Victorian Online Gateway Multilingual Support

1
Victorian Online Gateway Multilingual Support

• Presentation to the Expert Group
• 30 November 2001

2
Purpose

• Stanley Milford were invited by Multimedia
  Victoria to test the feasibility of the proposed
  model for multilingual support on the Victorian
  Online Gateway (the portal).
• The aim was to recommend a feasible solution that
  will improve access to Government information and
  online services for Victorian CALD communities,
  where the maintenance of each function point is
  driven by a business case and/or normal process.
  The principle of create once, publish many
  underpins the approach taken.

3
The Proposed Model Developed by Expert Group

• Home page to have an image (gif), presenting
  welcome in up to ten languages, as determined
  by current research within Victorian Government.
  When a user clicks on that image it will take
  them to a page in that language.
• Page composition will include the following
• Aggregation of available online services in this
  language, with links to
• Online government services in the language
• Offline government publication and how/where to
  get them
• Translation services that are available
• Intermediary services that are available
• Information regarding ESL courses that are
  subsidised by Government

4
Success Criteria

• Any model for multilingual support on the portal
  must meet the following criteria
• Provide value to CALD communities not
  tokenistic
• Be able to be maintained with limited resources,
  and in collaboration with peak bodies such as
  VOMA and VMC
• Be able to be implemented by June 2002
• Be consistent with the English language version
  of the portal, in its balance between original
  content and aggregation of existing content
• Be scalable to cater for the predicted increase
  in government sites that support LOTE
• Deliver sufficient benefits to balance the costs.

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Multilingual Support recommendations

• SUMMARY
• Multilingual Support
• A model that supports the aggregation of
  multilingual content already available.
• Supports the ten most common languages from the
  homepage, as supported by existing studies,
  population and content available in those
  languages.
• A starting point that supports Victorias
  leadership in government and cultural diversity.
• Business Owner None identified. VOMA are
  interested but unable to resource.

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Recommendations

• Provide multilingual support
• As an aggregator of government information and
  services, the Victorian Online Gateway should
  group together information and services that are
  currently available for people who have a limited
  ability to communicate in English (and their
  intermediaries).
• Feature ten languages
• It is recommended that the Victorian Online
  Gateway support up to ten languages. The precise
  number should be determined with reference to the
  budget for the program and from an audit of
  vic.gov.au websites to determine the availability
  of translated content.

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Recommendations

• The preliminary list of languages is
• Chinese
• Italian
• Greek
• Vietnamese
• Macedonian
• Turkish
• Arabic
• Croatian
• Spanish
• Polish

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Recommendations Provide entry point on portal
home page

• The portal should provide an entry point for each
  of the languages it supports. The entry point
  should be on the portal home page, as this
  maximizes service levels for users with limited
  English. The entry point should be an image
  (gif) of the word welcome in the character sets
  of the languages supported by the portal.
• Example Better Health Channel

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Recommendations Link to all levels of government

• The Level 1 and 2 LOTE pages should aggregate
  links to Federal, Victorian State and local
  government sites, as well as other jurisdiction
  Government sites that support languages other
  than English and have valuable, relevant content.

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Recommendations Links to online services

• Level 1 LOTE pages should group links to online
  services under categories that mirror the
  categories offered on the portal home page
  (English language version). The categories, and
  their descriptions, should be translated. Level
  2 LOTE pages should be category pages that
  contain the links to the relevant translated
  online resources. Level 2 LOTE pages will also
  include a standardised link to the equivalent
  English language category page, providing users
  with the option to explore English language
  resources.
•  
• All content on the LOTE pages (including
  category names and descriptions) for languages
  that use a non-Roman characters (such as Chinese,
  Arabic and Greek) should use small gif images of
  the text, with ALT tags.

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Recommendations List of offline government
publications

• The LOTE pages should provide an in-language link
  through to a list of offline government
  publications. This list could be generated from
  the Victorian Government Publications database
  maintained by the State Library of Victoria.

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Recommendations

• Contact details for translation and interpreting
  services
• The portal should not provide in-language
  contact details for translation and interpreting
  services for each LOTE, as the fee-free services
  offered by (TIS, CHIS and VITS) are aimed at
  publishers (i.e. departments and government
  agencies), not citizens.
• Link to directory of intermediary services
• The VMC directory of intermediary services
  should be accessible via the portal. The focus
  should be on statewide intermediaries, as opposed
  to localised services. Users should be
  encouraged to rely on their local council to put
  them in touch with local community groups and
  intermediaries.

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Recommendation link to intermediary organisations
The VMC directory of intermediary services should
be accessible via the portal. The focus should be
on statewide intermediaries, as opposed to
localised services. Users should be encouraged
to rely on their local council to put them in
touch with local community groups and
intermediaries.
14
Recommendations

• Link to directory of ESL course providers
• It is recommended that the portal provide a link
  to government subsidised ESL courses, so that
  visitors to the portal can make contact with a
  provider of their choice. There does not appear
  to be a directory that draws together English
  courses offered by the TAFE and Adult and
  Community Education (ACE) (including Adult
  Multicultural Education Services) sectors. The
  portal link should therefore allow users to
  access the resources below. Each should include
  short in-language descriptions of the TAFE and
  ACE sectors. This should be finalised in
  consultation with DEET.
•  
• http//www.otfe.vic.gov.au/studinfo/courses/instit
  ut.htm - directory of TAFEs in Victoria
• http//www.acfe.vic.gov.au/regions/index.htmmap
  - directory of Adult and Community Education
  Regional Councils including http//203.111.74.13/
  - Adult Multicultural Education Services (AMES)
  home page, and AMES head office phone number

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Recommendations

• Search
• Recommendations relating to the provision of
  in-language search tools on the LOTE pages will
  depend on the search engine adopted by the
  portal. It is likely that searching will be
  difficult for non-Roman character sets, as
  content will largely be in pdf format, or gifs,
  with limited ALT tag text.

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Overview of recommended Model
 
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Risks

• There are some risks associated with the model
• Need for resources and a business owner
• Quality assurance, maintenance and extension of
  the model
• Trawling for Links to aggregate
• Selection of languages
• Finding a balance between easy maintenance and
  usability

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Next Steps

• Assess content using Online Requirements Review
• Discuss ownership and management of multilingual
  support with DPC
• Research options for extracting meaningful and
  useful lists from Victorian Government
  Publications Database