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The instructions here apply to the GUI interface (menus and dialogs).
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For user guide translations, see below.
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There are two GUI translation files (assuming a default installation):
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/usr/share/fotoxx/locales/lc/fotoxx.po
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/usr/share/fotoxx/locales/lc/zfuncs.po
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"fotoxx" is the main application program. "zfuncs" is a collection
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of utility programs. "lc" is the standard 2-character language code:
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de, es, fr, zh, etc. These two .po files contain the English phrases
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used by fotoxx and zfuncs, with corresponding translations. They can
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be edited with any text editor or one of the special .po file editors.
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In addition to these "lc" translation files, files for regional
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languages or dialects may also be installed. These file names
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include the region code as follows:
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/usr/share/fotoxx/locales/lc_RC/fotoxx.po
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/usr/share/fotoxx/locales/lc_RC/zfuncs.po
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"lc_RC" is a combined language and region code, e.g. "de_AT" for
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Austrian German, or "zh_TW" for Taiwan Chinese. This is also the
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locale of the target computer system, as shown by the following
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If both standard and regional translation files are present, BOTH
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are read and processed. If the same English text is translated in
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both files, the regional translation will be used. Thus you can make
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a regional .po file that contains only the exceptions to standard
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REVISE AN EXISTING LANGUAGE AND TRANSLATION
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1. Edit fotoxx.po and zfuncs.po to add or update translations.
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2. Open a terminal window and go to the location of these files.
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3. Compile the .po files to check for errors:
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$ msgfmt -v --check-format -o /dev/null fotoxx.po
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$ msgfmt -v --check-format -o /dev/null zfuncs.po
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4. Run fotoxx and check how the translations look.
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5. Send the modified .po files to me (kornelix2@googlemail.com)
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so they can be included in future releases.
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Steps 2 and 3 are optional. The usual binary translation files (.mo)
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that are output by msgfmt are not needed by fotoxx. The translation
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source files (.po) are read directly by fotoxx, and changes made to
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a .po file are immediately effective. Steps 2 and 3 are useful to
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find errors (e.g. format codes in a translated string do not match
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those in the English string).
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ADD A NEW LANGUAGE AND TRANSLATION
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1. Move the source program files fotoxx-N.N.cc and zfuncs.cc from
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the release tarball into some convenient directory.
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2. Create template files (.pot) from the source programs (.cc)
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$ xgettext -s --keyword=ZTX -o fotoxx.pot fotoxx-N.N.cc
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$ xgettext -s --keyword=ZTX -o zfuncs.pot zfuncs.cc
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3. Create translation files (.po) from the template files (.pot)
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$ msginit -l lc -o fotoxx.po -i fotoxx.pot
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$ msginit -l lc -o zfuncs.po -i zfuncs.pot
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"lc" is the 2-character code for the new language.
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If asked for an e-mail address, reply with Enter to ignore this.
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4. Edit the two .po files to insert translations for all text.
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5. Create an installation directory for the translation files:
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/usr/share/fotoxx/locales/lc
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6. Move the two .po files into the installation location:
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/usr/share/fotoxx/locales/lc/fotoxx.po
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/usr/share/fotoxx/locales/lc/zfuncs.po
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7. Run fotoxx and check how the translations look.
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8. Send the new .po files to me (kornelix2@googlemail.com) so they
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can be included in future releases.
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PROBLEMS WITH LONG TRANSLATIONS
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English can be terse compared to other languages (e.g. "undo" becomes
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"Rückgängig machen" in German), and this can cause ugliness in the
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GUI layouts. Therefore try to make dialog labels and buttons short.
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CONTEXT DEPENDENT TRANSLATIONS
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Sometimes the same English text will need multiple translations that
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depend on context. A simple example is "save file" when used on a
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toolbar button or in a menu. On the button the translation should be
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short, but there is no limit for the menu. In German, this could be
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"speichern" for the button and "in Datei speichern" for the menu.
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The standard method to do this in Gnu gettext is fairly horrible, but
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since fotoxx reads the source translations (.po files) instead of
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the binaries (.mo files), a simpler method is available. The English
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text may include an extra string to distinguish different contexts.
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This context string is removed from the GUI output, so the user does
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not see it. The context string is any short string followed with the
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special marker "::". To continue our example, the fotoxx.po file
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msgstr "in Datei speichern"
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msgid "toolbar::save file"
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In English, fotoxx would show "save file" for both cases, and in
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German "in Datei speichern" or "speichern". Context strings may be
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present in the .po files distributed with fotoxx, and also in a
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newly created language .po file.
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INTERACTIVE TRANSLATIONS
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Use the fotoxx menu "Edit Translations" to start revising translations
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interactively as the application is being used. The advantage is that
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you can better understand the context, making translation easier and
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more accurate. The updated translations are also immediately seen in
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the application dialogs. The starting point is the two .po files as
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described above, which must be installed to start with. The translations
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may be partly or entirely missing at this point - it is only important
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that all the English strings are present in the .po files. This method
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is best suited for updating the translations after a new release of
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fotoxx, or to improve the translations.
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Use the menu to start the process. A popup text window is created and
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displays all english strings and their present translations as they are
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being used in the application. The format is like the .po files. Missing
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translations will repeat the English phrase in place of the translation.
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The translations may be edited in the window as soon as they appear.
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When the [apply] button is pressed, the original .po file(s) are copied
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and updated from the edit window. These edited versions are placed in
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/home/<user>/.fotoxx/locales/lc and .../lc_RC. Each time this process
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is started, a new popup text window is created for new translations,
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and these are accumulated in the .po files. A choice can be made to show
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only missing translations or all translations. Normally only missing
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translations are needed, but revisions in existing translations can also
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be made. Once a translation is edited and the [apply] button is used,
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the translation is no longer missing and will not appear again in the
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edit window if 'only missing' was chosen. The function can be started
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again (using the application's menu) to change the mode to show no
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translations, all translations, or only missing translations.
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When finished, replace the installation .po files in
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/usr/share/fotoxx/locales/lc and .../lc_RC
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with the edited .po files in
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/home/<user>/.fotoxx/locales/lc and .../lc_RC).
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Delete the edited .po files to stop fotoxx from using them.
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When fotoxx is started from a terminal window, any missing translations
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will be listed in the window. Be sure to send the finished .po files to
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me for inclusion in future releases (kornelix2@googlemail.com).
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USER GUIDE TRANSLATION
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The user guide is named as follows (assuming a default installation):
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/usr/share/doc/fotoxx/userguide-lc.html
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/usr/share/doc/fotoxx/userguide-lc_RC.html
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The file is a text HTML file, which may be edited with any HTML editor.
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"lc" is a standard language code, and "lc_RC" is a language and region
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code combination. The user locale in $LANG or $LANGUAGE is used to find
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"lc_RC". If a file with the region code is present, this file is used,
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otherwise the standard language version is used. If this is not found,
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the english file (userguide-en.html) is used.
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If you make a new or revised translation, please send it to me so that
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it can be included in future releases (kornelix2@googlemail.com).
added
removed
doc/translations
