[rt-devel] Translation

[Tobias Brox]

> I would like to volunteer to work on the internationalization
> of rt.

Localization, I guess. :) If I've understood the terminology right, i18n
(internationalization) is just to get it working and getting stuff like
dates, etc, correct.  I think RT2 fits the bill already; the templates
(for mail correspondance)  can be set up in whatever language and charset
that is wanted.  Currently the dates are printed according to the
international ISO standard; though it would have been better to follow the
Locale setting. l10n (localization) is to translate everything, so people
with no clue about english can use the product.

Mainly, those components needs translation;

- the default mail templates (though that is not so important, because the
local RT admin should be able to replace those easily him/herself).  I've
already set up the database setting so that different translations of
every mail template can exist.  Next, we need to be able to store
"preffered language" for every RT user and requestor.  That's a good idea,
I'll modify the schema.mysql right away. :)

- the HTML::Mason modules/templates for the web interface.  One way to do
that is to make a module for translation, and every time some piece of
text is to be inserted, we call this module, i.e. <& t, text=>"This is
some text" &>.  I don't like that too much, but it seems to be the best
option with Mason anyway.  You might eventually lurk a bit at the Mason
mailinglist and ask if anybody there have any experience with l10n.

- Error messages from the code itself - as well as all the text
that is currently hardcoded into the mail interface and the cli.

- Configuration; I guess we in the long term want to move anything that
doesn't _need_ to be in config.pm to the database.  In the short term I
think it's safe to assume that the person installing and setting up RT
can handle English.

I did write another long mail earlier about l10n, I'll see if I can find
it.

Also, Jesse once posted an URL to a very interessting article about
Locale::Maketext.  I guess we're going to use that package.  It's a
descendant of GNU gettext, I think - just that it's better at handling
languages with different grammar than English.

> I am not a developer,

That's bad.

>  but I can study and learn how
> to do things provided I get some guidance (not much, I promise).

That is nice.  I guess the best thing for doing that is to meet us in
Plzen the 19th of June. :)  In addition you should try to install RT2 and
ask for help every time you're stuck with it.

Memo to the rtcon: Do not forget to discuss l10n :)

For anyone that missed the rtcon invitation, it's located at
http://www.fsck.com/~tobiasb/rtcon.html