During the past two days I’ve been at this year’s conference of TransAlpine Chapter (TAC) of the Society for Technical Communication (STC). It was hosted by HERMES SoftLab here in Ljubljana. Since I work quite a lot on translating KDE and other open source software and sometimes also help with documentation I sure thought it would be interesting to attend the conference. One other reason for me to be there is that, as of late, I’m more and more thinking about how it would be to have a career in technical communication (translating, writing documentation and all things related). At first it looked like I wouldn’t be able to be at the conference because the attendance fee (195€) was quite high for a student. Luckily Linux Users Group of Slovenia (Lugos) stepped in and sponsored me.

The conference itself was well above my expectations. I anticipated to meet more or less older and more reserved people, but it turned out they are relaxed, fun, overall cool and in average younger than expected. The talks were also very interesting and they covered a broad range of subjects. Just goes to show how wide the spectre of technical communicators’ knowledge can be. To me the three most interesting presentations were:

Pictures and profits: how visual information design and simple usability studies can save your company millions by Patrick Hofmann

Very interesting how creative you often must be to convey some mesage or concept in a graphical way. A lot also depends on culture an end user comes from. In the end all makes users of documentation happier, because it is easier to understand. This, together with reduction of messages to translate, can save companies a lot of money.

Brave new world: How one writing team moved to DITA-based authoring by Helen O’Shea

DITA is not only a new XML format for technical documentation. It also brings a new way of thinking in topics as basic and complete chunks of information. Topics can later be assembled into different deliverables like books and online help. During this presentation I was constantly thinking how DITA could be used for documentation in KDE. Is there need (and will) for another conversion?

Improving the quality and usability of error messages by Katarzyna Kostorz

Yet another presentation where I was thinking about how all that was said could apply to KDE. First we were shown some examples of bad and good error messages and what are the properties that make them bad or good. Next we could see how error messages are handled by IBM. Not only is the short version shown in GUI, the longer explanation and possible further actions to be taken (by different type of users) are all part of the documentation.

At the end of the conference I was asked if all that I’ve learnt has scared me away from thinking about being a technical writer. I answered that I don’t get scared so easily. Quite the opposite, I can now say that I’m interested in a technical communication career even more. STC membership application is already filled out and ready to be sent across the Atlantic Ocean.

Congrats to the organisers for such a great conference. Hopefully I will be able to meet all the people once again next year.

Tags: transalpine chapter, tac, society for technical communication, stc, technical communication, technical writing, documentation, translation, dita, kde

I’ve been to Maribor last Thursday where the 1st Day of Open Source event was organised at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science. This was my first time visiting Maribor and my first impression was that it is a very nice, clean and lively city.

At the event itself you could attend various interesting talks about Linux and Open Source Software in general. I even had the honor to be the very first speaker. I presented FLOSS, it’s history, licensing and after that talked a bit about Lugos, the Linux User Group of Slovenia. Too bad I missed the talks at the end of the day but I had to catch the last train back to Ljubljana.

I must say I was pleasantly surprised by the number of attendance. A quick count showed that there were constantly at least 150 people in the room. By comparison, the day before this event Microsoft organised a similar event, where there were only 30-50 people. Despite Microsoft having better promotion and they even tried to bribe students by some expensive prizes.

Anyways, hats off to Oto Brglez jr. and the Students Group. They did an excellent job organizing the event and I sure look forward to the 2nd Day of Open Source.

Tags: open source, free software, floss, linux, lugos, maribor, slovenia

Looks like some Mozilla developers, like Gervase Markham, have noticed that Slovenia may soon become the first country in the world where Firefox will pass the 50% point when it comes to internet browser market share. When this happens Firefox will definitely be the most used web browser in our beautiful country.

The latest report from Xiti Monitor (in French) cites Firefox share in Slovenia to be at 47,9%. Gervase even thinks that Firefox is already the most widely used browser in Slovenia. Well in my opinion this hasn’t happened quite yet. If you check out my previous blog article Slovenia loves Mozilla Firefox web browser, you can see that a Slovenian internet advertisement company Iprom measured lower share of Firefox. By about 11% lower than Xiti. As long as the difference is still the same today, then Iprom would spit out a 37% share.

In any case the share of Firefox is very high in Slovenia and we are on a very good way to truly be the first country in the world to pass the magical 50% share. And I think there is still a couple months of time left to organise the World Slovenia Day that Gervase proposes.

To all Slovenians: Let’s not let Finland beat us to it. They are only 2,5% behind us. Ditch your old, closed source and insecure browser and switch to Firefox! Let’s make the whole world proud of Slovenia!

Tags: slovenia, mozilla, firefox, browsers, web, internet, ie, internet explorer

Well almost. There was a concert performed last night by an Italian Pink Floyd tribute band called Seamus. Although it was raining heavily the day before the event, the sky was luckily clear during the concert. If the weather wasn’t good with us, the performance would be in a large tent here in Bohinjska Bistrica, which sucks badly when it comes to acoustics. So the concert itself was at a place we call »Pod Skalco« (could be translated as Under the Rock) right next to Lake Bohinj. Seamus band played for about two hours and a half and everyone from our team of five agrees that they were very very good. And if old Pink Floyd gurus like my father and his friend Toni say this you can safely believe it to be true. It was a lot of fun and great music for only 5€ of entrance fee. In fact I was quite surprised that there were not more people at the concert. Ah well, those not being there, including my sister, can be very sorry. They missed a lot of great music for little money.

Tags: pink floyd, seamus, rock, concert, concerts, bohinj, slovenia, slovenija

Last weekend (on Saturday, 17th of May 2007 to be exact) I’ve officially become a member of Linux User Group of Slovenia (LUGOS for short). I must say it was about time as I do quite a lot of work for Linux, like translating software, testing, bug reporting, spreading the word about it and helping new users. So joining my local Linux user group was only natural. This happened while I was attending the 11^th meeting of LUGOS. It was my first LUGOS meeting and I must say it was quite fun. We talked about accomplishments in the past year and made some plans for this one. During the meeting we had some nice snack and after it we also had a cake. The first event that LUGOS is preparing for 2007 will be dedicated to all people who are interested in translating and localising free and open source software into Slovenian language. People who will come will be able to see how our work looks like, see some presentations and take part in workshops. Currently the planned date is 21^st of April. I hope to see many people, I’m sure it will be fun. Oh and by the way, this year LUGOS is celebrating its 10^th anniversary, so: Happy anniversary LUGOS!

Tags: linux, lug, lugos, slovenia, translation, events

Ko je bratranec Matej postavljal svoj blog, ga je seveda želel imeti v slovenskem jeziku. S samim WordPressom ni bilo težav. Vsa zahvala za prevod WordPressa v slovenščino gre Simonu Rozmanu. Sicer prevoda za različico 2.1 še ni na voljo, a prevod za različico 2.0.7 posloveni tudi veliko večino različice 2.1.

Druga komponenta, ki jo je bilo treba posloveniti, je bila tema. Matej si je za svoj spletni dnevnik izbral temo Connections Reloaded 1.5, za katero pa še ni obstajal slovenski prevod. Nič, pljunil sem v roke in temo pač prevedel v slovenščino. Za osnovo sem vzel paket s francoskim prevodom in ga naučil govoriti slovensko. Rezultat vam je na voljo za prenos:
Tema Connections Reloaded 1.5 za WordPress v slovenščini

Za uporabo temo odpakirajte v mapo wp-content/themes in jo nato izberite v nastavitvah za WordPress > Predstavitev > Teme. Da delujejo povezave na vrhu strani je potrebno še ustvariti nove strani z vsebino: O avtorju (o-avtorju), Arhivi (arhivi), Povezave (povezave) in Stik (stik). V oklepajih so nizi, ki jih morate pri ustvarjanju strani uporabiti za nastavitev Žeton objave (Page Slug).

Upam, da bo še komu prišla prav. Če opazite kako napako ali manjkajoč prevod, mi kar sporočite spodaj v komentarjih.

Značke: blog, bloganje, internet, wordpress, slovenščina, prevod, prevajanje

Winter has really been boring this year. No snow at all and not even that cold. Definitely not what it should be like here in Bohinj at this time of the year. Really bad for business at our ski centres Vogel and Kobla. Until the day before yesterday, when it finally started snowing. Some real winter at last. I hope it keeps snowing for a longer time.

Here’s the view from our balcony

On a weather related note, we had quite a few power outages yesterday and today. A very long time since the last one. Because of this my Gentoo Linux powered home server was off-line several times for a few of minutes. When it went off-line for the first time it had a couple of hours more than 81 days of uptime. I’m quite sure this is its highest uptime. I guess I’ll have to buy myself an uninterrupted power supply (UPS) unit some day. Until that day comes, don’t be surprised if this blog isn’t accessible at some moments.

Tags: winter, weather, bohinj, slovenia, uptime

A couple of months back we could read a report from a French company called Xiti Monitor, which indicated that here in Slovenia 40.5% people use Mozilla Firefox. This figure is great, but I think it is a little bit too high. Or in other words, the sample might not represent larger population in the best way.

Today a Slovenian company Iprom released their report (in Slovenian language), which should be very accurate. It shows that 29,5% of Slovenians use Firefox to surf the web. Still a very high share of Firefox users. They also indicate how fast the share of Firefox users is increasing. From January 2006 to December 2006 the Firefox share has increased by 64%.

Whatever the completely accurate number is, it is nice to see that Slovenia is the world leader when it comes to use of open source web browser. And it is great to see that so many people are switching to Firefox. Now, if only people at some Slovenian banks, who still force people to use the highly insecure Internet Explorer, would read these reports.

Tags: slovenia, firefox, browsers, web, internet, ie, internet explorer

Ever since 1^st January 2007 our new national currency here in Slovenia is the all mighty Euro (€), which is the official currency for most of the countries in the European Union. For the last two weeks we could still pay with our old and trusty currency – the Slovenian tolar (SIT). But from this day forward the transitional days are over and the Euro is the only currency left. Each country has their own design of one side of the coins. Here are the images and descriptions of Slovenian Euro coins.

I myself and most of the people didn’t have any problems with the change. I guess we are all used to changing our national currency. It has happened a couple of times in our recent history. Hopefully, Euro is here to stay for a long time. Plenty of time to loose my first Euro coin and find one

Oh and by the way, the translations and source code for KDE desktop and KOffice are already updated. You can expect the new Euro ready versions to be released in just a few days.

Tags: slovenia, euro, tolar, money, europe, kde, koffice

Yesterday was a special day here in Bohinjska Bistrica, and in many other cities across Slovenia. We were celebrating the 100th anniversary of opening of the Bohinj rail-road line and of the Bohinj tunnel. This was one of the last majestic projects of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and connected the city of Trst (Trieste) with Central Europe. Altogether, 42 tunnels, 3 avalanche galleries and more than 60 bridges were built on 145km-long line linking Jesenice with Trst. Besides Bohinj tunnel, which is 6327 meters long, another engineering marvel is the viaduct in Solkan, which has the largest stone arch among the railway bridges in the world (its span measures 85 m). To learn more about Bohinj line visit the page of The Bohinj-Gorica line society.

The celebration took place at the railway station. We arrived there quite a bit too early. People were still coming and amateur actors and musicians were preparing for the event. While we were waiting for the steam train to arrive there was also a small accident, that could turn out much worse. There were some flags on the roof of the station and because of the wind they fell down. Luckily, no one was beneath that part of the roof. By the time the train arrived a lot of people gathered. Our mayor, Evgenija Kegl Korošec, gave a short speech about the importance of the rail-road for Bohinj and how we should use it more in tourism. I couldn’t agree more. This is one of the most beautiful railway lines and our country could put a lot more effort into modernisation and promotion of it. After the speech amateur actors, dressed in the old fashion and representing important people from the time when the railway was opened, performed some dialogues. You could hear what people like Žiga Zoiss, Valentin Vodnik, Giacomo Ceconi and others could have said at the moment like this. We could also see a funny sketch depicting how some citizens of Bohinjska Bistrica reacted, when they first saw a steam train. Soon the train continued on its tour and we returned home. My sister took some photos of the celebration. You can check them out at Flickr in 100 years of Bohinj railway line photo set.

For this occasion a lot has been done in Bohinjska Bistrica. They renewed the rail-road station and the bridge that is on the path to it. For the first time we also have cross-road signs marking the streets in our town.

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Tags: railway, rail-road, railroad, anniversary, slovenia, bohinj, engineering, anniversaries, celebrations

When I was looking for a Slovenian public Jabber/XMPP server the other day, I was quite surprised about what I found out. Slovenian TV station POP TV has frequently been running this add about their social web site called Frendi in flirt (in English: friends and flirt). The site offers a place to put up your personal profile, write a blog and share photos. Soon users will also be able to upload their own videos. And the biggest surprise for me was that this popular site also offers their users the possibility to chat and they use the open instant messaging (IM) protocol called Jabber for it. For this they have also set up their own Jabber server, available at jabber.24ur.com. So when a user registers with Frendi in flirt, they automatically get a new Jabber account. The site also offers a Jabber client for easy download, which is basically a customised GAIM client. There are almost 10000 users registered at this moment. I also registered and tried to connect with the Jabber server using my favourite IM client - Psi (also translated into Slovenian). Needless to say, all went just fine. You simply have to love open standards. And it is nice to see that web developers for Frendi in flirt chose an open standard instead of reinventing their own or using some closed and proprietary protocol. They should be commended for this.

Tags: jabber, xmpp, im, instant messaging, gaim, psi, slovenia, standards

During this night (from midnight to about 4 am in the morning here in Slovenia) I was watching Super Bowl XL together with my sister. We were cheering up for the Seattle Seahawks who were playing against the Pittsburgh Steelers in Detroit. Both teams were playing very well, but unfortunately the mistakes in crucial moments doomed the Seahwaks and in the end the Steelers won with 21 against 10. Congratulations to the coach Bill Cowher and his team. They were working hard together for the long 14 years to come here.

And I must say thank you to Prva TV television station for bringing us Super Bowl XL and, for the first time here in Slovenia, the preceding games. Commentators were great. They were all full of enthusiasm and it was fun to listen to them. Can’t wait until the next year. Oh and if you didn’t know, we also have our own and only American football team here in Slovenia: Ljubljana Silverhawks. I must visit them some day, while they are having a training.

Tags: super bowl, seahawks, steelers, slovenia, silverhawks

Let me remind you there is less then a month until the beginning of the 2nd international Linux training camp, which starts on 20th and ends on 27th August here in Bohinj, Slovenia. Last year’s Red Hat Summer Camp was a huge success. For this year Red Hat and Housing prepared a program with 4 different tracks to choose from: Pingo Linux (for beginners and people new to Linux), RH300 with RH302 (get certified for RHCE), RH133 (Enterprise Linux System Administration) and Lab track (MySQL, PHP, firewall). In addition to learning about Linux, each track includes sport activities (adrenalin park, canyoning, rafting…). I hope you come and visit us here in beautiful Triglav National Park.

Tags: linux, training, red hat, summer, camp, bohinj, slovenia

In January 2005 Firefox, together with Mozilla, became the most frequently used web browser on one of the most popular Slovenian computer related web pages, Slo-Comp.net. You can see the usage history of Internet Explorer and Gecko based browsers in this recently produced graph. They also monitor the browser type of each post in their forum and they say that Firefox usage in this area is even five times greater then that of IE. And Firefox keeps increasing its share…

Nekaj trenutkov nazaj sem končal tudi s posodobitvijo prevoda programa KStars. To je odličen astronomski program, namizni planetarij, ki je namenjen predvsem ljubiteljskim začetnikom v astronomiji. Zelo prav pa lahko pride tudi pri učenju astronomije v šolah. Zaslonski posnetek poslovenjenega KStars si lahko ogledate tukajle.

English summary:
A few moments ago I finished updating the Slovenian translation of KStars, a great astronomy application. Screenshot of KStars with Slovenian user interface is available here.