YWAMKnowledgeBase:Multiple Languages

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When we started the YWAM KB project we started it in our native tongue. Although I (Kev-The-Hasty 10:08, 20 June 2008 (CEST)) can read French as well as English my written French is appalling. Machine translation is very poor too and insulting to other language speakers.

Mind The Gap

Yet there is a very important and rising principle in our Mission called we need to "Mind The Gap" in YWAM in respect to different languages and access to technology. Not all YWAMers have 20Mb broadband internet connections. Or even a computer for that matter. If we really want to aid each other most fully we need to choose technology that has the broadest reach.

For that reason I chose the Mediawiki tool. Here are some of the reasons why.

  1. We wanted to build a community: Wikipedia has successfully built a community around their projects
  2. We wanted a wiki as it offered the easy and quick editing the project required
  3. Mediawiki is one of the most well established and known wiki's available. It is also tuned for producing Encyclopedia's and a Knowledge Base is closer to that than a Blog for example.
  4. Mediawiki is Free and Open Source. This means we can give the software to each other and help each other out. It is easy to modify and improve. It also runs best on a Free software stack (LAMP) thus meaning that the only real costs have been hardware and domain purchase! (And the hardware was donated!)
  5. It is a browser based technology supporting a wide range of browsers. This excludes no-one inmy opinion.
  6. Mediawiki allow and default to Anonymous editing. This means the barrier to entry is very low - you go to the site and can contribute IMMEDIATELY. Anonymity is not good for our sort of community and makes the site vulnerable to vandalism. We ask users to register in order to edit so conversation can flow. Our registration process is very simple and quick and as low a barrier as I can make it.
  7. Mediawiki is multilingual out of the box
  8. The Wikipedia project has demonstrated how to have parallel wiki's in different languages. Wikipedia have chosen a parallel approach rather than an all in one. This reflects the complexity of languages. It also recognises the importance for local ownership of articles. An English article on Evangelism may differ from a Korean article on Evangelism due to cultural differences. However, both may be improved by borrowing from each other.
  9. Parallel wiki's can scale easier than a combined wiki.

Multi-lingual Vision for the Knowledge base

I see a time when we will have 7 or more Knowledge bases in parallel in several languages. English, Korean, Dutch, French, Spanish, Russian... who knows which languages.

I see each KB held to each other one by a shared vision and values but free to use their KB in whatever way most helps their cultural situation.

I see a small team of administrators co-operating to keep one or two servers that hold all these different KB's. It will be an international team, that perhaps never meet in person. It wont be limited if one person leaves or decides to take a mission trip for 6 months, others can step in for them. Infact there will be no official head of the KB project; just people helping each other bound together by a common vision.

A Plan

The goal is to have parallel KB's but realistically it will take some steps to get there. I have no idea how needed some of the intermediate steps are but time will tell!

  1. People start writing foreign articles in the English KB. They do this by starting a new article with the country code and a slash before the title.
    • Thus an article on "Evangelism" written in Korean becomes "KR/복음전도".
    • In French "FR/Evangelisation"
  2. A category should be added to a foreign language page (French Language Article)
  3. On the front page a link to the Category will be made in a new section on Foreign languages
  4. When it appears a momentum is growing and a community is forming in that language a proposal can be made to create a parallel wiki.
  5. Once a proposal is agreed, the new parallel wiki will be created and the articles migrated. New wiki will be in a sub-domain.
  6. New articles in this language will be written on the new wiki
  7. Unless an article is very mature I would advise against translating articles. The purpose of a wiki is for change. It is better to have English articles inspire Korean articles and visa versa.
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