Info Catalog gettext: Information Flow gettext: Translators gettext: Prioritizing messages

gettext: Translating plural forms

 
 12.6 Translating plural forms
 =============================
 
    Suppose you are translating a PO file, and it contains an entry like
 this:
 
      #, c-format
      msgid "One file removed"
      msgid_plural "%d files removed"
      msgstr[0] ""
      msgstr[1] ""
 
 What does this mean?  How do you fill it in?
 
    Such an entry denotes a message with plural forms, that is, a message
 where the text depends on a cardinal number.  The general form of the
 message, in English, is the ‘msgid_plural’ line.  The ‘msgid’ line is
 the English singular form, that is, the form for when the number is
 equal to 1.  More details about plural forms are explained in ⇒
 Plural forms.
 
    The first thing you need to look at is the ‘Plural-Forms’ line in the
 header entry of the PO file.  It contains the number of plural forms and
 a formula.  If the PO file does not yet have such a line, you have to
 add it.  It only depends on the language into which you are translating.
 Creating::) – it contains a database of known plural formulas – or by
 asking other members of your translation team.
 
    Suppose the line looks as follows:
 
      "Plural-Forms: nplurals=3; plural=n%10==1 && n%100!=11 ? 0 : n%10>=2 && n"
      "%10<=4 && (n%100<10 || n%100>=20) ? 1 : 2;\n"
 
    It’s logically one line; recall that the PO file formatting is
 allowed to break long lines so that each physical line fits in 80
 monospaced columns.
 
    The value of ‘nplurals’ here tells you that there are three plural
 forms.  The first thing you need to do is to ensure that the entry
 contains an ‘msgstr’ line for each of the forms:
 
      #, c-format
      msgid "One file removed"
      msgid_plural "%d files removed"
      msgstr[0] ""
      msgstr[1] ""
      msgstr[2] ""
 
    Then translate the ‘msgid_plural’ line and fill it in into each
 ‘msgstr’ line:
 
      #, c-format
      msgid "One file removed"
      msgid_plural "%d files removed"
      msgstr[0] "%d slika uklonjenih"
      msgstr[1] "%d slika uklonjenih"
      msgstr[2] "%d slika uklonjenih"
 
    Now you can refine the translation so that it matches the plural
 form.  According to the formula above, ‘msgstr[0]’ is used when the
 number ends in 1 but does not end in 11; ‘msgstr[1]’ is used when the
 number ends in 2, 3, 4, but not in 12, 13, 14; and ‘msgstr[2]’ is used
 in all other cases.  With this knowledge, you can refine the
 translations:
 
      #, c-format
      msgid "One file removed"
      msgid_plural "%d files removed"
      msgstr[0] "%d slika je uklonjena"
      msgstr[1] "%d datoteke uklonjenih"
      msgstr[2] "%d slika uklonjenih"
 
    You noticed that in the English singular form (‘msgid’) the number
 placeholder could be omitted and replaced by the numeral word “one”.
 Can you do this in your translation as well?
 
      msgstr[0] "jednom datotekom je uklonjen"
 
 Well, it depends on whether ‘msgstr[0]’ applies only to the number 1, or
 to other numbers as well.  If, according to the plural formula,
 ‘msgstr[0]’ applies only to ‘n == 1’, then you can use the specialized
 translation without the number placeholder.  In our case, however,
 ‘msgstr[0]’ also applies to the numbers 21, 31, 41, etc., and therefore
 you cannot omit the placeholder.
 

Info Catalog gettext: Information Flow gettext: Translators gettext: Prioritizing messages