Jonathan Nieder [off-list ref] writes:
The usual convention is that the _() macro is private to each
application. libintl provides a gettext function or macro, and
various programs do
#define _(msg) gettext(msg)
in some private header (that does not pollute the public namespace)
for notational convenience.
Yeah, I am aware of that. Is there a similar convention for [dn]gettext?
Perhaps not....
From: Junio C Hamano <redacted>
Date: Sun, 6 Mar 2011 14:40:05 -0800
Subject: i18n: add stub Q_() wrapper for ngettext
The Q_ function translates a string representing some pharse with an
alternative plural form and uses the 'count' argument to choose which
form to return. Use of Q_ solves the "%d noun(s)" problem in a way
that is portable to languages outside the Germanic and Romance
families.
In English, the semantics of Q_(sing, plur, count) are roughly
equivalent to
count == 1 ? _(sing) : _(plur)
while in other languages there can be more variants (count == 0; more
random-looking rules based on the historical pronunciation of the
number). Behind the scenes, the singular form is used to look up a
family of translations and the plural form is ignored unless no
translation is available.
Define such a Q_ in gettext.h with the English semantics so C code can
start using it to mark phrases with a count for translation.
The name "Q_" is taken from subversion and stands for "quantity".
Many projects just use ngettext directly without a wrapper analogous
to _; we should not do so because git's gettext.h is meant not to
conflict with system headers that might include libintl.h.
Signed-off-by: Jonathan Nieder <redacted>
---
Junio C Hamano wrote:
Yeah, I am aware of that. Is there a similar convention for [dn]gettext?
Perhaps not....
subversion uses Q_. Though it does not seem to be standard --- e.g.,
glib uses:
_() for gettext
Q_() for a variant on gettext that allows a string of the form
"context|message" as its argument;
C_() for a nicer version of Q_() that takes the context and message
as distinct arguments;
N_() to mark a string for translation without translating it;
NC_() to mark a string with context for translation without
translating it.
I suppose Q_ is as good a name as any.
Hopefully veterans from glib would not be used to glib's alternative
meaning of Q_, preferring to use C_ for messages with flags.
gettext.h | 12 ++++++++++--
1 files changed, 10 insertions(+), 2 deletions(-)
diff --git a/gettext.h b/gettext.h
index 04b5958..1b253b7 100644
--- a/gettext.h
+++ b/gettext.h
@@ -9,8 +9,8 @@
#ifndef GETTEXT_H
#define GETTEXT_H
-#ifdef _
-#error "namespace conflict: '_' is pre-defined?"
+#if defined(_) || defined(Q_)
+#error "namespace conflict: '_' or 'Q_' is pre-defined?"
#endif
#define FORMAT_PRESERVING(n) __attribute__((format_arg(n)))
@@ -26,6 +26,14 @@ static inline FORMAT_PRESERVING(1) const char *_(const char *msgid)
return use_gettext_poison() ? "# GETTEXT POISON #" : msgid;
}
+static inline FORMAT_PRESERVING(1) FORMAT_PRESERVING(2)
+const char *Q_(const char *msgid, const char *plu, unsigned long n)
+{
+ if (use_gettext_poison())
+ return "# GETTEXT POISON #";
+ return n == 1 ? msgid : plu;
+}
+
/* Mark msgid for translation but do not translate it. */
#define N_(msgid) (msgid)
--
1.7.4.1