Re: [Synaptic-devel] Plural Gettext

[Jean-Michel POURE]

Le Vendredi 30 Janvier 2004 10:18, Sebastian Heinlein a écrit :
> Does the "Queued" refer to the topic in the filter dialog? It is
> singular there, since it means "Queued Status" like "Current Status" and
> "Other Status".

This is precisely the point. Stings need to be non-ambiguous.

Translators do not have time to run Synaptic and try to understand the 
meaning. I have 10000 strings pending in PostgreSQL and other projects.

And I only spend 30 minutes everyday as a hobby. So I need to be quick.

Try to guess how much time Urdu translators can spend on Synaptic guessing 
"Queued" is singular or plural, masulin or feminin (or whatever their 
language requires). IMHO, do not try to guess thinking in English or in 
German or in French or in any European language.

Our languages are far too easy compared to other languages. Some grammars in 
the world are too complicated to try to be "smart". (even plural Gettext is 
"dummy").

As a minimal requirement, I would recommand avoiding English nouns that do not 
carry a minimum of:
- Gender (masc, fem, neutral, etc...)
- Singular/plural

In French, without any information, "installed" can be translated either by 
"installé", installée", "installés" or "installées".

On the converse :
"Installed packages" = paquets installés
"Installed package" = paquet installé

Tricky, don't you think? Again, being non-ambigueous about gender and plural 
is only important because Synaptic is a major software.

Cheers,
Jean-Michel