[Gaim-devel] anoncvs and Gaim 0.71 translations (was: Thus Spake Robert Flynn)

[Bjoern V. <bj...@cs...>]

Hello developers and translators,

Sorry, I changed the title for this thread. Sean, please choose a more
descriptive title than "Thus Spake Robert Flynn" next time if
important things like releases are announced. Sometimes I haven't the
time to read all messages in gaim-devel and I want to see the articles
which are interesting for me be reading the subjects.

Anoncvs state
-------------

I checked the state for Gaim's anoncvs repository. The last checkin is

  gaim/src/protocols/yahoo yahoo.c,1.162,1.163 (Fri, 03 Oct 2003)

So anoncvs is 5 days old. I don't hope, that this will change until
Thursday.

Please help
-----------

So, we (the translators) need some help from the developers. If you
could provide a URL for the translation template and/or for a current
tarball, it will be possible for some of us which have the time to
produce a current translation until Thursday.

Could someone provide this files in the next 2,5 hours (20:00 UTC)?

I describe in short words, how to make the translation template:

  $ cd po
  $ ./update.pl -M
  $ ./update.pl --pot

This also checks, if po/POTFILES.in is up-to-date.

The translation template is named gaim.pot. It's around 150kb.

HOWTO use the gaim.pot template
-------------------------------

It's possible to translate new strings with gaim.pot and without
current sources. Unfortunately, it's not possible to see the current
sources and to test the new strings with a new gaim build. Anyway, I
think, there are not much new strings and so this problems are not
very big.

I prefer to use current a current gaim.pot translation template in
the following way:

* Use the old files for old strings
  $ cd po
  $ ./update.pl --pot
  $ ./update.pl XX   # XX: the language

  Translate XX.pl
  $ emacs XX.pl

* Download the new gaim.pot file and save it to po/gaim.pot
  Update your translation

  Please note: ./update.pl XX and make update-po will destroy the new
  gaim.pot file, so don't use it here
  $ msgmerge XX.po gaim.pot -o XX.new.po

* Check XX.new.po and rename it
  $ mv XX.new.po XX.po

* Translate XX.po
  $ emacs XX.po

  And finally send it the usual way.

Suggestions
-----------

Danilo Segan <ds...@gm...> wrote:

> So, besides making freeze time longer, is it possible to improve on the
> other issues too?
>
> - For instance, when string freeze is announced, you provide us with a
> correct POT (PO Template) which needs to be translated, or, better yet,
> provide us with updated PO file (via intltool-update <lang>), so
> translators don't have to learn to use msgmerge and other tools.
>
> - Or, it would be nice if you would allow translators CVS write access
> (of course, allowing them through some policy to commit only
> translations, not to change anything else).
>
> - And let me not forget, gaim.desktop is not properly
> internationalized. I'd recommend making use of INTLTOOL macros to
> extract translations from PO files and merge them with gaim.desktop.in
> into gaim.desktop at compile time.

I think, the suggestions from Danilo are interesting and we should
think about them. Especially write access for translators is a good
idea, if write access is restricted to translations and i18n issues in
gaim.

But, I don't think, that we should use intltool only for
translating gaim.desktop. The Gaim default theme
pixmaps/smileys/default/theme is also not translated.

Bj=F6rn