friendica/util/README

Utilities

typo.php  - is a crude syntax checker to avoid checking in files with simple 
typos. It basically just loads each of our project files at once. Run from 
cmdline and see if any parsing errors are reported.



Internationalisation

extract.php - extracts translatable strings from our project files. It 
currently doesn't pick up strings in other libraries we might be using such as 
tinymce, simplepie, and the HTML parsers.

In order for extract to do its job, every use of the t() translation function 
must be preceded by one space. The string also can not contain parentheses. If
parens are required in a string which requires translation, please use hex escapes.

\x28 = (
\x29 = )

This only applies to English. Other languages may use parens in strings 
because they don't require extraction.
 
strings.php - a recent run of the strings program. This provides output that
is suitable for direct inclusion in the program. 

There are also translatable strings in the various files in the view/en
directory. By setting $lang = 'something' in .htconfig.php, the application 
will search for view/something/filename prior to the English version in 
view/en/filename when loading templates and view files. 

The translated string table should be placed in view/$lang/strings.php for
automatic inclusion.

You are not restricted to using known languages. You may also use this to
translate the software into "pirate", "surfer" or merely to replace certain
text which you don't care for.  

Note: The view/en directory contains many HTML template files, some of which 
only have a few words of English text amongst the HTML. Over time we will move
the translation to the replace_macros() function which calls these files and 
then relocate the files to the view directory. The files in the top-level view 
directory are template files which do not require translation. 


Placeholders

Do not translate placeholders in strings! Things like %s, %d, %1$s and $somename
are used to add dynamic content to the string.

%s rappresent a dynamic string, like in "Welcome to %s"
%d rappresent a dynamic number, like in "%d new messages"
$somename is a variable like in php
In %1$s %2$s,  the numbers are the position index of multiple dynamic content.
You could swap position in string of indexed placeholders.
e.g.
"%1$s's %2$s" => "John's photo", "John's item"
"%2$s di %1$s" => "foto di John", "elemento di John"


Plural

The tt() function supports plural form. Script extract.php write this in 
strings.php as an array, one string for every plural form language supports:

$a->string["%d message sent"] = Array(
 0 => "%d message sent",
 1 => "%d messages sent",
);

The function string_plural_select($n) defined in strings.php, return the string
index to use, related to the numbers of item (value of $n).

This is modelled after ngettext function of GNU gettext.
More info at http://www.gnu.org/software/hello/manual/gettext/Plural-forms.html


Xgettext and .po workflow

1. Run utils/run_xgettext.sh script (on *unix sistems, with GNU xgettext installed)
	This script runs xgettext on source tree, extracting strings from t() and tt()
	functions, and creates a utils/messages.po file.
2. copy utils/messages.po to views/<langauage>/messages.po
3. open views/<langauage>/messages.po with a text editor and fill in infos in
	"Last-Translator: FULL NAME <EMAIL@ADDRESS>"
	"Language-Team: LANGUAGE <LL@li.org>\n"
	"Language: \n"

	(eg:
	"Last-Translator: Guybrush Threepwood <gb@host.com>"
	"Language-Team: Pirate Friendika <pirate-friendika-ml@host.com>\n"
	"Language: pi\n"
	)
	
	For the line
	"Plural-Forms: nplurals=INTEGER; plural=EXPRESSION;\n"
	read GNU gettext manual at 
	http://www.gnu.org/software/hello/manual/gettext/Plural-forms.html
	
4. You could then translate the strings in text editor, but I suggest to use one
	of the many .po editors out there, like QtLinguist
	
5. run 
	$ php utils/po2php.php views/<language>/messages.po
 	to create the strings.php file
 	
When strings are added or modified in source, you could run
	$ utils/run_xgettext.sh views/<language>/messages.po
	to extraxt strings from source files and join them with the existing .po file:
	new strings are added, the existing are not overwritten.
	
If you already translated Friendika using strings.php, you could import your old
translation to messages.po. Run:
$ php utils/php2po.php views/<language>/strings.php