[Haskell-i18n] Some starters for the new list

Ketil Z Malde ketil@ii.uib.no
15 Aug 2002 10:28:22 +0200


Martin Norbäck <d95mback@dtek.chalmers.se> writes:

> * Translation issues
> What is the best way to make programs translatable? I have some files at
> http://www.dtek.chalmers.se/~d95mback/gettext/ which could be commented
> on.

I just want to repeat something somebody suggested, and which I
thought was a really neat idea:  Have string constants in programs be
replaced by (Prelude.fromString "..") or similar, like numerical
constants are handled already.

This was suggested in order to simplify the use of PackedString, but
I think it might come in handy for translation issues, too.  Granted,
it's not a complete printf with argument permutation and all, but at
least it should be extremely simple, and, hey, it'll probably suffice
for *my* uses :-)

(Naturally, the idea is that Prelude.fromString can be repaced by a
function that looks the string up in a translation table, instead of
using the default value.  Any reason this won't work?)

-kzm
-- 
If I haven't seen further, it is by standing in the footprints of giants