Translations (Jed)

Introduction

Demonstrates the entire process of gettext / i18n. Extracting strings into pot templates, populating templates into catalogues, converting catalogues into json and using gettext functions within the application code. Uses Jed as a Gettext implementation.

Installation

To install the application, run the following:

npm install;

To run the application, run the following:

gulp build && gulp server;

You will also (in a separate thread / terminal) need to run the API which acts as a file server to serve the .json catalogues. Ensure it is running before trying out this demo. It can be run with the following command:

node api/index.js

Usage

Extracting strings into a `.pot` file

Ideally we will have English references to our translations dotted throughout our client-side code base. These references could be found in JavaScript source files as well as template files such as .hbs files.

We are able to extract all of these strings and generate a .pot file from them. This is done via a module known as JSPot. It is intelligent enough to know the difference between a standard 1:1 translation and a translation with plurals, ensuring the .pot file is output correctly. I have written a wrapper method which will traverse all .js and .hbs source files.

gulp extract2pot

Creating `.po` catalogues from the `.pot` file

Using an editor such as POEdit, create a new catalog from the .pot file and ensure you set the plural form to be the correct value for the language you're about to be translating. You can find a list of plural forms here which should be of help. After this is done, fill out and save your .po file as required, placing it into the same directory as the .pot file but named after the languages two letter code.

NOTE: If you are using POEdit and are creating a catalog for the first time you may find it best to add the plural form after the initial setup screen. Sometimes if the plural form is input during the first setup screen it doesn't work correctly.

Converting `.po` catalogues into `.json` catalogues

The library is unable to directly read a .po file so it must be converted into Jed-compatible .json format. This is done via a module known as po2json and can be run with the following command:

gulp po2json

Terminology

gettext - Translates a chosen string.
ngettext - A plural version of gettext which uses an integer to determine whether or not to use a singular or plural version of a translation.
pgettext - A contextual version of gettext. Translation keys can be prefixed so you can have the same translation but in different contexts i.e. "OK" the response to a statement, and "OK" the action of clicking a button.
sprintf - Formats a string and replaces placeholders with variables.

anthonyhastings/translations-jed