|
| 1 | +1 Notes on the Free Translation Project |
| 2 | +*************************************** |
| 3 | + |
| 4 | +Free software is going international! The Free Translation Project is |
| 5 | +a way to get maintainers of free software, translators, and users all |
| 6 | +together, so that free software will gradually become able to speak many |
| 7 | +languages. A few packages already provide translations for their |
| 8 | +messages. |
| 9 | + |
| 10 | + If you found this `ABOUT-NLS' file inside a distribution, you may |
| 11 | +assume that the distributed package does use GNU `gettext' internally, |
| 12 | +itself available at your nearest GNU archive site. But you do _not_ |
| 13 | +need to install GNU `gettext' prior to configuring, installing or using |
| 14 | +this package with messages translated. |
| 15 | + |
| 16 | + Installers will find here some useful hints. These notes also |
| 17 | +explain how users should proceed for getting the programs to use the |
| 18 | +available translations. They tell how people wanting to contribute and |
| 19 | +work on translations can contact the appropriate team. |
| 20 | + |
| 21 | + When reporting bugs in the `intl/' directory or bugs which may be |
| 22 | +related to internationalization, you should tell about the version of |
| 23 | +`gettext' which is used. The information can be found in the |
| 24 | +`intl/VERSION' file, in internationalized packages. |
| 25 | + |
| 26 | +1.1 Quick configuration advice |
| 27 | +============================== |
| 28 | + |
| 29 | +If you want to exploit the full power of internationalization, you |
| 30 | +should configure it using |
| 31 | + |
| 32 | + ./configure --with-included-gettext |
| 33 | + |
| 34 | +to force usage of internationalizing routines provided within this |
| 35 | +package, despite the existence of internationalizing capabilities in the |
| 36 | +operating system where this package is being installed. So far, only |
| 37 | +the `gettext' implementation in the GNU C library version 2 provides as |
| 38 | +many features (such as locale alias, message inheritance, automatic |
| 39 | +charset conversion or plural form handling) as the implementation here. |
| 40 | +It is also not possible to offer this additional functionality on top |
| 41 | +of a `catgets' implementation. Future versions of GNU `gettext' will |
| 42 | +very likely convey even more functionality. So it might be a good idea |
| 43 | +to change to GNU `gettext' as soon as possible. |
| 44 | + |
| 45 | + So you need _not_ provide this option if you are using GNU libc 2 or |
| 46 | +you have installed a recent copy of the GNU gettext package with the |
| 47 | +included `libintl'. |
| 48 | + |
| 49 | +1.2 INSTALL Matters |
| 50 | +=================== |
| 51 | + |
| 52 | +Some packages are "localizable" when properly installed; the programs |
| 53 | +they contain can be made to speak your own native language. Most such |
| 54 | +packages use GNU `gettext'. Other packages have their own ways to |
| 55 | +internationalization, predating GNU `gettext'. |
| 56 | + |
| 57 | + By default, this package will be installed to allow translation of |
| 58 | +messages. It will automatically detect whether the system already |
| 59 | +provides the GNU `gettext' functions. If not, the included GNU |
| 60 | +`gettext' library will be used. This library is wholly contained |
| 61 | +within this package, usually in the `intl/' subdirectory, so prior |
| 62 | +installation of the GNU `gettext' package is _not_ required. |
| 63 | +Installers may use special options at configuration time for changing |
| 64 | +the default behaviour. The commands: |
| 65 | + |
| 66 | + ./configure --with-included-gettext |
| 67 | + ./configure --disable-nls |
| 68 | + |
| 69 | +will, respectively, bypass any pre-existing `gettext' to use the |
| 70 | +internationalizing routines provided within this package, or else, |
| 71 | +_totally_ disable translation of messages. |
| 72 | + |
| 73 | + When you already have GNU `gettext' installed on your system and run |
| 74 | +configure without an option for your new package, `configure' will |
| 75 | +probably detect the previously built and installed `libintl.a' file and |
| 76 | +will decide to use this. This might not be desirable. You should use |
| 77 | +the more recent version of the GNU `gettext' library. I.e. if the file |
| 78 | +`intl/VERSION' shows that the library which comes with this package is |
| 79 | +more recent, you should use |
| 80 | + |
| 81 | + ./configure --with-included-gettext |
| 82 | + |
| 83 | +to prevent auto-detection. |
| 84 | + |
| 85 | + The configuration process will not test for the `catgets' function |
| 86 | +and therefore it will not be used. The reason is that even an |
| 87 | +emulation of `gettext' on top of `catgets' could not provide all the |
| 88 | +extensions of the GNU `gettext' library. |
| 89 | + |
| 90 | + Internationalized packages usually have many `po/LL.po' files, where |
| 91 | +LL gives an ISO 639 two-letter code identifying the language. Unless |
| 92 | +translations have been forbidden at `configure' time by using the |
| 93 | +`--disable-nls' switch, all available translations are installed |
| 94 | +together with the package. However, the environment variable `LINGUAS' |
| 95 | +may be set, prior to configuration, to limit the installed set. |
| 96 | +`LINGUAS' should then contain a space separated list of two-letter |
| 97 | +codes, stating which languages are allowed. |
| 98 | + |
| 99 | +1.3 Using This Package |
| 100 | +====================== |
| 101 | + |
| 102 | +As a user, if your language has been installed for this package, you |
| 103 | +only have to set the `LANG' environment variable to the appropriate |
| 104 | +`LL_CC' combination. Here `LL' is an ISO 639 two-letter language code, |
| 105 | +and `CC' is an ISO 3166 two-letter country code. For example, let's |
| 106 | +suppose that you speak German and live in Germany. At the shell |
| 107 | +prompt, merely execute `setenv LANG de_DE' (in `csh'), |
| 108 | +`export LANG; LANG=de_DE' (in `sh') or `export LANG=de_DE' (in `bash'). |
| 109 | +This can be done from your `.login' or `.profile' file, once and for |
| 110 | +all. |
| 111 | + |
| 112 | + You might think that the country code specification is redundant. |
| 113 | +But in fact, some languages have dialects in different countries. For |
| 114 | +example, `de_AT' is used for Austria, and `pt_BR' for Brazil. The |
| 115 | +country code serves to distinguish the dialects. |
| 116 | + |
| 117 | + The locale naming convention of `LL_CC', with `LL' denoting the |
| 118 | +language and `CC' denoting the country, is the one use on systems based |
| 119 | +on GNU libc. On other systems, some variations of this scheme are |
| 120 | +used, such as `LL' or `LL_CC.ENCODING'. You can get the list of |
| 121 | +locales supported by your system for your language by running the |
| 122 | +command `locale -a | grep '^LL''. |
| 123 | + |
| 124 | + Not all programs have translations for all languages. By default, an |
| 125 | +English message is shown in place of a nonexistent translation. If you |
| 126 | +understand other languages, you can set up a priority list of languages. |
| 127 | +This is done through a different environment variable, called |
| 128 | +`LANGUAGE'. GNU `gettext' gives preference to `LANGUAGE' over `LANG' |
| 129 | +for the purpose of message handling, but you still need to have `LANG' |
| 130 | +set to the primary language; this is required by other parts of the |
| 131 | +system libraries. For example, some Swedish users who would rather |
| 132 | +read translations in German than English for when Swedish is not |
| 133 | +available, set `LANGUAGE' to `sv:de' while leaving `LANG' to `sv_SE'. |
| 134 | + |
| 135 | + Special advice for Norwegian users: The language code for Norwegian |
| 136 | +bokma*l changed from `no' to `nb' recently (in 2003). During the |
| 137 | +transition period, while some message catalogs for this language are |
| 138 | +installed under `nb' and some older ones under `no', it's recommended |
| 139 | +for Norwegian users to set `LANGUAGE' to `nb:no' so that both newer and |
| 140 | +older translations are used. |
| 141 | + |
| 142 | + In the `LANGUAGE' environment variable, but not in the `LANG' |
| 143 | +environment variable, `LL_CC' combinations can be abbreviated as `LL' |
| 144 | +to denote the language's main dialect. For example, `de' is equivalent |
| 145 | +to `de_DE' (German as spoken in Germany), and `pt' to `pt_PT' |
| 146 | +(Portuguese as spoken in Portugal) in this context. |
| 147 | + |
| 148 | +1.4 Translating Teams |
| 149 | +===================== |
| 150 | + |
| 151 | +For the Free Translation Project to be a success, we need interested |
| 152 | +people who like their own language and write it well, and who are also |
| 153 | +able to synergize with other translators speaking the same language. |
| 154 | +Each translation team has its own mailing list. The up-to-date list of |
| 155 | +teams can be found at the Free Translation Project's homepage, |
| 156 | +`http://www.iro.umontreal.ca/contrib/po/HTML/', in the "National teams" |
| 157 | +area. |
| 158 | + |
| 159 | + If you'd like to volunteer to _work_ at translating messages, you |
| 160 | +should become a member of the translating team for your own language. |
| 161 | +The subscribing address is _not_ the same as the list itself, it has |
| 162 | +`-request' appended. For example, speakers of Swedish can send a |
| 163 | +message to `sv-request@li.org', having this message body: |
| 164 | + |
| 165 | + subscribe |
| 166 | + |
| 167 | + Keep in mind that team members are expected to participate |
| 168 | +_actively_ in translations, or at solving translational difficulties, |
| 169 | +rather than merely lurking around. If your team does not exist yet and |
| 170 | +you want to start one, or if you are unsure about what to do or how to |
| 171 | +get started, please write to `translation@iro.umontreal.ca' to reach the |
| 172 | +coordinator for all translator teams. |
| 173 | + |
| 174 | + The English team is special. It works at improving and uniformizing |
| 175 | +the terminology in use. Proven linguistic skills are praised more than |
| 176 | +programming skills, here. |
| 177 | + |
| 178 | +1.5 Available Packages |
| 179 | +====================== |
| 180 | + |
| 181 | +Languages are not equally supported in all packages. The following |
| 182 | +matrix shows the current state of internationalization, as of October |
| 183 | +2006. The matrix shows, in regard of each package, for which languages |
| 184 | +PO files have been submitted to translation coordination, with a |
| 185 | +translation percentage of at least 50%. |
| 186 | + |
| 187 | +# Matrix here is removed! |
| 188 | + |
| 189 | + Some counters in the preceding matrix are higher than the number of |
| 190 | +visible blocks let us expect. This is because a few extra PO files are |
| 191 | +used for implementing regional variants of languages, or language |
| 192 | +dialects. |
| 193 | + |
| 194 | + For a PO file in the matrix above to be effective, the package to |
| 195 | +which it applies should also have been internationalized and |
| 196 | +distributed as such by its maintainer. There might be an observable |
| 197 | +lag between the mere existence a PO file and its wide availability in a |
| 198 | +distribution. |
| 199 | + |
| 200 | + If October 2006 seems to be old, you may fetch a more recent copy of |
| 201 | +this `ABOUT-NLS' file on most GNU archive sites. The most up-to-date |
| 202 | +matrix with full percentage details can be found at |
| 203 | +`http://www.iro.umontreal.ca/contrib/po/HTML/matrix.html'. |
| 204 | + |
| 205 | +1.6 Using `gettext' in new packages |
| 206 | +=================================== |
| 207 | + |
| 208 | +If you are writing a freely available program and want to |
| 209 | +internationalize it you are welcome to use GNU `gettext' in your |
| 210 | +package. Of course you have to respect the GNU Library General Public |
| 211 | +License which covers the use of the GNU `gettext' library. This means |
| 212 | +in particular that even non-free programs can use `libintl' as a shared |
| 213 | +library, whereas only free software can use `libintl' as a static |
| 214 | +library or use modified versions of `libintl'. |
| 215 | + |
| 216 | + Once the sources are changed appropriately and the setup can handle |
| 217 | +the use of `gettext' the only thing missing are the translations. The |
| 218 | +Free Translation Project is also available for packages which are not |
| 219 | +developed inside the GNU project. Therefore the information given above |
| 220 | +applies also for every other Free Software Project. Contact |
| 221 | +`translation@iro.umontreal.ca' to make the `.pot' files available to |
| 222 | +the translation teams. |
| 223 | + |
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