path: root/NEWS

Version 0.12 - May 2003

* The gettext package is now separated into two subpackages:
  - gettext-runtime: Runtime libraries and programs.
  - gettext-tools: Tools and documentation for developers and translators.
  The 'gettext-runtime' package is very small and should be installed on every
  system that has users who desire to use internationalization. Whereas the
  'gettext-tools' package is only for developers and translators.

* The po/Makevars file has a new field MSGID_BUGS_ADDRESS, which program
  maintainers should fill in, to help feedback from the translators to the
  program maintainers.
  xgettext, accordingly, has a new option --msgid-bugs-address.

* Programming languages support:

  - C++

    A new C++ class, called gnu::autosprintf, makes it possible to use
    C format strings in C++. This is needed for proper internationalization
    of C++ programs.

  - Java

    All the tools that manipulate PO files can work with .properties files
    as well, if given the --properties-input and/or --properties-output
    option. To create a .properties file from a PO or POT file, use
    "msgcat --properties-output".

  - Smalltalk

    xgettext now also supports Smalltalk.

  - PHP

    xgettext now also supports PHP.

  - Python

    "xgettext --language=Python" now supports the plural handling functions
    ngettext, dngettext, ungettext (introduced in Python 2.3).

  - A new autoconf macro AM_PO_SUBDIRS is added. It is like AM_GNU_GETTEXT,
    for packages written in other languages than C/C++.

* A new library libgettextpo, with public header file "gettext-po.h",
  provides functions for reading PO files into memory. It is useful for
  applying PO files to areas not covered by the GNU gettext programs.
  New documentation section:
  - Writing your own programs that process PO files.

* New documentation sections:
  - Prioritizing messages: How to determine which messages to translate first.
  - Names: Marking Proper Names for Translation.

* xgettext now supports msgid strings in other encodings than ASCII.
  xgettext has a new option --from-code that specifies the encoding of the
  source files. The resulting POT files are UTF-8 encoded.

* Tools for translators:

  - msgmerge has a new option -N/--no-fuzzy-matching that inhibits the fuzzy
    search for untranslated messages.

  - msgattrib has new options --only-file and --ignore-file that cause the
    specified attribute manipulation to apply to selected messages only.

* Compatibility with automake-1.7.

* In documentation section po/LINGUAS:
  - Document the optional "languages" en@quot and en@boldquot.

* New configuration option --enable-relocatable.  See the INSTALL file for
  details.

Version 0.11.5 - August 2002

* Bug fixes in the gettext.m4 autoconf macros.

Version 0.11.4 - July 2002

* The tools now know about the ISO C 99 <inttypes.h> format string directive
  macros PRId64, PRIxMAX etc.

Version 0.11.3 - July 2002

* New program:
    autopoint - copies standard gettext infrastructure

* The documentation makes it clear that 'gettextize' is a wizard and
  migration tool.

* gettextize has a new option --dry-run.

* Improved portability to Solaris, OSF/1 and Linux/libc5.

* Improved interoperability with GCC 3.1.

* New documentation sections:
  - CVS Issues
  - mkinstalldirs
  - config.h.in

Version 0.11.2 - April 2002

* Bug fixes in the gettext.m4 autoconf macros.

* New documentation section:
  - Preparing Translatable Strings

Version 0.11.1 - March 2002

* xgettext now also supports Python, Tcl, Awk and Glade.

* msgfmt can create (and msgunfmt can dump) Tcl message catalogs.

* msggrep has a new option -C that allows to search for strings in translator
  comments.

* Bug fixes in the gettext.m4 autoconf macros.

Version 0.11 - January 2002

* New programs:
    msgattrib - attribute matching and manipulation on message catalog,
    msgcat - combines several message catalogs,
    msgconv - character set conversion for message catalog,
    msgen - create English message catalog,
    msgexec - process translations of message catalog,
    msgfilter - edit translations of message catalog,
    msggrep - pattern matching on message catalog,
    msginit - initialize a message catalog,
    msguniq - unify duplicate translations in message catalog.

* msgfmt can create (and msgunfmt can dump) Java ResourceBundles.

* xgettext now also supports Lisp, Emacs Lisp, librep, Java, ObjectPascal,
  YCP.

* The tools now know about format strings in languages other than C.
  They recognize new message flags named lisp-format, elisp-format,
  librep-format, smalltalk-format, java-format, python-format, ycp-format.
  When such a flag is present, the msgfmt program verifies the consistency
  of the translated and the untranslated format string.

* The msgfmt command line options have changed.  Option -c now also checks
  the header entry, a check which was previously activated through -v.
  Option -C corresponds to the compatibility checks previously activated
  through -v -v.  Option -v now only increases verbosity and doesn't
  influence whether msgfmt succeeds or fails.  A new option
  --check-accelerators is useful for GUI menu item translations.

* msgcomm now writes its results to standard output by default. The options
  -d/--default-domain and -p/--output-dir have been removed.

* Manual pages for all the programs have been added.

* PO mode changes:
  - New key bindings for 'po-previous-fuzzy-entry',
    'po-previous-obsolete-entry', 'po-previous-translated-entry',
    'po-previous-untranslated', 'po-undo', 'po-other-window', and
    'po-select-auxiliary'.
  - Support for merging two message catalogs, based on msgcat and ediff.

* A fuzzy attribute of the header entry of a message catalog is now ignored
  by the tools, i.e. it is used even if marked fuzzy.

* gettextize has a new option --intl which determines whether a copy of the
  intl directory is included in the package.

* The Makefile variable @INTLLIBS@ is deprecated. It is replaced with
  @LIBINTL@ (in projects without libtool) or @LTLIBINTL@ (in projects with
  libtool).

* New packaging hints for binary package distributors. See file PACKAGING.

* New documentation sections:
  - Manipulating
  - po/LINGUAS
  - po/Makevars
  - lib/gettext.h
  - autoconf macros
  - Other Programming Languages

Version 0.10.40 - September 2001

* The libintl library is now covered by the GNU LGPL.  The tools are still
  covered by the GNU GPL.

Version 0.10.39 - July 2001

* This is a bug-fix release.

* Now uses libtool-1.4.  Linking with the libintl shared library is easier.

* The autoconf macros now work with both autoconf-2.13 and autoconf-2.50.

Version 0.10.38 - May 2001

* This is a bug-fix release.

* Manual pages for the GNU libintl library functions have been added.

Version 0.10.37 - April 2001

This is a bug-fix release.

Version 0.10.36 - March 2001, by Ulrich Drepper and Bruno Haible

* General plural handling. New functions ngettext, dngettext, dcngettext.

* Locales which differ only in the character encoding, for example ja_JP and
  ja_JP.UTF-8, can now share the same message catalogs. gettext converts
  the messages to the appropriate character encoding on the fly.

* The tools now correctly process PO files in CJK encodings.

* Support for non-GNU gettext has been dropped.  Previously, on Solaris, the
  system's gettext was used (unless --with-included-gettext was specified),
  which led to problems with PO files that were not 100% translated.

* Support for the catgets wrapper has been dropped.  This means that gettext
  now always supports the LANGUAGE environment variable, message inheritance,
  automatic charset conversion etc.

* Support for the old Linux specific .msg catalog format has been dropped.

* When the included GNU libintl is installed (i.e. on GNU platforms, when
  the configure option --with-included-gettext is given, or on non-GNU
  platforms, when the configure option --disable-nls is not given), it is
  also installed as a shared library, unless the configure option
  --disable-shared is given.

* PO mode changes:

** PO mode does not use recursive edit anymore, many edits may be worked on
   simultaneously in a single PO file.

** PO mode may handle many translation files at once while correlating related
   entries, for helping multilingual or cultured translators.

** On recent Emacses, PO mode automatically use proper fonts when available.

** PO mode supports marking of C++ sources.

** highlights original message while editing the translation

** PO mode has commands to mail messages to teams or to the translation
   coordinator, with automatic inclusion of the current PO file.

Version 0.10.35 - April 1998, by Ulrich Drepper

* by default the emulation of gettext using the catgets() functions of
  the C library is not selected anymore.  GNU gettext has so many nice
  extensions that this became unreasonable.  Using --with-catgets the
  emulation still can be requested.

* extend xgettext program to handle other file formats other than C/C++.
  For now it also handles PO file.  Using this feature one can concatenate
  arbitrary PO files.

* Tcl module with gettext interface

* Korean translation by Bang Jun Young

* xgettext writes to stdout when default domain name is set to -

* codeset name normalization

* msgmerge program now has all features tupdate has (and more).
  tupdate itself will be removed soon

* po/Makefile.in.in now uses msgmerge instead of tupdate

* escape notation in .po files are only used when explicitly selected

* changed interface of msgunfmt to conform to GNU coding standard

* msgmerge now knows how to handle obsolete entries.  If a formerly obsolete
  entry is used again msgmerge will find it

* better implementation of comment extraction in xgettext.

* better C format string implementation.  The xgettext will classify
  strings as being a format string, or not, in the .po file.  The
  programmer can override the decision explicitly for each string
  by specifying `xgettext:c-format' and `xgettext:no-c-format'
  respectively in a C comment preceding the string.

* msgmerge program now always produces output.  Fuzzy or non-existing
  translations are no reason for holding back the result.

* reasonable header entry format implemented

* Norwegian translation by Karl Anders Øygard

* Configure command line option `--with-gnu-gettext' is renamed to
  `--with-included-gettext'

* gettextize now can determine whether the aclocal.m4 of the project
  is sufficent

* use automake for Makefile.in generation

* by default now only c-format is emitted in xgettext.  If using the new
  --debug option one can enable printing possible-c-format to see who
  decided about the string: xgettext or the programmer

* the installed libintl.h file no longer depends on HAVE_LOCALE_H being
  defined.  After running configure we know whether this file exists.

* wrapping of lines in PO file output finally enabled.
  A new special comment no-wrap prevents wrapping.

* add --statistics option to msgfmt to get information about number of
  translated, untranslated, and fuzzy messages

* change behaviour of --verbose option to msgfmt.  This no longer
  causes the check on the messages to be performed.  The check for leading
  and trailing \n is always performed and the check of the format specifiers
  is performed when --check is given.

* shared library support based On Gord Matzigkeit's libtool package

* msgcomm program by Peter Miller to extract messages shared by input
  files

* many more translations.

Version 0.10 - December 1995, by Ulrich Drepper

* implement --shell-script option for gettext program

* implement object-oriented, lazy message handling :-)
  Consult the manual for more/any information

* implement locale name aliasing, similar to the one used
  in the X Window System

* support for GNU gettext sources in central place to support
  use in development environments of other projects

* implement CEN syntax for environment variable values

* msgcmp program to find matches in two .po files

* programs now have exit status != 0 if errors occured

* libintl.a is now selfcontained and can be used without context in
  other projects (even on systems missing alloca)

* gettextize now automatically runs config.status

* swedish message catalog

* new options for xgettext: -D/--directory to change in specified directory
  before processing the input files and -f/--files-from to specify file from
  which the names of the input files are read.
  The later option in necessary for large projects such as GNU C Library.

* new programs msgmerge and msgunfmt by Peter Miller.  The code of the other
  programs is now also much cleaner.

Version 0.9 - August 1995, by Ulrich Drepper

* again many improvements on the manual

* norwegian message catalog

* compilation now works with --disable-nls

* better checks

Version 0.8 - July 1995, by Ulrich Drepper

* much improved manual (although still far from being complete)

* improved PO mode; it now can prepare C sources for use with gettext
  by marking translatable strings

* better support for sparse System V systems

* check goal (kind of)

* more input tests and warnings

* better support for integration in other packages

* many bugs fixed

Version 0.7 - June 1995, by Ulrich Drepper

* New GNU package providing functionality to internationalize and
localize other programs.

* Implementation of the Uniforum(*) proposal for internationalization
on top of X/Open(*) style catgets functions.

* Complete implementation of the Uniforum functions for system
lacking either of them or those who which to have a different
implementation with many advantages.

* Implementation of the three tools for message catalog handling
described in the Uniforum.

* Emacs po-mode for handling portable message object files which are
the basis of the work of the package.


(*) Some history:  The POSIX working groups have so far been unable to
agree on one set of message catalog handling functions for the C Library.
For now there are competing proposals, one by the Uniforum group, led by
Sun, and the other by X/Open.  Although the latter is surely implemented
on more systems, it is not perceived as the clear leader.