Puppy Linux Discussion Forum

MU

This is difficult.

A program like Gnumeric can easily be localized, for 2 reasons:
1. the lanuage is stored in external gnumeric.mo -files in /usr/share/locale/LANGUAGE/.
2. gnumeric.mo -files already exist for maybe 20 languages.

Puppys tools are different.
Each word is hardcoded in the program itself.
So a "proper" localization would require 4 steps:
1. Replace each word with a variable
2. Add a function, that detects the LANG -environment-variable set with the "chooselocale"-utility.
3. "source" a /usr/share/locale/LANGUAGE/PROGRAM.mo -file to fill the variables with words.
4. Add as many different .mo -files as possible.

So we need coders that start adding the functions, and later users (without programming-experience) to translate .mo -files.

Mark

Nathan F · Posted: Wed 10 May 2006, 09:46 Post_subject:

After 109 releases I could possibly help with adding the variables you mentioned. I think once the first script has had such a conversion it could be used as a model or template, and all the rest would go that much quicker.

This is really something I want to help with because I've already got a lot of people interested in Grafpup from other parts of the world, and in fact the only reviews of Grafpup that have been anything less than positive come from overseas and focus on this issue.

It will of course be up to those who can speak and write a foreign language to add the actual translations. My German and Spanish are so rusty I avoid showing my ignorance Rolling Eyes

Nathan

rarsa · Posted: Wed 10 May 2006, 13:32 Post_subject:

First, I hope that when you say 'word' you mean 'sentence' or 'code snippets'.

Second,
I really think that we should use something like gettext

It's a de-fact standard. It may speed up the implementation and help us avoid headaches.

The implementation is quite easy and small and it's already included in Puppy.

GuestToo · Puppy Master Joined: 04 May 2005 Posts: 4078

would gettext work something like this?

export TEXTDOMAIN=dotpuphandler
MSG1=`gettext "File not found:"`
MSG2=`gettext "File integrity ERROR:"`

from what i can understand from a quick read of the getttext docs, this should translate those strings if gettext finds an approriate translation file, otherwise it should just set the variable to the string

this seems like it would be easy to implement in a script

however, i tried it with an icewm.po file in /usr/share/locale/fr/LC_MESSAGES/ like this:

# export LANG=fr_FR
# export TEXTDOMAIN="icewm"
# gettext "Error checking mailbox."
Error checking mailbox.
#

and it doesn't seem to work ... i think this should print:

Échec de vérification de la boîte à lettre.

but maybe i don't have the syntax quite right ... is TEXTDOMAIN the variable that holds the programs name? (i exported the variables just to make sure they would be what gettext would use)

anyway, it looks like a simple thing to do, if i figure out the right syntax

MU · Posted: Wed 10 May 2006, 23:54 Post_subject:

yes, sentences instead of words.
Sorry I don't write much concerning localisation at moment.
I'm tracking down Bugs in the 3D-wizard, and Puppy2 now has one with the backgroundsetter.
And we finally have summer, today I was swimming in the Elbe-river, and after 6 hours in the sun I currently look as red as a boiled crustean Confused

But i'm happy first people try to find solutions already Smile

Mark

Lobster · Posted: Thu 11 May 2006, 01:01 Post_subject: Swim, use Puppy, be happy ;)

puppian · Joined: 18 Jul 2005 Posts: 538 Location: PuppyLand

A bit busy and haven't been around these days. Good to see this new I18n forum section being developed Very Happy

Gettext should be useful:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gettext
Programs like Abiword and patched Dillo support gettext, but do Puppy's wizards and other apps (e.g those Tk/Tcl ones) support gettext too?

And we need a dotpup of this too:
http://www.poedit.org/
"poEdit is cross-platform gettext catalogs (.po files) editor..."

rarsa · Posted: Thu 11 May 2006, 14:52 Post_subject:

GuestToo · Puppy Master Joined: 04 May 2005 Posts: 4078

rarsa · Posted: Fri 12 May 2006, 09:57 Post_subject:

Here is a good guide to start with gettext. It shows the basic utilities and commands needed.

http://www.linuxvalley.it/encyclopedia/ldp/guide/abs/localization.html

It actually clarified to me what the TEXTDOMAIN value means.

By The way. What's the default localization path for Puppy?

/usr/local/share/locale/

or

/usr/share/locale/ ?

GuestToo · Puppy Master Joined: 04 May 2005 Posts: 4078

rarsa · Posted: Sat 13 May 2006, 14:39 Post_subject:

GuestToo · Puppy Master Joined: 04 May 2005 Posts: 4078

gettext seems to work ... what i couldn't get to work was $"a text string" ... bash is supposed to treat a text string starting with $ as a short syntax to translate a string ... like this:

TEXTDOMAIN=test1
echo $"hello"

if TEXTDOMAINDIR and LANG and an appropriate .mo file is setup, this is supposed to translate "hello" to the language set by LANG ... it works when i explicitly use gettext, but $"hello" does not work

maybe bash was compiled without NLS support? ... it's also possible that LANG is not set when $"hello" is executed ... it might be necessary to kill X or even reboot to properly set LANG ... by the way, this might be the problem if you are having trouble with gettext, i found that for testing, i had to begin a line with LANG=fr_FR or whatever language you choose, or it would use the LANG that was set when you booted, which in my case is en_US (not that i'm in the us), which means there would be no translation

GuestToo · Puppy Master Joined: 04 May 2005 Posts: 4078

i made a simple demo for using gettext in a bash script ... see
http://www.murga.org/~puppy/viewtopic.php?t=7996

rarsa · Posted: Sun 14 May 2006, 01:35 Post_subject:

I know what my problem was.

I was selecting LANG=es instead of LANG=es_ES.

I was also using the $"text" format instead of the explicit form. gettext...

Now it's working. I'll try internationalizing the Network wizard so it can be localized.

Oh, and you don't need to set the LANG in every line.