#now I just gotta poke html and hopefully it works

[jcmarchi]

CSS Chronicles XLII

New Post has been published on https://thedigitalinsider.com/css-chronicles-xlii/

CSS Chronicles XLII

Remember these? Chris would write a post now and then to chronicle things happening around the ol’ CSS-Tricks site. It’s only been 969 days since the last one, give or take. Just think: back then we were poking at writing CSS in JavaScript and juuuuuuust starting to get excited about a set of proposed new color features that are mostly implemented today. We’re nesting CSS rules now. Container queries became an actual thing.

CSS was going gosh-darned hog wild. Probably not the “best” time for a site about CSS to take a break, eh?

That’s why I thought I’d dust off the chronicles. It’s been a hot minute and a lot is happening around CSS-Tricks today.

I’m (sorta) back

We may as well begin here! Yeah, I was “let go” last year. There was no #HotDrama. A bunch of really good folks — all in the DigitalOcean community team — were let go at the same time. It was a business decision, love it or not.

Things changed at DigitalOcean after that. A new leadership team is on board and, with it, a re-dedicated focus on re-establishing the community side of things. That, and Chris published a meaty post about the CSS-Tricks situation from his perspective. Coincidentally or not, a new job opened that looked a lot like my old gig. I had feelings about that, of course.

This little flurry of activity led to a phone call. And a few more. And now I’m back to help get the ol’ CSS-Tricks engine purring, hopefully making it the rich resource we’ve loved for so long. I’m on contract at the moment and feeling things out.

So far? Man, it feels great to be back.

What I did during the “lull”

I jumped over to Smashing Magazine. Gosh, that team is incredible. It tickles me that we still have Smashing Magazine. And here’s a piece of trivia for your next front-end cocktail party: Smashing Magazine was launched in September 2006, a mere 11 months before Chris published the very first article here on CSS-Tricks.

I also spent my time teaching front-end development at a couple of colleges that are local to me where I live in Colorado. I had already been teaching but bumped up the load. But not too much because I decided this was as good a time as any to work on a master’s degree. So, I enrolled and split my days as a part-time editor, part-time educator, and part-time student.

The degree went quicker than expected, so I used the rest of my time finishing up an online course I had started a couple years earlier and finally got around to publishing it! It’s probably not the sort of course for someone reading this post, but for complete beginners who are likely writing their very first line of HTML or CSS. You ever get asked how to build a website but don’t have the energy (or time) to explain everything? Yeah, me too. That’s who this course is for. And my mom.

I call it The Basics — and I’d love it if you shared it with anyone you think might use it as a starting point into web development.

What I want for CSS-Tricks, going forward

This site’s always been great, even long before I was brought on board. Historically, it’s been more of a personal blog turned multi-author blog with a steady stream of content. Nothing wrong with that at all.

What’s lacking, though, is structure. Most everything we publish is treated like a blog post: write it, smash the Publish button, and let it sit on top of the stream until the next blog post comes out. We’re talking about a time-based approach in which posts become a timeline of activity in reverse chronological order. Where do you find that one post you came across last month? It’s probably buried by this point and you’ve gotta either hit the post archives or try your hand searching for it by keyword. That might work for a blog with a few hundred posts, but there are more than 7,000 here and searching has become more like finding the metaphorical needle in the equally metaphorical haystack.

So, you may have noticed that I’m shuffling things around. Everything is still a “post” but we’re now using a Category taxonomy more effectively than we had been in the past. Each category is a “type” of post. And the type of post is determined by what exactly we’re trying to get out of it. Let’s actually break this out into its own section because it’s a sizeable change with some explanation around it.

The “types” of things we’re publishing

OK, so everything used to be an article or an Almanac entry. We still have “articles” and “entries” but there are better ways to classify and distinguish them, most notably with articles.

This is how it shakes out:

Articles: The tutorials that have been the CSS-Tricks bread and butter forever

Guides: Comprehensive deep dives into a specific CSS topic (like the Flexbox guide)

Almanac: Reference pieces for understanding CSS selectors and properties that can be cited in articles and guides.

Notes: A post for taking notes on things we’re learning. They’re meant to be loose and a little rough around the edges, just like taking notes you’d take from a class lecture — only we’re taking notes on the things that others in the community (like you!) are writing about.

Links: Things we’re reading that we find interesting and want to share with you. A link might evolve into a Note down the road, but they’re also useful resources that can be cited in the Almanac, a guide, or an article.

Quick Hits: I hate this name but the idea is to have a place to post little one-liners, like a thought, an idea, or perhaps some timely news. I’m openly accepting ideas for a better name for these. 😇

This is what we’re looking at right now, but there are obviously other ways we can slice-n-dice content. For example, we have an archive of “snippets” that we’ve buried for many years but could be useful. Same with videos. And more, if you can believe it. So, there’s plenty of housekeeping to do to keep us busy! This is still very much early days. You’ll likely experience some turbulence during your flight. And I’m okay with that because this is a learning place, and the people working it are learning, too.

Yes, I did just say, “people” as in more than one person because I’d to…

Welcome a couple of new faces!

The thing that excites me most — even more than the ice cream truck excites my daughters — is bringing new people along for the ride. Running CSS-Tricks is a huge job (no matter how easy I make it look 😝). So, I’ve brought on a couple of folks to help share the load!

Juan Diego Rodriguez

Ryan Trimble

I got to know Juan Diego while editing for Smashing Magazine. He had written a couple of articles for Smashing before I joined and his latest work, the first part of a series of articles discussing the “headaches” of working with Gatsby, landed on my desk. It’s really, really good — you should check it out. What you should know about Juan Diego that I’ve come know is that the dude cares a lot about the web platform. Not only that, but pays close attention to it. I’m pretty sure he reads CSSWG specifications for pleasure over tea. His love and curiosity for all-things-front-end is infectious and I’ve already learned a bunch from him. I know you will, too.

Ryan, on the other hand, is a total nerd for design systems that advocates for accessible interfaces. He actually reached out to me on Mastodon when he caught wind that I needed help. It was perfect timing and I couldn’t be more grateful that he poked me when he did. As I’ve gotten to know him, I’m realizing how versatile his skillset is. Working with “design systems” can mean lots of different things. For Ryan, it means consistent, predictable user interfaces based on modular and reusable web components — specifically web components that are native to the platform. In fact, he’s currently working on a design system called Platform UI. I’ve also become a fan of his personal blog, especially his weekly roundups of articles he finds interesting.

You’ll be seeing a lot of Juan Diego and Ryan around here! They’re both hard at work on bringing the trusty Almanac up-to-date but will be posting articles as well. No one’s full time here, me included, so it’s truly a team effort.

Please give ’em both a hearty welcome!

This is all an ongoing work in progress

…and probably always will be! I love that CSS-Tricks is a place where everyone learns together. It might be directly about CSS. Maybe it’s not. Perhaps it’s only tangentially related to web development. It may even be a rough idea that isn’t fully baked, but we put it out there and learn new things together with an open mind to the fact that the web is a massive place where everyone has something to contribute and a unique perspective we all benefit from — whether it’s from a specialization in CSS, semantics, performance, accessibility, design, typography, marketing, or what have you.

Do you wanna write for CSS-Tricks?

You can and you should! You get paid, readers learn something, and that gets people coming to the site. Everybody wins!

I know writing isn’t everyone’s top skill. But that’s exactly what the team is here for. You don’t have to be a superior writer, but only be willing to write something. We’ll help polish it off and make it something you’re super proud of.

More than 200 web developers, designers, and specialists just like you have written for this site. You should apply to write an article and join the club!

So, yes: CSS-Tricks is back!

In its own weird way! In my perfect world, there would be no doubt whether CSS-Tricks is publishing content on any given day. But that’s not entirely up to me. It not only has to be of at least some value to people like you who depend on sites like CSS-Tricks but also to DigitalOcean. It’s a delicate dance but I think everyone’s on the same page with a shared interest of keeping this site around and healthy.

I’m stoked I get to be a part of it. And that Juan Diego and Ryan do, too. And you, as well.

We’re all in it together. 🧡

[other-peoples-coats]

Notes on Mando'a in BTMYBW

Ok! so, the next chapter of Be that monster you been wanting is about to go up, and it contains like, so much fucking mando'a I kitbashed into existence. This post goes into more about the specifics of word choices, what I actually did, and the sort of world building navel gazing I suspect only one or two people might care about.

You do not need to read this to understand the next chapter; everything you need to understand what's happening in the chapter is on Ao3. This is notes on translation choice, some of which make things slightly more nuanced, none of which alter the story or actual meaning of the chapter.

A disclaimer: I am not a linguist. I don't even play one on tv. My grasp of grammar was formed by the Australian schooling system, which is so notoriously bad at teaching grammar that novels that have been published in Australian markets often get automatically re-edited by overseas publishing houses when they acquire the rights because the grammatical standards here are so comparatively low.

What I am saying is: I might have fucked this up terribly, and I am in no means an expert at anything here. I've been writing in mando'a for [checks notes] uh about just over two weeks, so, y'know. Baby's first nonfunctional conlang. That said: under the cut be spoilers for chapter 10 of be that monster you been wanting, some wider spoilers for the world (though none of them are very specific and honestly shouldn't be that surprising), and kind of a lot of thought about mandalorian cultural differences, at least as I'm making them up for this particular AU.

Also, so much made up Mando'a.

So, the major resource I used while kitbashing this nightmare language together was the great big google spreadsheet of doom, with a little from mando'a.org.

One of the main sort of ideas that I leant heavily on is that Mando'a uses a lot of words for both military use and for civilian use, and it's heavily contextually dependent.

The New Mandalorians, being pacifists, are mostly ditching a lot of those meanings and/or making new ones, or just not needing to make a distinction between, say, putting your armour on, and putting on clothing. Qui-gon would have learnt the New Mandolorain / Kalevalan dialect of Mando'a — so he translates, say, 'comms unit' (which I have rendered as jorhaa'ur, from talk [jorhaa'ir] + 'ur for performer of the action) as talker, like person who is talking, instead of the more accurate (to the context) translation as radio or comms unit.

In context, the word is pulling double duty and is dependant on said context to differentiate between 'person who is talking' and 'helmet radio, aka thing you do the talking with'.

One of the other major things I kind of tossed out was that Mando'a doesn't use anything but simple tenses, because…well, that's not really functional for me. That's it, it's easier to have progressive tenses and past tenses and past progressive tenses to tell the story I'm telling, and the idea that you might never ever hear them is nuts to me.

In world, I'm going to call that one of the major differences between dialects — on the sliding scale of Modern to Archaic As Fuck, the three major dialects I'm making up (New Mando'a aka Kalevalan, what I'll call Common Mando'a which is everyone else, Death Watch Mando'a which is…death watch) sit basically:

-New Mandalorian: most modern, lots of complicated verb structures and much less contextually dependent words, very few uses for meanings of words pulling double duty of military and civilian.

-Common Mando'a: somewhat modern, more context dependent but still uses some complex verb forms when needed, many words pull double duty as military terms and civilian ones

-Death Watch Mando'a: Intentionally obscure, highly context dependant, and a fuck load of very old words literally no one else uses anymore. Almost no complex verb structures. This is not really a natural dialect, but something made up by a cult and used exclusively by a cult. Shit loads of jargon pretending to be a sentence, basically.

In general, the more modern your base dialect, the more complicated your sentence and grammar becomes, but the less ambiguous your words are. There would be sub dialects, but: I ain't fucking with that.

Yes, this does mean that Death Watch — a literal cult — are out there talking in a very closed off, kind of nearly incomprehensible and hugely context dependent sentence structure that is at least a bit alienating to everyone else. This is on purpose, because, again, it's a cult. That's how cults work, making themselves more closed off to outsiders helps reinforce Stay With The Cult.

They're also prone to using more archaic words and phrases, because…uh, they're very much into the whole The Good Old Days (when we were Conquering Warlords), which includes things like we used to say it like THIS. "man's out here trying to chat with the taung empire" is the sort of thing mean teens might say, if it was safe to make fun of death watch, who are doing the equivalent of wandering around being like FORSOOTH and VERRILY instead of, y'know, modern english.

Ok! I think that's all the like, base world assumptions, more or less. Let's get down to the word choices. So, the first sentences of Mando'a is from Satine (Kalevalan by birth though now speaks mostly Common Mando'a, so she's got complex grammar coming out of her ears).

Ogir shi sol'tan jet'entye'tsad ni ven'nari ruusiir'an Manda'yaim ne'ja'hailir. Ru'ca'nara jetii taabir rud Manda'yaim, ner buir cu'kyrun'amu, shi jorcu jor kih'paklalat bac ner kih'vod balyc ni nu'mirshe'vi'tayc.

Literally, this translates as "There's only one of those who have jedi-duty I'd trust (on) mandalore not-observed. Time(past) Jedi march around mandalore, my parent was soul killed, only because-why little silver tongue that my little sibling and I not-mind-collared."

Which, uh, is a pretty nonsense sentence.

Functionally, though, I've translated it as "There's only one who follows the Jedi code I'd trust on Mandalore unwatched. The last time a Jedi wandered around here, my father was killed, and it's only because of little silver tongue that I and my sister aren't mindless slaves too".

To break down the word choices a bit more:

Sol'tan is direct from the spreadsheet, and means one, but in the sense of like, unique or one of a kind. Satine's doing the verbal equivalent of saying the one (1) [jedi] she trusts.

jet'entye'tsad is a kitbashed word from jetii (jedi) + the archaic word for duty, specifically the debt a mandalorian owes to mandalorian society (Mand'entye) + group ('tsad).

Functionally, Satine's approaching this from a slightly different perspective than just those who are Currently Part Of The Order — she's talking about anyone who follows the Jedi Code and/or acts as a Jedi, basically.

As an example based in canon, post order 66, the Order (jetiise) doesn't exist, but the jedi-duty (jet'entye) will, and those who follow it are jet'entye'tsad, even if they're not jetiise.

ven'nari ruusiir'an is the future progressive (I think) of trust — so, functionally, it's I (would) trust.

ne'ja'hailir is ne' (negative) + observe/watch over, so. unwatched/unobserved. Qui-gon is missing the negative, but is still getting…roughly the right translation, as spotty as it is. (he translates it as observed rather than unobserved.)

ne'cara is time, ru' is the prefix for past tense. Time-(past), which is a very rough sort of last time or the time (in the past).

taabir is technically foot+verb ending (ir), so like, footed. The spreadsheet has it as marched, but since I'm pulling this mando'a into doing double duty, it's functioning here as a general word for moved around — everything from like, marched to walked to wandered.

cu'kyrun'amu - this is a big kitbash. cu' is the passive (was, in this case) + ky'runi is soul killed +'amu seems to be the suffix attached to murder or like, killed rather than just died.

Spoilery sidebar about ky'runi — the spreadsheet has it listed as very rarely used, mostly about someone who is completely destroyed and unwilling to live on, "killed soul".

Functionally, in this case, Satine is talking about her father having been had his mind fucked with so badly and extensively over that year on the run that he wasn't, functionally, a person any more, just a puppet for the Sith. The man who her father was was dead, and his body just happened to still be moving around. Or at least, that's how she conceptualised it.

kih'paklalat is functioning here as a nickname. Literally, it means small-silver tongue, but I'm using it as a nickname, and also sort of as a call sign. OPSEC is no joke, and sure, Qui-gon doesn't speak Mando'a as far as they know, but saying who it really is would make it pretty obvious to him anyway. Some of this is habit from the year on the run. Names have power.

last kitbashed word of the sentence! nu'mirshe'vi'tayc - not-mind-collared. nu' is, again, negative, mirshe is actually technically brain rather than mind, and vi'tayc is collared, like of an animal or very derogatory for a slave. This is a word that would probably more accurately translate as brainwashed in normal use, but, uh, given they're talking about a sith, it's a far more literal 'collar on the mind' kind of deal.

Sentence two.

Ranov'saan ru'jorhaa'ir kil'yc Jetiise nu'cuyi sa'ibacir. Literally, this translates as Secret-reliable said some jedi not-be like-that. Functionally, I've translated this as Ranov'saan said that at least some of the order wasn't like that.

Ranov'saan comes from secret (ranov'la) + reliable (saan), and is a play on an apparently common Mandalorian name, ruusaan (reliable one). Another nickname/callsign, this one much easier to slip into conversation.

(yes, Qui-gon is ...kind of right about it being a variation on Ruusaan, if not quite like a john/jon situation)

ru'jorhaa'ir is just talk/speak but past tense.

Kil'yc and jetiise are both from the spreadsheet. Bo-katan is using jedi here, not people who follow the order's duty, because she's specifically talking about, well, Jedi, and in the context that dooku was a "jedi" at the point he was on mandalore and mindfucked their dad. This is part of the reason I came up with that differential — I figure mandalorians, of all people, would have a way to draw a line between [part of group] and [part of culture which mostly overlaps with group]

cuyi is the catch all verb for to be — eg he is/ they are/I am — and, as said earlier, nu' is a negative. therefore, not-to-be, or he isn't / they aren't / I am not etc.

sa is like, and ibac is that, ir is the verb modifier suffix, therefore, kitbashed it's like-that, as in, 'George is a dickhead, I'm so glad sally isn't like that.'

Sentence (chunk) three! and the comparative linguistics associated with it.

Solacabur cuyi kar'tyc meg kebbur pel'tigaanur kaden'edee meh kaysh mirdir ru'sur trikar'la, ne'sushir meg duur'shupuur bah kaysh. Atin en'naryc shabuir.

Literally, this is Lonely-protector is softhearted who try soft-touch angry-teeth if he think looked sad, ignore what might-injure to him. Stubborn dutiful bastard.

Functionally, I translated this as Solacabur's a softie who'd try and pet a rancor if he thought it looked sad, and never mind what damage it did to him. Stubborn dutiful bastard.

Solacabur is, again, a nickname/callsign. Literally it translates as lonely protector or isolated guardian (Sola = single/lonely/isolated, cabur = guardian/protector), but, y'know, smashed together like that it's more obviously a callsign.

Having multiple callsigns is not usually useful or even a good idea, at least all in use at once within the same group — normally one would be retired before the next one was used, so kih'paklalat THEN Ranov'saan THEN Solacabur— but given uh, the Year on the Run is basically when Satine and Bo developed their OPSEC standards, they are very into redundancies and making it as difficult as possible to tell who they're talking about or even how many people.

(Yes there are reasons for this that are maybe obvious but will be in more detail in the side fic still currently Satine Wins Worst Gap Year Award).

cuyi is often dropped in conversational sentences in mando'a, but I'm using it here as a sort of emphasis — not just that Solacabur's got a soft heart, but that they're a softie. Not derogatory, but the sort of — resigned fondness. the difference between "He'll do [x]" and "He will do [x]" — both are grammatically correct, but one's a bit more…emphasised, I suppose.

pel'tigaanur is kitbashed - pel is soft and tigaanur is touch, thus, to pet something rather than just, y'know, touch it however.

kaden'edee is also kit-bashed to be rancor, given, uh, they're angry and have so many teeth(kaden = angry, edee = teeth/jaws).

Mando'a seems to mostly go in for false naming things, rather than having a specific name — like the gentle folk instead of fae or bear instead of the unknown word bear replaced, the specific phrase for this sort of thing escapes me at the moment — so angry-teeth seemed like it fit in with the other mando'a animal names (wind-bird and iron-teeth, etc).

mirdir is actually 'think' (direct from the spreadsheet), but contextually it's thought, in the sort of indefinite [whenever] time frame. If they were speaking only following Kalevalan dialectal norms Bo would probably use ru'mirdir, which is more precise and grammatically consistent. But accents are fuckin wild and so is dialect, so. mirdir it is.

sur is sight/the thing you're looking at, and ru' is once again past tense. Thus, looked as opposed to looks. In less Kalevalan influenced Mando'a this would probably just be sur, and the looked would be contextual, but Satine and Bo are chatting to each other and doing the equivalent of somewhat sliding into their shared childhood accent/dialect.

duur'shupuur is more kitbash - duur is may, and shupuur is injure. duur' seems to be a prefix, and if it's not, well, mando'a probably has a word for [thing/situation] that might hurt (you/anyone).

kaysh is the one (1) mando'a pronoun. Not super common in conversational Common Mando'a, far more common in Kalevalan dialect, used here both as a dialectal habit to specify and as emphasis, because it's about how Solacabur specifically might get hurt (and wouldn't care if it meant they helped someone).

en'naryc is en'nar (duty) + the yc suffix because it's an adjective/adverb - the [stubborn bastard] is dutiful.

Shabuir is bastard. Like the sheet says it means jerk but stronger, but come on. Buir is parent. It's mando'a for bastard.

kih'kaden is a kitbash - kih' is the prefix for small, and kaden is angry. So, annoying is small-angry.

Which means, yes, the New Mandalorians he was staying with and helping negotiate grain and fibre standards called Qui-gon a stubborn annoying bastard.

Sentence (chunk) four!

Ne'miit'akaan. Ni ru'ogir, partaylir. Ni ru'jahailir dini'la shu'shuk bes'haarir buy'ce tatugir'tuur balyc banar troan be'haaran ru'nari dinuir'an kaysh ge kyr'nuhoy mirshe'jehavey'irne, jorcu vencuyanir mhi haaranovor mirshe'jurkadur Jetii'cabur balyc Kyr'tsad.

This one's a fucking doozy.

Literally, it says:

No argument. I was there, remember. I saw (that) crazy disaster put on helmet repeated day also happen face covering kept giving him almost coma brain ambush(the most), because sustain us hide (from) his brain-rapist jedi-guardian also deathwatch.

Less literally:

Won't argue with that. I was there too, remember. I watched that insane disaster put that helmet on every day even though having anything over his face just about sent him catatonic with trauma, cause it would keep us hidden from his mind rapist teacher and deathwatch.

So, breaking it down into words, skipping those that are either covered or already in the spreadsheet and don't need more explanation:

miit'akaan is argument, nu' is negative, this is pretty simple. Sliding a little away from Kalevean dialectal norms here, because Bo's talking about something that happened during the year on the run, where she was Very Much Not talking like a Kalevalan. (Memory is wild, and it is 100% a real thing that sometimes people will talk differently from their current usual accent just from recalling a memory of when they used different accents or dialect.)

Ni ru'ogir is literally I there (Ni ogir), functionally I [was] there, and ru' is, again, past tense. Therefore, I was there instead of I am there.

Ni ru'jahailir is again, I (past tense) + observe (jahailir). Jahailir is pulling double duty here — in a civilian context it is watch like I watch birds, in a military context it's more like observe like we are observing the patrol schedule before infiltrating the base. Sliding a bit further down the scale away from Kalevalan dialectal norms.

Deathwatch Mando'a would use jahailir exclusively. Common Mando'a would use it as well as several other options. Kalevalan Mando'a would use it mostly as a very specific sort of meaning akin to observe like scientifically observe rather than common phrasing.

dini'la shu'shuk - literally, it means insane/crazy disaster, but functionally, it's the sort of — that mad bastard, where you're half admiring and half holy shit what the fuck are you DOING mate?! On the one hand, Bo-katan is thankful, obviously. On the other hand, it was the kind of thing that's so far beyond the line of what's expected that you just have to be like 'holy fuck dude you are going way harder for this than anyone would — should, does — expect of you'.

bes'haarir buy'ce this is partially kitbash! haarir is put on/dress up/etc, and bes' seems to be the root word fragment for anything to do with iron/armour. Thus, bes'haarir is to specifically put on armour, as distinct from put on, say, your tunic. New Mando'a does not use this word; the other two dialects do, because they actually have a need to specify between putting on armour and putting on, like, Things What Make You Not Be Naked In Public.

Buy'ce is helmet. I'm pretty sure if you've read one fic in star wars that uses Mando'a you know this word. It's paired with the above because…well, that's what makes Bo say bes'haarir rather than just haarir, for all that Common Mando'a would probably count both as 'correct' phrasing, given the unambiguous context.

tatugir'tuur is literally repeat day kitbashed together. Mando'a does not seem to have a word for every day, but given the structure of some of the other time words, repeat day seemed…close enough.

Also, yes, Bo-katan is drifting even further from Kalevalan dialectal norms — contextually, this word is an indefinite length of repeats, and also should be past tense. Neither of which Bo has used.

balyc banar - again, literally this is also happen. Contextually, this is [doing x for y reason] also (caused) [z thing] (to) happen. Functionally… this is not how the more modern dialects of Mando'a would phrase it. It's heavily contextual, the grammar is a fucking mess, and there's just… less convouluted ways to say that.

troan'be haaran - kitbash. Dialectal phrase that has ossified in use in Common Mando'a despite being wildly archaic in structure, is in heavy use in Deathwatch Mando'a because it's wildly archaic in structure, and is not used at all in Kalevalan Mando'a because a) archaic and b) no helmets in common use. Troan is face, haaran is cover/clothes/suit. 'be is the archaic version of a possessive prefix - the modern possessive goes at the start of the proper noun. (thus, haaran be'troan, or face's cover).

ru'nari dinuir'an here's where we get in the weeds. dinuir is give, ru'nari [word]'an is past progressive tense. Thus, we get something kind of like kept giving.

Is the grammar here correct in any way for any dialect? No, not really. Death Watch Mando'a doesn't use past progressive tense explicitly and just lets it sit as contextual, Kalevalan Mando'a does use past progressive but wouldn't phrase the rest of the sentence like this, ditto for Common Mando'a. Bo-Katan is doing the thing where you know a phrase in one language but can't remember what it is in the language you're speaking, and end up with like 'mat on be the cat was sit', which…is intelligible, but also, not…really correct.

kyr'nuhoy - coma. Literally, death-sleep — this is straight from the sheet, but is grammatically…uh, wrong. It's wrong. Bo-katan should be saying comatose or, honestly, catatonic, but, again, dialectal slipping etc etc. She's sort of letting the past progressive plus the almost (ge) carry the context here, which isn't actually right for any dialect but does make sense from a mixed dialectal stance. I mean, kind of, it's nonsense strictly grammatically speaking.

As an aside - disorganised speech is in fact a semi-common trauma response, even without dialectal differences making it much easier. (also like, non-neurotypical etc etc, but. y'know. It's trauma, here.)

mirshe'jehavey'irne - full kitbash. mirshe(brain)+ jehavey'ir (ambush) + ne (superlative suffix). Literally, this is most brain ambush, but I'm using it as a sort of catch all trauma trigger/flashback/etc. The superlative is like, emphasising that the trauma flashbacks/fallout were fucking intense.

Piled together with the preceding phrase, you get nearly catatonic [from] trauma.

vencuyanir is actually sustain, like keep alive, but given the rest of the context, it's functionally both keep (us hidden, as in the progressive tense of continuing to be hidden) and also keep (us alive, as in the action caused them to stay alive/hidden). Lot of double duty here — this is kind of a double meaning/double entendre in Mando'a, except instead of sex it's, y'know, not being murdered or worse.

mhi haaranovor - mhi is us, and haaranovor is actually hide — again, dialectal slip and disorganised speech is fucking with the tense here. Functionally in the sentence it is clearly, from context, hidden, but that's not actually a direct translation, just the actual meaning. Someone who spoke Common Mando'a would probably find it kind of awkward phrasing but not, like, unintelligible; someone who only spoke Kalevaen would be pretty weirded out and may or may not even understand what the whole sentence meant, just because of the baffling tense changes.

mirshe'jurkadur - this is another kitbash. mirshe is again, brain. jurkad is assault. rape is baar'jurkad (body-assult), so brain-assault is mind-rape. -ur is the suffix to make a verb into a noun for the performer of the action (so like, to run -> runner), and making a noun into a verb in the first place is …any vowel + r as a suffix. Thus, brain-rapist.

Jetii'cabur - kitbash, but a fairly standard one. Jedi-guardian. In this particular case, Bo-katan is using jetii like the organisation, since at that point Dooku was part of the Jedi Order, even if he was, y'know….not really a Jedi.

balyc Kyr'tsad - and Death Watch. Grammar's still a little weird, but it's carried by the rest of the sentence.

ok. Sentence five. Which, thank fuck, is a short thing.

Kotep utreekov'ika, which is literally brave little empty-head.

Qui-gon translates this as brave little fool, which isn't wrong, but doesn't quite capture the idiot(affectionate) vibe. And also that Satine is sort of questioning just how much actual thinking was going on in that ginger head, rather than, y'know, self sacrificial duty.

Sentence six.

Shaadlar kaysh at yamika jillane ranov'saan ven'arir tra'olaror!

Literally, this is move them to rooms immediately secret-reliable will do sky-arrive!

Functionally, it's Get him to his rooms right now Ranov'saan's about to land!

jillane - jiila is immediately, and -ne is, again, the superlative intensifier. So it's RIGHT NOW, instead of just right now. This mando is telling everyone to drop whatever the hell they are doing and hop to.

ven'narir - ven' is the future tense, narir is do. Therefore, will do, or, contextually, is (about to)

tra'olaror - kitbash. Mando'a doesn't have a word for land, like from a (space) ship. But they do have a word for sky, and tra' shows up a few times in other space/flight related words, so, sky arrive being land (your space ship) seems to fit in.

Sentence seven

Jorhaa'ur shukycne, ru'nukyrir gotali'an a'ni n'tabalhar pirebu chakaaryc Jetii ti ner mirda n'aranar.

Literally, this is Talker's most broken, was-not-finished repairing but-I not-patrol near rotten Jedi with my mind not-defend.

Functionally; comms unit's busted, I was repairing it but I'm not going near a damn Jedi with my mind undefended.

Mando'a doesn't have a word for comms, apparently, because…mando'a doesn't have any useful words at all, basically.

Thus: like I said way up in the beginning of the post, I called it pulling double duty based on context, and used talker as both person who is talking, and as thing you do the talking with. Qui-gon speaks (at a rudimentary level) Kalevean Mando'a, which doesn't have comms as a phrase he would have run into, and even if he had likely would have used a different word, since Kalevean is far more precise and doesn't do nearly so much context dependant phrasing.

ru'nukyrir gotali'an is, say it with me since this has come up a few times now, the past progressive (ru'[word]'an) of a negative (nu'[word]), and the word in question is…actually a phrase. kyrir gotal is finish repair, but given all the other modifiers, it's finished (there's the past) repairing (and the progressive), in the negative (so. not finished repairing).

a' is literally the but prefix, and ni is I. Therefore, but I [whatever].

n'tabalhar - negative n' + patrol (tabalhar). This is leaning very heavy on double duty linguistics - patrol as it's used here is more like walking, or physically moving to [place]. New Mando'a would not use this. Common Mando'a does, particularly since, in this case, the mando in question is following orders from the Mand'alor, and thus is acting under orders (like…they would be if they were told by their captain to patrol around camp or whatever).

chakaaryc - so, mando'a doesn't really have functional infixes, either (like fucking, as in abso-fucking-lutly or good fucking god no), but chakaar seems to be a sort of …criminal/dubious ethics term of abuse, which kind of lines up with damn, like as in damned (to hell because it's bad). Thus, we end up with damned jedi, which is mostly the mando expressing that jedi(generic) can't be trusted because they have terrible morals.

Mirda is mind! this is the more common, less specific to physical brain and more, like, your…mind, personality, whatever. Contrast this with Satine and Bo, who are both very much on the actual literal brain end of the scale when they walk about mindtricks, which is partially dialect and partially, like, just a difference in word choices. Sometimes you say brain and sometimes you say mind and it means the same thing.

n'aranar - negative of defend, thus, undefended. Helmet off = mind tricks work. Helmet on = no mind tricks.

There is very much a reason Qui-gon was told to stay the hell away from any mando's not in full kit, and it's because they don't want to give him the opportunity to do some mind tricks.

This is less about Qui-gon — Satine and Bo don't yet know him from a hole in the dirt — and more about the last Jedi who was on Mandalore.

Sentence eight or, thank god, the last bit of mando'a in the chapter.

Miit'akaanir ven'jii, jetii banaar ne'mav jiila. Mand'alor ke'gyce.

Literally, this is: Argue later, jedi happen not-free right away. Mandalor order.

Functionally, Argue about it later, get the Jedi locked down now. Mand'alor's orders.

Miit'akaanir ven'jii is literally just scraped straight from the spreadsheet. the [about it] is implied from context, more than actually said — Kalevalan Mando'a might say it, but then, argue later is a perfectly reasonable sentence fragment as it is.

ne'mav is literally not-free, but is working as a sort of — secured, rather than locked up or imprisoned. They're not locking Qui-gon in a cell, they're just getting him back to his rooms asap and he will not leave them for a bit. The difference between a prisoner and a temporarily detained guest.

ke'gyce is rule/orders/command — Kalevean Mando'a uses it like rule, like it's a rule you can't draw on the teacher's desk, and thus Qui-gon is missing the context that it's a new order, as in one that was just issued because Ranov'saan is about to land.

So, that's, uh, all the Mando'a in that chapter, plus why I chose the words I did and what I was sort of thinking about as I did that. If you've made it to the end, congratulations and also I'm so sorry.

If you have questions, do feel free to drop a line in the ol' ask box or whatever. I am by no means saying this is The One True Mando'a, I'm not even saying this is correct mando'a, but for two weeks intermittent work I'm calling it good enough pending someone being like 'dude you said [x] when it should be [y]'.