Re: icecast-server 1:1.3.12-21.1: Please update debconf PO translation for the package icecast-server

[Christian PERRIER <christian@perrier.eu.org>]

CC'ing debian-i18n as this might be of some interest for some translators....

Quoting Dennis Fernandes Vieira (dfvieira@msn.com):
> 
> hello christian
> 
> just one more question , for example we have this piece of text:
> 
> #, fuzzy
> #| msgid ""
> #| "I will now create a new user for you, called icecast. This user has no "
> #| "rights, no shell, and should not be able to perform any other operation "
> #| "than to run Icecast."
> msgid ""
> "The icecast user will now be created. This user has no rights, no shell,  "
> "and should not be able to perform any other operation than to run Icecast."
> 
> the we senttence is the settence that start with # or without it ?

The sentence you must translate is the non commented sentence (the one
not starting with "#"). The other one is the previous version, the
version which the current translation is based upon. It is kept here
as a helper to allow you to spot what did change.

I strongly recommend using (good) PO file editors that make it easier
to deal with all this. IMHO? the best one as of one is lokalize.

> im startting the group and i'm still strating to understanding how it works, but again this file has already being translated, nothing to be done here, the translation is correct


If the translation is correct, then the "fuzzy" marker should be
removed.

A fuzzy marker is added to a string in the situation where a string
was originally translated, but the original version changed
slightly. Instead of just dropping the existing translation, it is
marked "fuzzy" which is a way to say "hey, this translation is *about*
right but should be verified".

A string marked "fuzzy" is not used when the locallized material is
used.

Example of sequence leading to a fuzzy string.

Original file:

msgid "This is an example."
msgstr ""

--> no translation


A (french) translator works on it:

msgid "This is an example."
msgstr "Ceci est un exemple."

-->this translation will be used

The original maintainer changes the original string: "This is an
example." becomes "This is a good example"....

The PO file becomes:

# ,fuzzy
#| msgid ""
#| "This is an example."
msgid "This is a good example."
msgstr "Ceci est un exemple."


--> The translator checks the file and see (s)he must adapt his|her
--> work. The translation should become "Ceci est un bon
--> exemple.". The translation will NOT be used because of the fuzzy marker.

The correct way to do this is:

msgid "This is a good example."
msgstr "Ceci est un bon exemple."

--> here, the translator removed the "fuzzy marker"....as well as the
--> "previous msgid" lines. Removing the fuzzy marker is the important
--> part.... (s)he could indeed have left the previous msgid lines
--> with no harm


There are other situations, where a change to the original string has
no consequence on the translations. Let's take an example:

msgid "This is an exemple."
msgstr ""

(the original author was French and made an error in the spelling of
"example")

msgid "This is an exemple."
msgstr "Ceci est un exemple."

(Still, a French translator did the translation)

# ,fuzzy
#| msgid ""
#| "This is an exemple."
msgid "This is an example."
msgstr "Ceci est un exemple."

(the original author noticed the error and fixed it. Gettext has not way to
"know" that the translation is still correct...so the translation is
marked fuzzy)

msgid "This is an example."
msgstr "Ceci est un exemple."

(the translator just removed the fuzzy marker line)



gettext tools will tell you about statistics for PO files. A good
trick to quickly check for the completeness of a PO file is:

msgfmt -o /dev/null --statistics --check <pofile>

This actually compiles the file into an MO file, but that's not really
the point. The useful stuff are the two switches that request for
checks to be made (in case of syntax errors, etc...) and statistics to
be calculated:

bubulle@mykerinos:~/tmp> LC_ALL=C msgfmt -o /dev/null --statistics --check fr.po
5 translated messages.


bubulle@mykerinos:~/tmp> LC_ALL=C msgfmt -o /dev/null --statistics --check pl.po
705 translated messages, 27 fuzzy translations, 314 untranslated messages.