Re: gettext-based localization
Scott G. Miller 12 Apr 2002 19:20 UTC
> I.e. instead of having to come up with a MESSAGE-TAG for each
> message, why not use the primary-language "MESSAGE" as it's own
> template? This is much simpler and convenient, plus of course
> it is compatible with the GNU gettext paradigm, which I think is
> desirable. (Primary-language need not mean English, of course, but
> it should be one that both the programmers and likely translators
> are comfortable with.)
Also, using the primary language as the tag discourages clean
localization patterns, where the author of the code should be collecting
his locale dependent messages in one place so that translators can
easily translate the messages without having to seek them out in the
code. Or, if the primary language programmer wants to make a
change in said primary language, he has to search out the string in his
code as well.
Scott