po file format (was: File trashed by previous translator ?)

[Derek Atkins]

Thank you for the explanation!  I've always wondered what fuzzy
translation meant.

-derek

Christian Stimming <stimming at tuhh.de> writes:

> Quoting Derek Atkins <warlord at MIT.EDU>:
>>>>>>  1313 #: ../src/business/business-gnome/glade/billterms.glade.h:10
>>>>>>  1314 #, fuzzy
>>>>>>  1315 msgid ""
>>>>>>  1316 "Days\n"
>>>>>>  1317 "Proximo"
>>>>>>  1318 msgstr "Próximo"
>>>>>>  1319
>>>>
>>>> This is a broken translation.  The translation (msgstr) should include
>>>> both the translation of "Days" and the translation of "Proximo"
>>>
>>> Actually no, the translation is not broken, it simply hasn't
>>> translated this msgid so far. Please note the marker "fuzzy" in front
>>> of the translation - any translation marked as "fuzzy" is ignored by
>>> the rest of the gettext system, just as if it had no msgstr
>>> translation at all.
>>
>> That's not how I read it.  If it hasn't be translated wouldn't the
>> msgstr match the msgid?
>
> There are two questions here:
>
> 1. What will appear in program, i.e. which translation will make it
> into the msgfmt-compiled .gmo file? The answer is: No translation will
> appear in the program. Any translation marked as "fuzzy" is ignored by
> the rest of the gettext system (i.e. msgfmt), just as if it had no
> msgstr translation at all. This statement is true regardless of what
> msgstr has been set to.
>
> 2. Where does the msgstr content come from? I think the confusing part
> here is whether any human translator would have inserted such a msgstr
> to this msgid. And I think the usual explanation is that this
> msgid/msgstr hasn't been touched by any human translator so far - it
> was simply automatically matched by msgmerge when updating the
> translation. msgmerge for whatever reason decided this msgstr might
> match that msgid and inserted it here, BUT marked as FUZZY. This is
> all fine and good as long as everyone keeps in mind that "fuzzy means
> untranslated".
>
> That's why I emphasize this again and again: If a msgid is marked as
> fuzzy, it says nobody knows anything about this msgstr. The only thing
> known is that this msgstr will not appear in the program, as the msgid
> will be treated as untranslated.
>
> Regards,
>
> Christian
>
>
>

-- 
       Derek Atkins, SB '93 MIT EE, SM '95 MIT Media Laboratory
       Member, MIT Student Information Processing Board  (SIPB)
       URL: http://web.mit.edu/warlord/    PP-ASEL-IA     N1NWH
       warlord at MIT.EDU                        PGP key available