Re: [Translation-i18n] The reason for make dist updating po files

[Bruno Haible <bruno clisp org>]

Christian Rose writes:
> > intltool-commit should be a shell
> > script which hides the complexities of "cvs update", the conflict check,
> > "msgfmt -c", "msgmerge", "cvs commit" to the translator.
> 
> I have my doubts about that and how suitable such an approach would be.
> First of all, I'm not sure how feasible it would be to teach such a
> command how to distinguish an update that actually has a po file bugfix,
> committed by another translator or developer, from a routinely checked
> in "make dist"ed po file, committed by a developer.

I'm sure such an intltool-commit script is feasible with less than 20
shell commands. Remember that you have all the CVS history at hand,
and each CVS revision - as well as the translator's new PO file - each
have a PO-Revision-Date in them.

> Also, I'm not sure about how positive the intltool developers are about
> adopting intltool to these specific behaviors and weirdnesses of cvs
> development. But I'm cc:ing them.

Well, this entire thread came up because there is apparently a big
problem in the CVS based workflow between developers and translators.
Since intltool is made for GNOME, and all projects of GNOME use CVS
and use the same translator's tutorial (which already refers to
intltools), the intltools are the logical place for solving this.

> As I said above, I'm not sure if I believe in that as a solution to the
> problem.

I'm sure the intltools developers can solve the problem, through an
intltool-commit script, in a day or two.

Bruno