IMO, it's a bad idea. The forums here at Invelos are for the "community" as a whole to discuss issues relating to the program. Segregating the forums into languages would only fragment the userbase. IMO, if a user is uncomfortable with using a language other than his/her native tongue, he/she can always post in their native language. It's been my experience here that everyone is more than willing to assist non English speaking users with problems/questions related to DVD Profiler when posting in a language other than English. Heck, I've been known to assist some Spanish speaking users from time to time. Just my 2 cents (which, after taxes comes to 0.012080 )

Quoting 8ballMax:

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IMO, it's a bad idea. The forums here at Invelos are for the "community" as a whole to discuss issues relating to the program. Segregating the forums into languages would only fragment the userbase.

Yes and no. - IMHO the userbase tends to fragment more, if there are external sites where the users not familiar with the English language find together.

The problem I see with this is that the wise guys get their knowledge over here at invelos and have no reason to visit the "low level knowledge forums" held in foreign languages. This keeps the foreigners away from the knowledge

The bottom line for me is, that we do not only separate languages but also DVDP knowledge with the currently external sites...

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IMO, if a user is uncomfortable with using a language other than his/her native tongue, he/she can always post in their native language. It's been my experience here that everyone is more than willing to assist non English speaking users with problems/questions related to DVD Profiler when posting in a language other than English. Heck, I've been known to assist some Spanish speaking users from time to time.

From my point of view, it works very seldom and the visitors are quite discouraged to write here at Invelos. The first thing they get, is a link to the corresponding external site... which is good and bad: Good, because they get helped over there, and bad, because the leave this site where all the knowledge resides...

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Just my 2 cents (which, after taxes comes to 0.012080 )

... makes a total 4.012080 cents on my account - I'll get rich over here

Regards, AA

Quoting RossRoy:

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Quoting 8ballMax:

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IMO, if a user is uncomfortable with using a language other than his/her native tongue, he/she can always post in their native language.

In theory yes.

But in practice, if I go to a forum and see all posts in english with no french section, I'll automatically post in english and never even think to post in french.

Not to mention that it will quickly get annoying for people to see posts and threads in languages they don't understand. This doesn't mean that I'm in favour of adding sub-forums for different languages. I'm not. If people wish to have discussions in languages other than English there are plenty of other forums on the internet for that.

The only exception would be a multi-language technical support forum. That would actually be useful and serve a purpose. Other than that I feel these forums are fine as is.

It should be noted that English is not my native language.

KM

Quoting Astrakan:

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It should be noted that English is not my native language.

Mine neither.

But we both have the advantage, that in our countries the english language has some importance - we learn at least the basics over here and I assume in Canada it is much more than only basics...

But there are countries which don't put any emphasis on the english language at all. They are hadicapped throughout the web in common and over here especially...

Regards, AA

Quoting AiAustria:

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and I assume in Canada it is much more than only basics...

Well, the majority of Canadians does have English as their native language so for them it's no an issue. And for Francophones there's mandatory English studies from a relatively early age. Sometimes that's not enough though, and there's plenty of Francohphones who speak very poor English or next-to-none at all.

My basic concern with adding non-English subforums is that it may splinter this forum. Right now there's only the odd question or thread being conducted in non-English, but with entire sub-forums I worry that will be much more extensive.

For non-software related threads that's fine, but then again those sorts of discussions can be held elsewhere. For software related threads it's not fine, as discussions like that should be accessible to as many users as possible, and the only way to accomplish that is to keep those kinds of discussions in English.

KM

Precisely right, Ken.

For AiA, the problem which you refer to

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There would be a way found in between anarchy and regulation, which leaves the liberté the french want and keeps the database working...

Stems from the simple fact that the Online database is not series of isolated databases, it is a conglomerate of the work of EVERYONE. So while I understand you comment,please understand that because of its design the failure of even of even ONE locality to follow the Rulkes and do things they way they wish to affects the data for EVERY other user in the world.

If Ken were to isolate the various localities into their own dataset that impacted only that locality then all Localities could adopt their own Rule set. This would weaken in most ways the strength of the database overall, but would give what you have suggested. I thin in the overall scheme of things the design as it is appropriate, therefore it falls to all of us to follow the rules for the benefit of ALL users including those that do not frequent the Forums or simply lurk.

Skip

Quoting surfeur51:

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Quoting kdh1949:

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To be fair, there was ONE French who says that French users have stopped contibuting because they don't understand the rules.  I don't recall any other French user expressing a similary complaint...

And how many french users regularly post here ???? 

You aren't the only French poster, just the only one to make the claim that French users have stopped contributing because they cannot understand the rules.  Other than because you have said so, I've seen no evidence to support that assertion.

Sorry, I don't trust any statements from one disgruntled user -- who has often stated that he disagrees with the rules for contribution -- and until I see that assertion confirmed by more people I will continue to view it as such:  an unproven claim by a self-admitted anarchist who doesn't think he should be required to follow the rules that all other users (French and non-French) have to obey.

I don't think French users are any less capable of understanding the rules than other non-English users.  So, given the fact that the Rules will not be tailored to suit the desires of French users any more than any other users -- I believe it is up to those French users who are also fluent in English to translate the rules into a form that non-English fluent French users can understand.  But if they refuse to help people understand the rules and perhaps counsel them on ways to circumvent those rules -- I say to heck with them.  French users aren't any better or worse than anybody else.  The rules are for everybody to follow.  If you don't choose to follow the rules it's your problem and has nothing to do with whether or not people (French or otherwise) can understand the rules.

Quoting kdh1949:

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Quoting surfeur51:

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Quoting kdh1949:

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...
To be fair, there was ONE French who says that French users have stopped contibuting because they don't understand the rules.  I don't recall any other French user expressing a similary complaint...

And how many french users regularly post here ???? 

You aren't the only French poster, just the only one to make the claim that French users have stopped contributing because they cannot understand the rules

And how many french users regularly post here ????