[Mailman-Developers] Re: [Mailman-Users] Localization

Barry A. Warsaw bwarsaw@CNRI.Reston.Va.US (Barry A. Warsaw)
Thu, 20 Aug 1998 12:39:53 -0400 (EDT)


[[Note that I've changed the CC to mm-dev]]

>>>>> "KM" == Ken Manheimer <klm@cnri.reston.va.us> writes:

    KM> If you take a look at the latest mailman version (see
    KM> http://www.python.org/mailman/listinfo/mailman-checkins for
    KM> instructions on following the current CVS revision), you'll
    KM> see that we've (primarily barry has) begun to separate out all
    KM> the multi-line text messages into separate files, and also are
    KM> using a functional interface to the messages.  Seems like this
    KM> would be an opportune place to incorporate locale sensitivity,
    KM> among other things.  It would have to be generalized a good
    KM> bit to apply to *all* messages, but we suspect that it's a
    KM> start...

We had a discussion about this topic a couple of months ago (sadly, I
realize this was in mailman-users 1998q3 archive).

Ken's right about the groundwork I laid to rip most of the in-code
text messages out of the .py files and into separate .txt files inside
templates.  I did it primarily for the cleanliness such separation
provides, but also with a thought toward localization.

We need to go one step further: we would need separate language
specific subdirs inside templates that would hold the appropriate
texts for other languages.  We would need to modify
Mailman.Utils.maketext() so that it takes an optional language
argument, and would pick the text template out of proper subdir.

Other issues: the keys interpolated into templates need to be
localized.  Other end-user intended text sprinkled in the code should
be localized.  Language preference on a per-list or per-user basis (or
both)?  Support for alternative localized HTML templates?  Option
names and descriptions?

-Barry