I would definitely want to see the statistics and see what are the top few most spoken languages of OGS users.
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Maybe (my tech knowkedge is limited) we could have something looking at what is the language by default of the browsers coming on OGS? That’d be a start.
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Country data from 2021:
Not very reliable, and don’t exactly indicate language, but still give an idea of the distribution.
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That is a good idea and it is inline with what I mentioned in the first spot (the case where the languages used between two people who both speak that language to communicate in a better more concise way between them).
This also nullifies most of the presented issues since the participants of those sub-boards are either native or highly professional speakers of that language or, which is an added bonus, people that are trying to learn that language and wish to use that sub-board for training their communication skills. 
If I am not mistaken the owner is from an English speaking country and the base language of the server and the forum, which is then used to translate the whole OGS platform to other languages, is English.
So, even if there is no declaration of “primary language” (OGS is not a country to have a constitution 
), there is a practical understanding that the base language of OGS is, indeed, English.
Exactly, and usually the second language that most people happen to know in here is, English.
This is why in my example, I used English in Sweden and tourists use English in Greece. That happens to be the most common second language for the natives of those countries.
They probably do, but more people know English here, than own Apple devices.
I have yet to even see one in my whole life, let alone hold one or use one.
I assume that Android phones will have apps that do the same thing, but I have never checked it out.
Πες το κι έτσι…
I do not have a problem with it either.
We are just discussing/exploring the pros and cons of the idea, since that is the topic.
I put that in google translate and totally agree.
By the way, if you do not mind the totally ignorant question, but I have had this thing that I was wondering about ever since I saw Hindi text decades ago.
Since there seems to be an horizontal line that exists in all the letters, at the same relative vertical coordinates/position, do the student notepads in India contain that extra line as standard?
For example, this is a normal student notepad page here in Greece:
But does a notepad for Hindu students contain a faint line like this, to help them balance their letters, at least while they are learning?
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No. Maybe that line is present in those special notebooks for toddlers to learn the script, but no. That line is not needed. All the notebooks look like the first image you posted. However some kids in the primary standard (until 5th) do use notebooks with double faint lines for English. To help them write better cursive.
Also, small correction. Hindu, is a person who follows Hinduism (religion). Hindi, is a language (spoken in central and Northern India). Example, an Indian Christian also speaks/write Hindi.
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The Chinese writing practice notebook (usually split into 4 parts per word) is a lot more daunting to look at and practice (especially for traditional Chinese). It would have the word itself, the “root” of the word, the number of strokes, and the strokes outside of the roots, and the sequence of the strokes, breaking down in every step, and lots and lots of repeated practice for each word. (and for Taiwan, we also added an additional how to pronounce them using Bopomofo on the side)
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Awesome … would so very much love to learn Chinese but this life is already overflowing with everything else I’m trying to learn. Alas!
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I don’t have difficulties to read this without extra effort. Just 2 clicks is enough to make it English.
But if this would be translated by non English speaker to English by translator I think it make a lot difficulties to decode it.
Although we both non English speakers, we can express our thoughts in English so we write in English here.
But we mustn’t force other people to write in English. Especially if their English is none.
It won’t help. I forced my browser to send ‘en-US,en;q=0.9’ in ‘Accept-Language:’ header. I think other users could make it too. Because lots of web resources try to use autotranslator with terrible quality. Even UI is unreadable.
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A lot of decently good points have been raised in here. The idea that someone can tap two times to translate something is certainly something I have learned.
My thoughts are somewhat between the two ideas being proposed… and for multiple reasons.
1- The question “should non-English speakers post in their native language?” isn’t really a good question, no disrespect intended. A better question might have been “Are there any problems with posting in this forum in a language other than English?” When we use the words “should”, there is a moral imperative, almost, implied in the question… which puts quite the burden on those answering the question, and indeed on those answeing them.
It creates a situation where there is the potential for a wrong answer, and while this may seem needlessly nitpicky of me, I don’t think it is. How we choose to frame a question is often indicative of the kind of conversations that result from that question.
2- If we go, and then use the suggested question above, the answers will become quite different. Are there really any substantial reasons why a person cannot post in their own language, be it as a response or indeed an original post? Quite simple… the answer is no.
Even when we respond and create posts in English, there is still a lot of detail missed. It’s why my own responses tend to be somewhat on the longer side, because I have a personal craving to be understood exactly in what I’m saying. Even so, the context of tone, sarcasm, humour, and more is lost in the written word unless oddly specified. The only times when the written word can convey such meanings are usually through fictional writing, where it is overtly stated that a character is being sarcastic or is using a tone that would be lost were it not said, and of course, when someone goes out of their way to express something using languge and comparisons to convey something to an “in croud” of people who understand the comparisons being used and thus can of course understand the “implied” tones being used.
So… if such things are already being lost with just a standard response in a forum, where people can read in their mind the words I write, and atribute emotions that I may not be feeling, then the idea that losing context through translation, is somwhat an argument that falls flat in that context is nearly always being lost, or forgotten in some reguard, regardless of the situation.
3- The translation tools that we have available in this day and age, for any suitably well-known language, are good enough already that the loss of any context through that language is somewhat mitigated. People also have the agency to be able to translate what they have written and see for themselves just what that translation does to their intended content. People, therefore, can make an informed decision by themselves, knowing the broad result of what their writing is going to become in translation, before they hit the send button.
As such, if they indeed do choose to write something in a different language from English, then the responsibility of the content of their writing still belongs to them… not to the tool that is translating it, because they have the option to check the translation to see what would be churned out by that tool, or any other general translation tool.
Any misunderstandings that could arise from a translation would, in theory, be minimal. In situations where they could be, broadly speaking, more problematic or larger, there are already tools in place to mitigate this, and it falls on the person posting in a different language to check that themselves before posting, or inevitably wind up in a situation where they have to correct themselves anyway.
But! The caveat to this is that when we post in English, it is incumbent on us English speakers to do the same, and to ensure what we are saying also makes sense in English… the added burden is minimal at best, and at worst any burden created by writing posts in an alternative language belongs to the author, not the reader.
I do not see clicking twice to get a quick translation, a burden. Much in the same way, none of us in here had to click to open this thread and begin reading, and or responding.
My final thoughts are this: if you want to comment or post in a different language, go ahead and do so. If people want to read what you have written, they will translate it. The burden of posting in a different language belongs only to the person who is actually posting in this way. If that is broadly understood, then I don’t see any single real issue with seeing different languages popping up.
One last thing I would add is this… this is a majority English-speaking/writing place, but that is broadly speaking by convention more than any other thing. As such, conventions can change, and it may be that the internet as a whole will be using Chinese Mandarin to communicate in 50 years. But no convention around language is ever really going to hold that much weight when powerful tools for translation exist, and thus, a broad understanding between people who speak different languages also exists.
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From past experiences, there are some languages very hard to translate to English, and no easy tool to do so, and full of miscommunications in the post, even if the original post uses their own language.
I myself often need to take quite a bit of effort when trying to translate some ancient writings or sources in Chinese or medieval Japanese to share here, and as far as I know, there is still no tool that would be able to translate them without confusing the hell out of the reader.
Let me show you an example of an ancient text
誘征 第二
凡棋有徵棋，未須急煞，使令引出，必獲利多。既被入征，前鋒必引應子，凡有六處：二處當空，四處當實。烏子征白子者，左右二相，各有一角，白子既被入征在中，使為二角。烏子左右二相角外，各有一空角，白子當此角引者，皆得其力。白外引者，全不相應。當此六處引者，道別各有其法。白子當左相空角者，烏子必須在右相當空角，去所引白子一角對頭上下兩道任著之。白子還，入征死。白子當烏子左相角引者，烏子又須在左相對白處角，去所引白子一角對上頭道著之，對頭而死。白子若引自當左相角，烏子在右相自當其對白自一角著之，還入征死。左右各二相，任引皆準此法。白引子二子各當二白角者。烏子在外，皆上押二子入回征之而死。此乃引征之法，必須詳審，思而行之。依法為者，獲利不少。
Anyone who doesn’t know Chinese can tell what this paragraph is talking about?
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I could tell you what Gemini thinks 
It thinks it’s about ladder tactics in Go
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I understand the point you are trying to make here. But my point still stands: if you wish to post and comment in ancient Chinese, you are free to do so. However, the repercussions of that also belong to you.
Yes, the translation tool does butcher ancient Chinese, and no doubt that would be the case for other languages as well; however, if you are choosing to write in that language, and people cannot understand what is being said, then they are free to not respond to you, or to ask you to be clearer. It’s important to understand that if you “want” to be understood, it’s on you to make sure that you are.
We can use the tools available to us to translate, and that’s no real burden on me to use that tool. That said, the example you presented to us is an extreme one and represents something of an argumentative fallacy in debate. You may be one person who can use Ancient Chinese conversationally, but I very much doubt that there would be many other people who share that particular skill.
If you are going to suggest that no one should post in their language of choice because the tools of translation available to us don’t work in extreme circumstances, when they work fine in almost all other standard interactions for a vast majority of languages, then you are essentially removing choice and freedom of expression from everyone who may wish to use an alternative language.
The fact of the matter is, translation tools work pretty well for the majority of commonly spoken languages, and I don’t foresee a time when there will be a group of people wanting to communicate all of their ideas and responses in ancient languages that even native speakers of the countries of their origins cannot read or write in.
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That’s not my point, if you saw my reply earlier, I am for people to use their own languages in their own subsections, so people don’t need to spend time misunderstanding each other. A post is not just the original post, but mostly about replies and comments with others, as you said, those who wish to discuss in a foreign language purely rely on translation tools and have no knowledge of the context and cultures of the original ones would waste so many replies just double check, and often even become offensive, and spiral into chaos, or no body wish to discuss anymore.
Without a special section, the general section I think, would devolve into chaos, and lots of “dead posts” no one would want to reply and participate. There has to be a measure in place to keep the discussion flowing, instead of wasting so much time double and triple-checking, and risking splitting the already not-so-popular forum further apart.
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which version of Gemini did you use?
Summary
The 2.5 flash did a very poor job,
https://gemini.google.com/share/6f5b9e057752
The 2.5 pro most people have limited access, and its thinking process implies it is searching the internet for sources of the title, but the content is still gibberish
https://gemini.google.com/share/06a3e9d5b0f3
And gpt-5 is clueless
ChatGPT - Go pursuit sequence translation
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This thread reminds me of this funny translation that caused misunderstandings:
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Das könnte aber die Moderation des Forums erheblich erschweren, weil es dann erfordern würde, dass es im Moderationsteam Sprecher/innen jener Sprachen gibt.
Was zum Teufel?
However, this could make the moderation of the forum considerably more difficult, because it would then require that there are speakers of those languages in the moderation team.
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沒錯，在我們大學的BBS站上，就是各國的留學生自己去管理版務，或是找外語系的幫忙(他們通常非常積極的想跟留學生交流)。但這些板的人氣也不一定跟會說的人數有關，但往往那些很冷門語言的往往會吸引不少人去跟他們交流(因為好奇)，而通常都是有會說那個語言的人去申請才會去成立獨立看板成為第一代的板主。(要有申請才會成立分板)
上面在說啥?
That’s right, in our BBS for university students, they are usually moderate by themselves, or find those who studied in foreign language degrees to help assist (they are usually very eager to have conversations with exchange students). However, the number of speakers of a language is not always associated with how popular a particular sub-board becomes. A lot of times, those boards with unfamiliar languages have high popularity since people are curious and want to learn and know these languages. And these sub-boards have to be applied by people who speak it and wish to create them to begin with, and become the first generation of the mods/admins (exchange students would need to leave eventually).
It’s not the job of the server administrators to set them up, but only when enough people are interested and wish to communicate in them, would them be formed and have a purpose to exist (and obviously they have to take care of them), otherwise those rarely visited boards might just get suspended and achieved.
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Flags chosen by players. And here we are talking about languages. I think browser language setting may be more pertinent.
I think both have the issue of not indicating what languages the users can speak. I can be from a certain country with a certain browser setting but I can speak a totally different language.