Style of communication in manuals, was: Re: Seeking Help with Windows Maxima installer localization

Am 15 Nov 2006 um 15:10 hat Mario Rodriguez geschrieben:

> 
> > 
> > 2. In German there are two kinds of translating 'you' respective two
> > ways of communicating with the reader. One is direct, personally,
> > private and the other one is more elaborated, impersonal, official,
> > polite, ... . Which kind of communication with the user does the
> > Maxima community prefer? 
> 
> Hallo Volker,
> 
> We have the same problem in Spanish (du=t?, Sie=usted). But I prefer in
> these cases to avoid personal references to the reader, and make use of
> the impersonal form. For example, I'd write something like
> 
> "Man soll das Fenster oeffnen" (or something similar)
> 
> instead of "Du solls das Fenster oeffnen", or "Sie sollen das Fenster
> oeffnen".
> 
> But I'm not sure that "Man ..." is common practice in these contexts.
> 
> Just an idea.
> 

Hi Mario,

eLearning has proven, that in education with electronic media the students get better results 
if the eLearning system communicates with the students in a direct and personal style, using 
"Du=t?". 

Does Maxima should have a more professional attitude? Then it should communicate in a 
more non-personal style using "Sie=usted". Does especially open source software need a 
professional attitude to avoid the association open source = not professional?

We should clear this point here in the list. The English manual doesn't have this problem. 
But as you write, both the Spanish and German translators should think about a clear style 
of communication: Educational and personal or professional and non-personal?

Let's see what the others think about this. Is there a similar problem in Italian or Russian?

Volker van Nek