GNU gettext utilities - 14 Concluding Remarks

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# 14 Concluding Remarks

We would like to conclude this GNU `gettext` manual by presenting an history of the Translation Project so far. We finally give a few pointers for those who want to do further research or readings about Native Language Support matters.

## 14.1 History of GNU `gettext`

Internationalization concerns and algorithms have been informally and casually discussed for years in GNU, sometimes around GNU `libc`, maybe around the incoming `Hurd`, or otherwise (nobody clearly remembers). And even then, when the work started for real, this was somewhat independently of these previous discussions.

This all began in July 1994, when Patrick D'Cruze had the idea and initiative of internationalizing version 3.9.2 of GNU `fileutils`. He then asked Jim Meyering, the maintainer, how to get those changes folded into an official release. That first draft was full of `#ifdef`s and somewhat disconcerting, and Jim wanted to find nicer ways. Patrick and Jim shared some tries and experimentations in this area. Then, feeling that this might eventually have a deeper impact on GNU, Jim wanted to know what standards were, and contacted Richard Stallman, who very quickly and verbally described an overall design for what was meant to become `glocale`, at that time.

Jim implemented `glocale` and got a lot of exhausting feedback from Patrick and Richard, of course, but also from Mitchum DSouza (who wrote a `catgets`-like package), Roland McGrath, maybe David MacKenzie, François Pinard, and Paul Eggert, all pushing and pulling in various directions, not always compatible, to the extent that after a couple of test releases, `glocale` was torn apart. In particular, Paul Eggert -- always keeping an eye on developments in Solaris -- advocated the use of the `gettext` API over `glocale`'s `catgets`-based API.

While Jim took some distance and time and became dad for a second time, Roland wanted to get GNU `libc` internationalized, and got Ulrich Drepper involved in that project. Instead of starting from `glocale`, Ulrich rewrote something from scratch, but more conformant to the set of guidelines who emerged out of the `glocale` effort. Then, Ulrich got people from the previous forum to involve themselves into this new project, and the switch from `glocale` to what was first named `msgutils`, renamed `nlsutils`, and later `gettext`, became officially accepted by Richard in May 1995 or so.

Let's summarize by saying that Ulrich Drepper wrote GNU `gettext` in April 1995. The first official release of the package, including PO mode, occurred in July 1995, and was numbered 0.7. Other people contributed to the effort by providing a discussion forum around Ulrich, writing little pieces of code, or testing. These are quoted in the `THANKS` file which comes with the GNU `gettext` distribution.

While this was being done, François adapted half a dozen of GNU packages to `glocale` first, then later to `gettext`, putting them in pretest, so providing along the way an effective user environment for fine tuning the evolving tools. He also took the responsibility of organizing and coordinating the Translation Project. After nearly a year of informal exchanges between people from many countries, translator teams started to exist in May 1995, through the creation and support by Patrick D'Cruze of twenty unmoderated mailing lists for that many native languages, and two moderated lists: one for reaching all teams at once, the other for reaching all willing maintainers of internationalized free software packages.

François also wrote PO mode in June 1995 with the collaboration of Greg McGary, as a kind of contribution to Ulrich's package. He also gave a hand with the GNU `gettext` Texinfo manual.

In 1997, Ulrich Drepper released the GNU libc 2.0, which included the `gettext`, `textdomain` and `bindtextdomain` functions.

In 2000, Ulrich Drepper added plural form handling (the `ngettext` function) to GNU libc. Later, in 2001, he released GNU libc 2.2.x, which is the first free C library with full internationalization support.

Ulrich being quite busy in his role of General Maintainer of GNU libc, he handed over the GNU `gettext` maintenance to Bruno Haible in 2000. Bruno added the plural form handling to the tools as well, added support for UTF-8 and CJK locales, and wrote a few new tools for manipulating PO files.

## 14.2 Related Readings

Eugene H. Dorr (``dorre@well.com´`) maintains an interesting bibliography on internationalization matters, called Internationalization Reference List, which is available as:

    ftp://ftp.ora.com/pub/examples/nutshell/ujip/doc/i18n-books.txt

Michael Gschwind (``mike@vlsivie.tuwien.ac.at´`) maintains a Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) list, entitled Programming for Internationalisation. This FAQ discusses writing programs which can handle different language conventions, character sets, etc.; and is applicable to all character set encodings, with particular emphasis on ISO 8859-1. It is regularly published in Usenet groups ``comp.unix.questions´`, ``comp.std.internat´`, ``comp.software.international´`, ``comp.lang.c´`, ``comp.windows.x´`, ``comp.std.c´`, ``comp.answers´` and ``news.answers´`. The home location of this document is:

    ftp://ftp.vlsivie.tuwien.ac.at/pub/8bit/ISO-programming

Patrick D'Cruze (``pdcruze@li.org´`) wrote a tutorial about NLS matters, and Jochen Hein (``Hein@student.tu-clausthal.de´`) took over the responsibility of maintaining it. It may be found as:

    ftp://sunsite.unc.edu/pub/Linux/utils/nls/catalogs/Incoming/...
         ...locale-tutorial-0.8.txt.gz

This site is mirrored in:

    ftp://ftp.ibp.fr/pub/linux/sunsite/

A French version of the same tutorial should be findable at:

    ftp://ftp.ibp.fr/pub/linux/french/docs/

together with French translations of many Linux-related documents.

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