Welcome to theJanuary 2025 edition of theLanguage and internationalization newsletter by the Wikimedia FoundationWikimedia Language and Product Localization team!This newsletter provides you with quarterly updates on new feature developments, improvements in variouslanguage-related technical projects and support work, community meetings, and ideas to get involved in contributing to the projects.

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The Contribute menu, found under user contributions on Wikimedia wikis, offers editors various ways to engage, such as starting a translation, exploring suggested edits, uploading files, or creating new articles.This menu is being gradually introduced to wikis where translation tools and features are available, meaning editors can easily translate existing content or contribute in multiple languages.So far, the menu has been enabled on 144 wikis, with 221 more planned for future rollout.^[1]

Southern Ndebele, Pannonian Rusyn, Iban, Obolo, and Tai Nüa have received a Wikipedia as part of the Future of Language Incubation initiative.^[2][3]This initiative is a new experiment designed to test ideas for supporting the growth of new language editions of Wikipedia.It is part of a larger effort under theWikimedia Foundation’s Annual Plan 2024–25 to help communities close knowledge gaps by making tools and systems more accessible, adaptable, and effective.The goal is to increase the creation and availability of reliable encyclopedic content.

These five languages represent millions of speakers around the world:

• Southern Ndebele – Spoken by 1.1 million people in South Africa
• Iban – Spoken by 2.45 million people in Malaysia, Brunei, and Indonesia
• Obolo – Spoken by 318,000 people in Nigeria
• Pannonian Rusyn – Spoken by 20,000 people in Serbia and Croatia
• Tai Nüa – Spoken by 720,000 people across Central Europe and Southeast Asia

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  Tai Nüa – Spoken by 720,000 people across Central Europe and Southeast Asia
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  Southern Ndebele – Spoken by 1.1 million people in South Africa
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  Iban – Spoken by 2.45 million people in Malaysia, Brunei, and Indonesia
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  Pannonian Rusyn – Spoken by 20,000 people in Serbia and Croatia
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  Obolo – Spoken by 318,000 people in Nigeria

TheLanguage Diversity Hub (LDH) recently organized its first community consultation, focusing on the translation of technical terms.This initiative is designed to assist communities as they overcome challenges within the Wikimedia landscape.The Dagbani community, recognized for its creativity and commitment, took part in the inaugural session.Translating MediaWiki is a key step for new language communities, and mentors provided useful guidance to make the process easier.Is your community interested in a consultation? Submit a requesthere, and the team will follow up.^[4]

9 Languages were added totranslatewiki.net, including Acholi^[5], Fur^[6], Mansi^[7].

Translatewiki.net is a platform that enables communities to localize the software into their languages before the language becomes fully supported.These translations are essential for making the platform user-friendly in their language and are a key step in the new wiki creation process.With these new languages added, users can now translate the user interface messages they see on Wikimedia sites like Wikipedia (e.g., menus, buttons, and system notifications).

4 Languages were added toMediawiki, including Chakma^[8] and Tigre^[9].Among these languages is also Duala, which has become the first language from Cameroon to be supported by MediaWiki, marking an important milestone for linguistic diversity on Wikimedia platforms.^[10]This is the next step after Translatewiki.net and involves making these languages officially supported by the MediaWiki software.With this support, speakers of these languages can use Wikimedia websites like Wikipedia or Wiktionary in their own language and create or contribute content directly.

Furthermore, several Configuration fixes were implemented, such as fixing line height^[11] renaming autonyms^[12], adding or modifying namespace translations^[13] and adding new keyboards^[14].Learn morehere.

In November 2024, the Language and Product Localization team launched an exciting new feature in the Content Translation tool: Community-defined lists.This innovative translation suggestion feature is designed to enhance the experience for translators working in Wikis where themobile experience of Content Translation is available.Now, translators can easily discover articles related to their interests from Wikiproject campaigns within theAll collection category of suggested articles.

Wikiproject Campaign organizers can take advantage of this feature by incorporating the‎<page-collection>...‎</page-collection> tag into their campaign article list on Meta-wiki.This simple addition will make those articles readily discoverable in the Content Translation tool, connecting more translators with topics they are passionate about.

For a comprehensive guide on how to effectively use this tool and the tagging process, please refer to thedetailed step-by-step instructions provided.Getting involved in Wikiprojects campaigns has never been easier!

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  A session onGetting started with Wikimedia language tech volunteering was delivered for 30+ students fromWikitech Club India. They were introduced to the basics of internationalization and localization, along with beginner-friendly tasks from actively maintained repositories, perfect for them to start their newcomer journey in the Wikimedia movement. One of the new developers,Ravitej_Neeli, had their first MediaWiki core patch merged–kudos!
• In case you missed the language community meeting in August, you can catch up by watching thevideo recording and reading the notes. This meeting was co-organized by the Language and Product Localization team and the Language Diversity Hub and had over 35 attendees, covering topics such as developing Indonesian language keyboards, hearing firsthand from Moore Wikipedia community members about their language incubation journey and challenges and outcomes from the language support track at Wikindaba. Sign uphere to attend the upcoming meeting in February.
• Language and Product Localization team membersshared their experience from organizing a hackathon at the Wikimedia Technology Summit 2024.
• The 2024 Global Voices Summit in Nepal brought together voices from around the world to discuss preserving endangered languages and strengthening Wikimedia’s role in this effort. Discover the key discussions and outcomes from the eventhere.

• If you are looking for technical tasks, take a look at the easy tasks that haven't been assigned yet in variouslanguage project repositories on Wikimedia Phabricator.
• Interested in contributing to language support related technical tasks for new and existing languages?See open tasks on LPL Technical Support workboard.
• If you are looking for tools to edit and translate articles and interface messages, you can useContent translation andSpecial:Translate onTranslatewiki.net. These tools make it easier to work with content in different languages.
• Report feedback ontalk pages of language tools.

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