The past meets the present, future, ...and open standards technology is the facilitator. Like the all purpose, operating system agnostic, Java-based Eclipse platform with its plug-in extensions, the IBM Lotus Symphony plug-ins enable the building of bridges between modern world languages and --potentially-- ancient dialects as well.
I recently attended my niece's religious service and subsequent celebration party; it marked her 15 years of life on this planet ?her Quince Añera. It is a ritual that purportedly originated, like the Náhuatl language, long before the confluence of the Spanish culture with its American counterpart (1492)--already developed and sustained by the peoples radiating outward from the region now known as México.
Evidently, I had the opportunity to have contact with an dancer who carries forward a spark of the ancestral language and, equally important --the ritual-- for very special occasions.
Although my niece's very own Quince Añera (which symbolizes her passage into womanhood) did not belong to the category of events that demand an unflinching effort on the part of the dancers to perform, the group made an exception. I thank them very much for the privilege of having performed their symbolic dance for my niece. It was very special to her and all of us in the extended family.
Coincidentally, I had become drawn to the planning of a Náhuatl plugin for the nearing general availability (GA) release date (end of May 2008) of IBM Lotus Symphony. The overall aim, of course, is to be able to translate, in either direction, Náhuatl and Spanish ?at the very least; for the intended market is represented by the enormous size of all students of Náhuatl in México. The English language translation issues subsequently would be addressed, plus any other languages that other interested parties desired.
The project preferably is to be open source, if possible, with its inherent open standards so as to collaborate with the world's free and open source (FOSS) communities. Would you care to contribute with the technical and/or linguistic aspects??? Please, let us know with your post.
I have made a similar request at the IBM Lotus Symphony Developers pertinent section.
This entry was posted by Jose and filed under Current Trends, Symphony. Tags: apacheoo, ibm, language, lotus, nahuatl, open standards, openoffice, plug-in, plugin, symphony. 2 comments
Comment from: Owen F Thomas Visitor
Comment from: Jose Member
Sr. Owen F Thomas:
I find it amusing that you be engaged in such fantastic endeavor. But tell me, would not academia entities like the UNAM be more adequate –and have more resources– for the task that you have taken on solo?? As I understand, the above institution was tasked with the creation of a Náhuatl - Español dictionary for the student population of México city.
On my side, well, I am not retired and with lots of time. I am immersed in the technical demands of this plug-in project for the IBM Lotus Symphony productivity suite among other business matters. Besides, the non-technical linguistic aspect is huge and the time required to achieve a certain success in this project will be determined by human variables.
In the meantime, you are welcomed to download the OpenOffice based, natively supporting the truly Open Document Format (ODF), operating system agnostic Java-based, IBM Lotus Symphony for your own use –at no charge. Although it is in beta testing phase currently, it will soon be generally available (GA).
It has been many years since I constructed a sonar control system based on the Forth computer language which was open source. I now have interest in reading a picture manuscript which preceded Nahuatl as written in Spanish orthography.
My blogs show how little I have accomplished but there is a digital structure to the picture manuscript.
Can we cooperate in this effort?