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Document common mistakes in translations.

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trag1c or I point these out manually whenever we see them, but they're
extremely common and probably deserve being explicitly documented.

“Style Guide” was made sentence case because no other title is in title
case.

Before anyone comments: I use “full stop” instead of “period” because
the Unicode Character Database uses “full stop” instead of “period”, and
I avoid “dot” because Unicode has a plethora of dots.
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Kat
2026-02-27 09:53:35 +11:00
parent dea263a8ae
commit 848d8afecc
1 changed files with 46 additions and 3 deletions
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49
po/README_TRANSLATORS.md
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@@ -103,8 +103,9 @@ Lines beginning with `#` are comments, of which there are several kinds:
affect translators in other locales.
The first entry of the `.po` file has an empty `msgid`. This entry is special
as it stores the metadata related to the `.po` file itself. You usually do
not need to modify it.
as it stores the metadata related to the `.po` file itself. You should update
`PO-Revision-Date` and `Last-Translator` once you have finished your edits, but
you normally do not need to modify other metadata.
## Creating new translation files
@@ -150,7 +151,7 @@ translation file that you created and `Y` is your [localization team name](#loca
+/po/X.po @ghostty-org/Y
```
## Style Guide
## Style guide
These are general style guidelines for translations. Naturally, the specific
recommended standards will differ based on the specific language/locale,
@@ -187,3 +188,45 @@ but these should serve as a baseline for the tone and voice of any translation.
[GNOME Human Interface Guidelines](https://developer.gnome.org/hig/guidelines/writing-style.html)
on Linux, and [Apple's Human Interface Guidelines](https://developer.apple.com/design/human-interface-guidelines/writing)
on macOS.
## Common issues
Some mistakes are frequently made during translation. The most common ones are
listed below.
### Unicode ellipses
English source strings use the ellipses character, `…`, instead of three full
stops, `...`. If your language uses ellipses, use the ellipses character instead
of three full stops in your translations. You can copy this character from the
English source string itself.
### Title case
Title case is a feature of English writing where most words start with a capital
letter: This Clause Is Written In Title Case. It is commonly found in titles,
hence its name; however, English is one of the only languages that uses title
case. If your language does not use title case, **do not use title case for the
sake of copying the English source**. Please use the casing conventions of your
language instead.
### `X-Generator` field
Many `.po` file editors add an `X-Generator` field to the metadata section.
These should be removed as other translators might overwrite them when using
a different editor, and some (such as Poedit) update the line when a different
_version_ is used—this adds unnecessary changes to the diff.
You can remove the `X-Generator` field by simply deleting that line from the
file.
### Updating metadata (revision date)
It is very easy to overlook the `PO-Revision-Date` field in the metadata at the
top of the file. Please update this when you are done modifying the
translations!
Depending on who last translated the file, the `Last-Translator` field might
also need updating: make sure it has your name and email. Finally, if your name
and email are not present in the copyright comment at the top of the file,
consider adding it there.