Re: Localization questions

Hello, 

On 2-11-2003 you (Brion Vibber) wrote:

BV> As a reminder, the base Language.php contains a lot of stuff that isn't 
BV> needed in specific language files.

Should a LanguageTemplate.php be split off, that holds the pieces that are
relevant? This would also ease name-translation (provided the word
("Template") itself doesn't occur).


BV> Most of the code at the bottom is 
BV> inherited or unused for other languages. The date format option is only 
BV> used for English.

Does that mean it should be in an LanguageEn.php only? Still, though /this/
date formatting might be typical for combining different English-languaged
cultures, I would have liked for Frisian to offer switching cases or
non-classical monthnames.



BV> The language name list is supposed to contain only 
BV> native names of languages (please help fill in any you know that we 
BV> don't have yet) and should not be translated or included in other 
BV> language files. ...

Why is this? It appears to me this causes a lot of unreadable stuff to the
common user of each Wikipedia, while those people who could make use of
some of that stuff apparently are multilingual and hence will be able to
read it anyway.



BV> And just a technical note: it's very common to have problems with 
BV> missing commas and unbalanced quotation marks: a double-quote character 
BV> (") inside a quoted string needs to have a backslash (\) before it 
BV> (\"). Just keep an eye out for them.

So I've been told, after I made those mistakes.
Is there maybe a very simple structure checker for this?



BV> On Nov 2, 2003, at 01:20, Onur Volkan HATEM wrote:
OV>> I saw that in german page "Spezial:..." is used instead of
OV>> "Special:..."

OV>> How can I do this?

BV> In the localization files, you'll see at the top an array for 
BV> 'namespaces'. Change "Special" to the appropriate word there. Change 
BV> any hardcoded references there may be in the other strings too.

Should/can these hardcoded references be changed to softcoded?
Like changing:

 "This is a reference to [[Special:Somepage]].";

to:

 "This is a reference to [[" . $namespaces[ 0] . ":Somepage]]."?
(I don't know PHP.)

That way changing Template to Xx (the language code) throughout the file
should handle that one as well.



BV>> Can I also override the tags following "Special:" prefix?

BV> So far no, the names are hardcoded to the names of functions.

I can see where they could be translated /to/ international. Is there a
single point of interpretation where a lookup could be added /from/
international?



But more in general: Are the file and this list the only documentation or
did I overlook the set of Meta pages on this topic?


Sincerely,
-- 
Aliter