What is the fairest way to divide translation work in an open-source project?

[Stella_S]

I’ve been trying to organize a community-led translation of an open-source software manual, but I’m stuck on how to fairly divide the work and credit everyone. How do you handle the division of labor when the contributions are so uneven, with some people doing huge sections and others just fixing a few typos?

[Alexander91]

We split the work into blocks of text and assign a block owner. Each block has a short goal and a deadline and we keep a CONTRIBUTORS file that lists each person and the block they owned. When someone finishes a big block we add a note in the release notes and give credit for the work they led while still crediting everyone who touched it during reviews.

[VioletJH]

Our method tries to balance by difficulty not just word count. We tag blocks with a rough difficulty and reward leads with extra recognition while still crediting everyone who touched it during reviews. It helps a little but it can feel odd when someone edits a lot and gets the same credit as a single typo fix.

[Joshua.J]

One person ended up with two long chapters while others flicked through little typos. To cope we added a minimum contribution bar and required each person to own at least one section if they are on the project but that did not always work when folks came and went.

[Donald_J]

Maybe the bigger issue is not fair division but keeping people engaged. We tried to onboard new folks with simple starter tasks and pair them with a mentor rather than throwing them at a big block and that helped a bit.

[SavannahM]

We keep a running log of who touched what and try not to burn people out. Is the real problem here just getting enough hands or is the credit system in fact the root cause?