pt., 6 wrz 2024 o 17:38 Joaquin M López Muñoz via Boost < boost@lists.boost.org> napisał(a):
El 06/09/2024 a las 14:31, John Maddock via Boost escribió:
Inclusivity
[...]
[...] And of course inclusivity also extends further than gender: to non-native English speakers to name but one.
I'm very glad that you raised the issue of participation barriers for people with low (or no) English skills. Being a non-native English speaker myself, language inclusivity (not to be confused with inclusive language) has always interested me. The topic has not been discussed very often here, perhaps, if I may venture, because it does not rank high in the Anglosphere's political debate.
For example, participation in the project from people from East Asian countries is very low in proportion to their usage of C++ and Boost, which I think can be largely attributed to linguistic barriers. Some countries from the area (China, Japan) struggle to increase English proficiency among their citizens, with limited success. There are brave efforts to bring Boost closer to local audiences, such as boostjp from Akira Takahashi and others:
https://boostjp.github.io/index.html
which provides documentation in Japanese on Boost and some of its libraries, plus a study group and an online forum oriented to Japanese-speaking developers. This effort should be recognized, supported and linked from boost.org, IMHO.
It would be great if we started a conversation on how we can make Boost more accessible and appealing to developers who are not fluent enough in the English language to engage in the project in its current form. Possibly by reaching out first to the people running boostjp and similar initiatives.
Joaquin, thanks for bringing this up. Let me offer my perspective, of another non-native English speaker, on the matter. The only aspect of "inclusivity" that I actually understand and that resonates with me is, "do not intimidate newcomers with using business-specific jargon and TLAs (Three-Letter Acronyms)". There is a good reason why we use jargon and acronyms, so I would never think of imposing on anyone any restriction in this aspect, but I observe that there is a trade-off here. If you use jargon, you communicate more effectively and comfortably, you build a local culture, but at the same time you intimidate and potentially put off the newcomers. In Poland, where I come from, we were taught as children at that time that you should learn English in order to get a decent job, and so many of us did. But even then, when I joined a couple of discussion groups, I had a hard time understanding the discussion group jargon: FWIW, AFAICT, IMHO, LOL. Now, add to that C++-specific acronyms: can NTBS cause UB as NTTPs? Even now, after years of participation, I have trouble understanding new acronyms as they come. From the recent discussions on the future of Boost, I collected: BDFL, OG, SJW. I also had a hard time even googling terms " bussin" and "fam". I know some communities address this by publishing a list of acronyms and jargon words they use. Regards, &rzej;