Jaiswal [mailto:pj37 at cornell.edu] 
Sent: Thursday, April 29, 2004 8:56 AM
To: POC-dev
Subject: friendly reminders

Here are a few friendly reminders.

-please do not use characters like ! # $ in the definitions.
-The main term should always have an American english spelling if required.
-the synonyms can have British spellings.
-Same goes with definitions. Try using the American English spellings.
-do not use short forms of words like "str." for "structure" in the
definition. Always use full form.
-Always prefix /suffix the desired term mane if its a combination of noun
and an adjective. e.g. "indehiscent fruits". Having only "indehiscent" as
term name is insufficient.

There are some more things, which I will post later on. I did some of the
changes but asombody has to go through them again.

Cheers

Pankaj

************************
Pankaj Jaiswal, PhD
G15-Bradfiled Hall
Dept. of Plant Breeding
Cornell University
Ithaca, NY-14853, USA

Tel: +1-607-255-3103
      +1-607-255-4109
Fax: +1-607-255-6683
http://www.gramene.org
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