How are translations evaluated – upvoting.

• Once a translation has been submitted, it can be evaluated by other translators. If the translation is deemed to be sufficiently adequate, then the translation may receive one upvote from another translator. But other translators may give upvotes for the same translation as well. Thus, a single translation can receive multiple upvotes. At this time there is no limit to the number of upvotes a single translation may receive.

• Translators cannot upvote their own translations. Also, they cannot give more than one upvote to the same translation. But, they can award single upvotes to each of several translations for the same translation unit.

• Upvoting can only take place once a translation unit has actually been translated. Once a unit has been translated it shows a black triangle, a 0 (zero) and a green tick mark to the left. If you give it an upvote, the black triangle turns red and the zero increases to 1. As more upvotes are awarded, the tally increases from 1 to 2, etc. When you come to a translation unit that has received one or more upvotes, the triangles will be black and the number of upvotes is indicated. But the triangle only turns red because you gave it an upvote. The red color is not visible to other evaluating translators.

• The green tick mark indicates that the translation with this mark is the leading translation. A translation receives the green mark if it is the most recently upvoted translation. It is not necessarily the translation with the most upvotes. The underlying idea is that a translation tends to improve with time as more translators have looked at it and their input has been incorporated into successive translations.

• Diligent translators find that over time their total number of upvotes increases steadily as other translators appreciate their translations. Translatihan.com accumulates extensive data both in real time and historically, some of which is shared on the charts of the website. The Welcome page which is adjusted every second gives an overall snapshot of the status of the website, including activity for all language couples and individual rankings (top three translators) for the top language couples. The individual language couples show a complete ranking, listing the user names in colored boxes with the number of upvotes received. The yellow boxes are for translators with up to 999 upvotes, the orange boxes for translators with between 1000 and 2999 upvotes and the red boxes for translators with 3000 and more upvotes. The colors for boxes for future milestones and the number of upvotes is at the discretion of the website owner.

• The site Welcome page also lists the total number of translations and the total number of upvotes for the major language couples. The individual Profile page for each translator displays the number of translations and upvotes for each one of the language couples to which this translator has contributed.

• It should be emphasized that the upvote system in translatihan.com does not intend to create competition amongst the translators. The upvotes are a measure of the activity level of a specific translator as well as the collective expression of appreciation of fellow translators for the efforts of their co-translators. Much effort goes into creating a quality translation and that includes the numerous helpful suggestions made by fellow translators that are not rewarded with upvotes for them.