@FeNDrais (and to everybody else):
Actually, I don't understand the purpose of the tags "Father = dada" and "Father = ata". I can make up dozens of those tags with synonyms like "to phone = zvanić", "to phone = telefanavać", but I honestly can't imagine how they can be useful.

If someone knows the language, they will be able to restore the main form (at least dada and ata don't seem irregular...); and if someone needs to find the word "ata", he can simply use search.

I just used them to highlight the interchangeable aspect of the translations. I suppose I could just give it an "interchangeable" tag instead (or as an additional one).

Still, I don't see what the problem is.

"If someone knows the language" is a big assumption, as someone could be learning the language. In the latter case, that person might benefit from knowing the reason for there being multiple translations. Pinpointing the interchangeable aspects (if interchangeability is the reason) makes this possible.

If there are tagging laws that I was not aware of, then feel free to step in and correct me, though...

There are no laws, I'm just wondering... ^^

Anyway, I'm not sure that these tags will help those who doesn't know the language in any way. The sentences are identical except "dadam" and "atam", aren't they?

And please excuse my misspelling your nick. -_-

Yes, but sometimes the differences carry different meanings. There, I've put "Interchangeable Variant" tags. Now it's clear that "ata" and "dada" may be used interchangeably.

To the inquiring mind, that should be helpful.

> If there are tagging laws that I was not aware of, then
> feel free to step in and correct me, though...

There aren't any tagging laws, we're still feeling out the options.

Tags, however, do work best when a whole bunch of sentences can be tagged with the same tag. That's why I have a "Quote" tag separate from the "By-Winston Churchill" tag. Clicking on "Quote" can get you all the sentences that are quotes.

It looks like you're tagging sentences that contain words that have synonyms. A great number of words have synonyms, and I don't really see the need to belabour the point but there's nothing to stop you if you want to.

Ah, there is one thing that bugs me though - the "(Uyghur)".

When viewing a list of sentences with a tag, like
2nd Person Informal (Uyghur)
http://tatoeba.org/eng/tags/sho...mal_%28Uyghur_

You can select a language from the drop-down list on the right. I don't see the need of having a separate tag for
2nd Person Informal (Uyghur)
2nd Person Informal (Japanese)
2nd Person Informal (Swedish)
etc, etc, etc.
when you can just have
2nd Person Informal
and let people select the language they are interested in.

Fair enough. When I started tagging, I didn't realize that you could select languages.

But perhaps this brings up a bigger point. If tags are meant to group, then why not have a second set of non-grouping tags for clarifications?

> then why not have a second set of non-grouping tags for
> clarifications?

No reason why not at all. I do that with the "By-Shakespeare" and "From-Romeo and Juliet" type tags that go with the "Quote" tag. Many of them are unlikely to have more than one or two sentences.

Better yet, why not program a "Notes" tab for each sentence? Not comments, since those are for discussion, but a small notes window where the owner can clarify anything that's necessary about the sentence.

Because, to be realistic, tags like "said by male", "said by female" aren't going to be useful in terms of grouping. I don't think anyone will ever go to "Browse" and say "Hmm... I'd like to see all the sentences said by a male in so-and-so language." Those are purely for clarification, and so should not be tagged either, if grouping is the purpose.

> Interchangeable Variant
IMHO these should be attached to links, not to the sentences... Link tags aren't planned in the near future, as far as I know.

But linking two sentences in the same language already means they're interchangeable... :o

> If tags are meant to group, then why not have a second
> set of non-grouping tags for clarifications?
IMHO these tags should be attached not to the sentence, but to individual word forms. E.g. there should be a possibility to set the initial form of "dadam" to "dada", and also mark it's the noun.

But since it's too much work, these should be set automatically and only corrected when they are incorrect. And this is even more work for sysko and Trang, so I doubt this will be realised in the near future...

> I don't think anyone will ever go to "Browse" and say "Hmm...
> I'd like to see all the sentences said by a male in so-and-so
> language." Those are purely for clarification, and so should
> not be tagged either, if grouping is the purpose.
I can imagine such a situation. ^^

> I don't think anyone will ever go to "Browse" and say "Hmm...
> I'd like to see all the sentences said by a male in so-and-so
> language."

Actually I disagree. It would be a good way of picking up gender differences in the language - something that can be
very useful. For example, it's commonly said that there are a
lot of big muscular American soldiers who speak oddly feminine
Japanese because they've been learning from their girlfriends. ;-)