VTP Software: Internationalization

The first step in internationalization ("i18n" for short) is to translate the text in the GUI of each application.  This is the text that appears in the Menus and Dialogs.

We are using the GNU gettext approach for translations.  This is the normal way to do i18n with wxWidgets applications.  A nice free GUI tool for working with gettext files is poEdit.

A brief description of the process:

  1. The programmer outputs a .pot file, which is a simple text file.
  2. The translator fills in the .pot file with translated text, and returns it to the programmer as a .pox file.
  3. The programmer turns the .pox file into a .mo file.
  4. The user put the .mo file in a folder under their application.
  5. When the application launches, it finds the .mo file and the GUI is displayed in the current language.

Bilingual translators are needed only for step 2.

Current template files:

Enviro:

Language POX Translators MO MO
updated		 Put in a
folder named...
Afrikaans Enviro.pox Riaan van den Dool Enviro.mo 2004.03.26 af
Arabic Enviro.pox Alaa Ahmed Masoud Enviro.mo 2006.11.10 ar
Chinese Enviro.pox Juan Hu, Jangeofan,
Jam Ch'in		 Enviro.mo 2007.09.16 zh
English (UK) Enviro.pox Roger James Enviro.mo 2004.03.22 en_GB
French Enviro.pox Peraud Joseph Enviro.mo 2005.08.08 fr
German Enviro.pox Thomas Schubert,
Gerrit Wessendorf,
Lars Fricke		 Enviro.mo 2007.09.02 de
Hungarian Enviro.pox Andras Sarkozy Enviro.mo 2004.03.25 hu
Italian Enviro.pox Federico Rottura,
Marco Gualdrini,
Roberto Angeletti		 Enviro.mo 2008.05.06 it
Portuguese Enviro.pox Rodrigo Pellizzari Enviro.mo 2004.03.22 pt
Romanian Enviro.pox Vasile Craciunescu,
Stefan Constantinescu		 Enviro.mo 2007.01.8 ro
Spanish Enviro.pox José-Luis Díez Enviro.mo 2004.11.29 es
Swedish Enviro.pox Fredrik Ahl Enviro.mo 2006.10.18 sv
Turkish Enviro.pox Metin Inanc Enviro.mo 2005.08.15 tr

Note: by default, Enviro will attempt to use the default locale of your computer.  If you want to force it to use a difference locale you can use Enviro's command-line argument -locale.  For example, to use Romanian, use -locale=ro.

VTBuilder:

We have just begun to do i18n for VTBuilder.  To begin a new language, please start translating with the VTBuilder.pot file above.  Much of the text is the same as Enviro, especially toward the bottom of the file, so this might make it easier.

Language POX Translators MO MO
updated		 Put in a
folder named...
Arabic VTBuilder.pox Alaa Ahmed Masoud VTBuilder.mo 2006.11.10 ar
Chinese VTBuilder.pox Juan Hu, Jangeofan,
Jam Ch'in		 VTBuilder.mo 2007.09.08 zh
French VTBuilder.pox Peraud Joseph,
Philippe de Franclieu		 VTBuilder.mo 2005.12.20 fr
German VTBuilder.pox Gerrit Wessendorf,
Lars Fricke		 VTBuilder.mo 2007.09.02 de
Italian VTBuilder.pox Roberto Angeletti VTBuilder.mo 2008.05.06 it
Romanian VTBuilder.pox Vasile Craciunescu,
Stefan Constantinescu		 VTBuilder.mo 2007.01.8 ro

Like Enviro, VTBuilder will attempt to use the default locale of your computer, but you can tell it to use a difference locale with a command-line argument, e.g. -locale=zh

About Chinese support:

If you are running on a WinXP computer whose default language is not Chinese, you must have support enabled.  Look under Settings: Control Panel: Regional and Language Options. The checkbox with "Install files for East Asian Languages" must be checked.