Limnoria-doc/contribute/translate.rst

Translating Limnoria

I already wrote a guide on how to translate plugins. So, this page will only explain how to translate the core and push your translations to Limnoria.

The best way: using Git yourself

As I said in the policy about developer's contributions <contribute-develop-policy>, I don't give write access to my repo for the moment, but I accept pull requests.

As you are a translator, you don't need to know all the technical details about development, so I write a simplified doc here.

Cloning the repository

You first need an account on GitHub; I think you don't need explaination for that.

Then, go on Limnoria repository and click the Fork button. This will create you a copy of my repository where you will have write access (and I won't have this write access).

Then, open a console, and write (replace YourName by the name of your GitHub account):

git clone git@github.com:YourName/Limnoria.git --branch=testing

This will create a new directory, called Limnoria, where all the code and project history are copied. Now, cd to the directory:

cd Limnoria/

The things below affect to you only if you didn't specify the branch in the git clone command.

Then, you need to checkout the testing branch. What does that mean? It means that there is differents stages in Limnoria: all changes are made in testing, and when I think testing is stable, I merge it into master. So, checking out testing means Git will use the code in testing, you will translate strings that are in testing, and changes you make will be in testing. Now, do it:

git checkout testing 

Git will reply you that it understood what you mean by testing.

Ok, now, you can translate.

Pushing translations

Once you have done some translations (let's say you translated Alias), you have to commit your changes. That mean you tell Git "Ok, I've made some changes, and I want to take a snapshot (either to be able to roll back or to publish your changes).

First, you need to tell Git what files you want to be committed (let's say you are the Finnish translator, so you updated Alias's fi.po):

git add plugins/Alias/locales/fi.po

Then, you can commit your files. Depending on what you made, you can use one of this commands (not all of them!):

git commit -m "Alias: Add l10n-fi."
git commit -m "Alias: Update l10n-fi."
git commit -m "Alias: Fix l10n-fi."

By the way, the text that follow -m is a message that will be readed by humans, so you can write anything you want, but I think it's better that everybody use the same kind of messages.

Ok, then, Git knows you have done something. But you didn't send your work on Internet yet. To send it, run:

git push

Simple, isn't it?

Now, go back to GitHub and your forked repository, and click the Pull request button. Then, set testing on the both side, and run Update Commit Range. I will by mailed that you asked me to merge your changes, and I will do it soon.

Getting updates

As you may know, I do some updates in Limnoria repository. ;)

You need to have the latest version of the messages.pot files. So, you need to teach Git how to get this updates:

git remote add upstream git://github.com/ProgVal/Limnoria.git

Now, every time you want to download updates, run:

git fetch upstream
git merge upstream/testing

Another way: mailing me your translations

I think this is the simplest way for you. You only have to follow the translation guide and send me your .po files by mail.

You can choose either one of this way to do it.

Mikaela's way ------------

Send the fi.po (or whatever the name is) files one by one as an attachment. Don't forget to tell me what plugin it is.

I (Mikaela) have moved to git long time ago though.

skizzhg's way

Do many translations. Put them in a tarball/zipball/whatever (but not a RAR archive, I can't read them because is a proprietary format).

I prefer that you choose this architecture:

• FirstPlugin/locales/it.po
• SecondPlugin/locales/it.po
• ThirdPlugin/locales/it.po

Because I can extract everything with one click.