Re: Update.

[Pavel Roskin <proski gnu org>]

Hi, Tomasz!

> > Actually, what should be done is a converter from the manpage to SGML and
> > back.
>
> Do you anything about good roff to SGML converter ? I don't belive it is
> possible but always is possible from SGML to roff ot any other format.

You probably don't understand an important point - this is not just a
manpage. It contains non-standard "hints" for man2hlp that are comments
for the makefile but should become tags in the SGML file. No standard
converter would do it.

In fact, it was produced from an SGML file using patched sgml-utils (which
is now obsoleted by jade), But those files got out of sync with the
manpage being ahead.

You may want to revive the sgml file from CVS but I think that it's easier
to convert the existing manpage using a Perl script.

> > It should preserve the links in the manpage. The links are actually
> > hints for man2hlp, generator of the helpfile - they are implemented as
> > comments with the word "LINK2".
>
> In long time it will be good drop current implemetation help system in
> mc. Why ? because in current implemetation isn't possible make them
> i18nable. Idont know kow it must look but also for this resources it
> will be good keep all source form in XML/SGML. Also I don't know is it
> good idea use man page for chain them to help system.

Of course it would be better to generate the help system from SGML
directly.

Keeping translations up to date is a serious problem. We cannot require
every translator to keep track of CVs changes.

Maybe we could write a converter from SGML to a fake C file containing
sentences (paragraphs, pages?) from the manual? Then gettext would take
then and put to mc.pot file. Another converter would take *.po files and
make translated SGML from them.

I'm not sure what "granularity" should be used. It would not be nice to
have translated and untranslated sentences intermixed. Perhaps "help page"
(i.e. what would become it after converting to mc.hlp) would be a good
unit.

-- 
Regards,
Pavel Roskin