Off topic: A modest proposal to promote GNU/Linux among translators Thread poster: Mr. Satan (X)
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Mr. Satan (X)
English to Indonesian
Good morning/day/afternoon/evening, what have you! 
There seems to be some interests in Linux (and disappointment towards Microsoft) among translators lately. Perhaps it warrants its own thread, to discuss anything GNU/Linux for translation professionals? Hopefully, anyone who were interested to try it out could find posts in this thread to be helpful.
S... See more Good morning/day/afternoon/evening, what have you!
There seems to be some interests in Linux (and disappointment towards Microsoft) among translators lately. Perhaps it warrants its own thread, to discuss anything GNU/Linux for translation professionals? Hopefully, anyone who were interested to try it out could find posts in this thread to be helpful.
Some useful links:
- TranslateOnLinux - Comprehensive Linux guides tailored for translators, by our very own Jean Dimitriadis.
- DistroWatch - Linux news and reviews showcasing various Linux distributions, if you want to "shop" around.
- Hardware for Linux - A community project listing Linux compatibility on myriads of hardware configurations.
- Wine AppDB - Check if the software you need would run flawlessly on Linux using Wine's compatibility layer.
- Linux distros and desktop environments in a nutshell.
Anyone is free to add more links as they desire. Though I don't know if I can pin them in the first post. Isn't there a time limit for until how long you can edit your post? (unsure)
With this, I hope GNU/Linux would gain more userbase and becoming a viable option for many things, but especially in translation business. I myself am happy with it, I hope you also would get the same experience.
I use openSUSE BTW.
[Edited at 2021-11-11 12:47 GMT] ▲ Collapse
| | | | | LinuxForTranslators.org | Nov 12, 2021 |
Hello Novian,
Thank you for opening this thread!
I too have noticed a growing number of linguists mention Linux in the forums, which is a nice surprise
I don’t think GNU/Linux will gain enough traction to become mainstream anytime soon, but it is there for anyone who wants to use it and it is entirely possible to work as a professional translator on a Linux machine. I think those of us who ... See more Hello Novian,
Thank you for opening this thread!
I too have noticed a growing number of linguists mention Linux in the forums, which is a nice surprise
I don’t think GNU/Linux will gain enough traction to become mainstream anytime soon, but it is there for anyone who wants to use it and it is entirely possible to work as a professional translator on a Linux machine. I think those of us who do thoroughly enjoy it. I know I wouldn’t have it any other way.
To those who are considering taking up Linux as their default OS, it would be amiss to not mention LinuxForTranslators.org. This has been for many years THE reference and it still is a great entry point. It has been updated last year and I think it provides a quick overview of (and personal commentary on) various aspects on translation in the Linux space, while pointing to TranslateOnLinux.org for some nitty gritty details.
I think this forum is a good place to discuss any translation-on-Linux-related stuff, and I encourage anyone to do so (although most non-translation related questions would probably be best addressed in the many online communities revolving around Linux these days), but I would also like to point to the Linux For Translators mailing list, for those who prefer email exchanges: https://groups.io/g/LinuxForTranslators
Cheers!
PS: OpenSUSE has been my distribution of choice for my first GNU/Linux endeavors back in 2007 to 2011. Although I have been distro hopping since, it will always have a special place in my heart After settling for some years on CrunchBang and Arch/Antergos, I am now on Linux Regolith myself. i3wm FTW! ▲ Collapse
| | | | | eggs and baskets | Nov 12, 2021 |
I think it's a great idea!
My suggestion for newcomers to Linux is to setup their machine on dual boot. This can be useful especially when it seems that some things "can't" be done on Linux out of the box. Not keeping all your eggs in the same basket would certainly be useful under such circumstances.
But it is perfectly possible!
The links @Novian you mention in the first post are gold.
| | | | | All about market share | Nov 12, 2021 |
Jean Dimitriadis wrote:
I don’t think GNU/Linux will gain enough traction to become mainstream anytime soon, but it is there for anyone who wants to use it and it is entirely possible to work as a professional translator on a Linux machine. I think those of us who do thoroughly enjoy it. I know I wouldn’t have it any other way.
With the Steam Deck running Linux out of the box and seemingly drawing a lot of positive interest in the gaming community, there is hope that Linux will gain not only market share per se, but more positive visibility in the mainstream, since the console gives full access to the desktop operating system underneath. Valve’s funding has also pushed compatibility tools/layers farther at a much faster pace than before, so running Windows translation software might become less of a hurdle as that progresses, though I personally prefer not to spend hundreds on unsupported software that I can’t rely on from one update to the next.
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Mr. Satan (X)
English to Indonesian
TOPIC STARTER | Realistic expectation | Nov 13, 2021 |
Well, probably not mainstream. But if GNU/Linux could get 3 to 5% market share, that’s already a huge achievement. Maybe just maybe, big players like Trados or MemoQ would start considering to make a proper Linux version of their CAT tools. Or at the very least, making sure their software would run on it w/o issues and provide an official, easy to follow how-to guide on their websites, just like Subtitle Edit. I am grateful that I mostly work on subtitles, and those aren’t really an issue un... See more Well, probably not mainstream. But if GNU/Linux could get 3 to 5% market share, that’s already a huge achievement. Maybe just maybe, big players like Trados or MemoQ would start considering to make a proper Linux version of their CAT tools. Or at the very least, making sure their software would run on it w/o issues and provide an official, easy to follow how-to guide on their websites, just like Subtitle Edit. I am grateful that I mostly work on subtitles, and those aren’t really an issue under Linux. But I’m well aware that CAT tools might not always want to play nice with it.
I just would love to see more people trying it out. That’s why, as much as I prefer nerdy distros like Debian or openSUSE, for anyone who are fresh to Linux, I would instead recommend Linux Mint, ElementaryOS, or PopOS as their first distro, to get them started. They can venture out later if they so choose.
Jean Dimitriadis wrote: PS: OpenSUSE has been my distribution of choice for my first GNU/Linux endeavors back in 2007 to 2011. Although I have been distro hopping since, it will always have a special place in my heart After settling for some years on CrunchBang and Arch/Antergos, I am now on Linux Regolith myself. i3wm FTW!
Nice!
I tried Sway and AwesomeWM before, spend a couple days with each. I can see the appeal of tiling WMs, but I don’t think it’s for me. Traditional desktop is still my kinda thing. ▲ Collapse
| | | | Metin Demirel 
Türkiye
Local time: 05:58
Member (2018)
Italian to Turkish
+ ...
| I am hopeful | Nov 18, 2021 |
I stopped using Linux earlier this year after I got myself a MacBook, before which I had consistently used elementary OS for about one and a half years. And before that, I used to have an on-again, off-again relationship with various Linux distributions.
I think most of the problems we have with Linux will not go away easily, yet I am not totally pessimistic. Sometimes, when I had a job on a web-based platform like Memsource, I would work on a USB stick just to try out a new distro.... See more I stopped using Linux earlier this year after I got myself a MacBook, before which I had consistently used elementary OS for about one and a half years. And before that, I used to have an on-again, off-again relationship with various Linux distributions.
I think most of the problems we have with Linux will not go away easily, yet I am not totally pessimistic. Sometimes, when I had a job on a web-based platform like Memsource, I would work on a USB stick just to try out a new distro. There I realized that Linux might not be fully ready for translators any time soon, and I don't believe SDL or MemoQ will bother to release Linux-compatible versions of their software. Yet the software industry is shifting towards a more web-based world, which I hope will result in most industrial apps abandoning the OS-dependent desktop tradition. After all, if people weren't dependent on desktop software, who would not give Linux a try, and subsequently switch to Linux for good?
[Edited at 2021-11-18 17:13 GMT]
[Edited at 2021-11-18 19:15 GMT] ▲ Collapse
| | | | Mr. Satan (X)
English to Indonesian
TOPIC STARTER | Jumpy audio on Linux | Feb 9, 2022 |
Greetings all,
Just want to share about an issue that has been driving me nuts for quite a while. I don’t think I’ll need to explain how annoying it is to have jumpy audio problems for those who perform any kind of transcription tasks. As it turned out, this was caused by a bug in the kernel for the Realtek WiFi card. I’ve managed to fix this by always connecting to the internet, or disable the WiFi when not in use (FYI my laptop has a killswitch button to turn-off all wireles... See more Greetings all,
Just want to share about an issue that has been driving me nuts for quite a while. I don’t think I’ll need to explain how annoying it is to have jumpy audio problems for those who perform any kind of transcription tasks. As it turned out, this was caused by a bug in the kernel for the Realtek WiFi card. I’ve managed to fix this by always connecting to the internet, or disable the WiFi when not in use (FYI my laptop has a killswitch button to turn-off all wireless connections).
Here’s a link in case anyone would want to know more about it.
https://askubuntu.com/questions/1044552/audio-stuttering-in-ubuntu-18-04
Other solutions were proposed as well, although I didn’t try them myself. So I can’t testify whether they would work or not. But the best course of action is probably to not use a Realtek WiFi card if you planned on migrating to a GNU/Linux system. ▲ Collapse
| | | | Metin Demirel
Türkiye
Local time: 05:58
Member (2018)
Italian to Turkish
+ ...
Novian Cahyadi wrote:
But the best course of action is probably to not use a Realtek WiFi card if you planned on migrating to a GNU/Linux system.
I also used an HP laptop with Realtek WiFi card for a while, like 3 years, and yes, I had my fair share of hard times with it. But I don't think just one particular product of a particular company could be the deal-breaker for migrating to Linux. Most computers are optimized to perform with Windows, so any hardware in any computer, if not optimized for Linux, could give you some troubles. Just as there is no guarantee that other WiFi cards would work seamlessly on Ubuntu, there are hundreds of (tens of, actually) distros that will have a wonderful relationship with your Realtek card But, then again, you may have other hardware issues.
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| Long time Linux user here | Feb 14, 2022 |
I've been using Linux for a good decade and a half, since Windows Vista turned me off. I've only been using it for translation work for about six months though. I've mostly used Ubuntu, but I recently made the switch to Fedora because I wanted to get more recent features and try something new. That's had the effect of breaking my workflow, but I've mostly gotten everything back together.
I still use Windows in a VM, h... See more I've been using Linux for a good decade and a half, since Windows Vista turned me off. I've only been using it for translation work for about six months though. I've mostly used Ubuntu, but I recently made the switch to Fedora because I wanted to get more recent features and try something new. That's had the effect of breaking my workflow, but I've mostly gotten everything back together.
I still use Windows in a VM, however, because I can't get away from Microsoft Office. Nothing else really comes close to it in terms of features and usability, and nagging formatting problems between it and LibreOffice keep me away from LibreOffice for everything except my own personal documents. It would be nice if Microsoft put out a Linux version of Office, apparently the underlying framework it uses works on Windows, MacOS, and Linux. But so far, the only office app they've bothered to release a Linux version of is Teams, probably for internal communication with their engineers who run Linux machines. They probably don't see enough of a market for the rest of the suite. ▲ Collapse
| | | | Mr. Satan (X)
English to Indonesian
TOPIC STARTER
Andrew Hawkins wrote:
It would be nice if Microsoft put out a Linux version of Office, apparently the underlying framework it uses works on Windows, MacOS, and Linux. But so far, the only office app they've bothered to release a Linux version of is Teams, probably for internal communication with their engineers who run Linux machines. They probably don't see enough of a market for the rest of the suite.
They also ported Edge and Skype to Linux, and probably some more of their software catalog that I'm not aware of. We have MS Office for Mac, so why not for Linux?
P.S.
I could never understand the logic behind the market share argument. But then again, I'm a strong proponent of cross-platform software. So I might be biased about this.
[Edited at 2022-02-14 08:42 GMT]
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Novian Cahyadi wrote:
They also ported Edge and Skype to Linux, and probably some more of their software catalog that I'm not aware of. We have MS Office for Mac, so why not for Linux?
P.S.
I could never understand the logic behind the market share argument. But then again, I'm a strong proponent of cross-platform software. So I might be biased about this.
[Edited at 2022-02-14 08:42 GMT]
Here it is, .NET (previously .NET Core) runs on Linux:
docs.microsoft.com/en-us/dotnet/core/install/linux?WT.mc_id=dotnet-35129-website
So yeah, it seems like they've already laid all of the groundwork. Providing support isn't entirely trivial, even for a company with deep pockets like Microsoft, but we Linux users are usually willing to put up with some breakage and figure out how to fix things or contribute to solutions.
It's probably just inertia on the part of the Office team. But who knows, maybe Word, Excel, and Powerpoint ports are around the corner. That would certainly get my workflow off of Windows, and they'd still be getting my MS365 subscription money.
[Edited at 2022-02-14 15:00 GMT]
| | | | Mr. Satan (X)
English to Indonesian
TOPIC STARTER
You can already run MS Office Suites as if they were native Linux software, by using WinApps. I personally don't like this method since it's pretty much the same as running Windows in a VM. You'll still need a Windows ISO and quite a beefy machine for this. But it's an option you can take.
... See more You can already run MS Office Suites as if they were native Linux software, by using WinApps. I personally don't like this method since it's pretty much the same as running Windows in a VM. You'll still need a Windows ISO and quite a beefy machine for this. But it's an option you can take.
https://github.com/Fmstrat/winapps
https://fossbytes.com/microsoft-office-on-linux-is-now-a-thing-thanks-to-winapps-how-to/
[Edited at 2022-02-15 06:41 GMT] ▲ Collapse
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