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Universities to translate Firefox into African language

By Edris Kisambira , IDG News Service , 08/05/2008
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Makerere University of Uganda and Rhodes University of South Africa are collaborating to translate Mozilla's Firefox Internet browser into Luganda, Uganda's most widely spoken language.

The schools have organized a two-day translation marathon at Makerere University on Thursday and Friday. The workshop will bring together software gurus from Uganda and South Africa, as well as top Luganda linguists.

The aim of translating Firefox into the Luganda is to make it more accessible to non-English speaking Ugandans, said Deborah Namirembe, communications officer of Makerere's Computing & Information Technology Faculty.

Africa's academic community has emphasized the importance of issuing local content and language support in order to reach the rural population, given that the continent is home to hundreds of languages.

If successful, this most recent effort will result in the first computer program to be translated into Luganda.

The browser has already been translated into six of South Africa's 11 official languages -- Xhosa, Zulu, Venda, Northern Sotho, Siswati and Tswana.

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translating web resourcesBy gg4u on October 9, 2008, 6:47 amDear Edris Kisambira, with interest I've read your post. I am proposing a project to spread access in African local languages to content for rural development,...

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thanxBy Anonymous on August 10, 2008, 3:56 pmgood innovation, ssabasajja awangale

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interestingBy TechMasai on August 5, 2008, 9:24 pmthis is very good news, for it means more people will get access to and be able to use the internet in Uganda

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