[Bashburn-info] Gettext support

[Anders L. <and...@gm...>]

My reply to Steven was sent only to him. I'm reposting the message here.

> As the changes to bb start to wind down, there are new text strings 
> creeping in and old ones that might want to change. They should be
handled 
> in less of an ad hoc manner; If I change a string now, I'm afraid
it'll 
> just leave the other languages out of sync.
> 
> Which brings up a new topic... The way that we're handling the
different 
> language problems right now works but it feels somewhat unwieldy. We
have 
> strings in lang/English/somefile.lang and then we have copies of the
file 
> in lang/!English/somefile.lang . Some of the files are mostly
translated. 
> (Good job BTW.) Some languages are there in good shape, but if a
string 
> changes, I don't see a system for *knowing* that the other languages
have 
> to be followed up. Also, we have a lot of strings that are duplicated,
and 
> changing one instance begs the questions whether followup can be
managed.
> 
> So here's the $64 question: Does anyone here have any experience with 
> gettext/msgfmt/po files/pot files/ etc? Should we keep going the way
we 
> are? I ask this with no prior experience using pot files.
> 


All experience with po files I have is that I helped translate an
application to Swedish a bunch of years ago. I have no experience in
actually adding support for it though.

I agree with you though Steven. The translation system is sort of a
mess. It works yes but it's kind of awkward to work with (All credit to
me I suppose). I think it would be a good idea to look into using
gettext. I'm sure it would make translators lives a lot easier. 

-- 
Anders Lindén
http://bashburn.sf.net