using gettext for .desktop translations

[Jonathan Riddell]

On Fri, Dec 11, 2009 at 04:48:38PM +0100, Pino Toscano wrote:
> Translations from where? Which format?
> If tomorrow I install eg a GNOME application in my KDE, where will the KDE 
> menu look for the translations of the entries of the .desktop file of the 
> application?

>From the application's .po file.  The .desktop file contains a line
with the translation catalogue name.

> The same applies of course in the other way round, and in general 
> for any XDG menu implementation. This is als why IMO having translations in 
> .desktop files (not DE specific) is a good solution so far.

There's nothing desktop specific about gettext, it's used all over the place.

> And if the application does not use gettext at all for its translations (for 
> example with Qt-only or Java applications)?

For their .desktop files they can fallback to the old in-file
translation method.

> > I believe the glib maintainers are looking at this too.
> 
> Frankly, who cares? :)

.desktop is a shared standard so if they're considering changes we
should too.

Jonathan