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[PATCH] C style: use standard style for "TRANSLATORS" comments

From
Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason <avarab@gmail.com>
Date
May 11, 2017, 21:20 UTC
Message-ID
<20170511212012.6782-1-avarab@gmail.com>
In-Reply-To
<20170511204334.GM83655@google.com>

Change all the "TRANSLATORS: [...]" comments in the C code to use the regular Git coding style, and amend the style guide so that the example there uses that style.

This custom style was necessary back in 2010 when the gettext support was initially added, and was subsequently documented in commit cbcfd4e3ea ("i18n: mention "TRANSLATORS:" marker in Documentation/CodingGuidelines", 2014-04-18).

GNU xgettext hasn't had the parsing limitation that necessitated this exception for almost 3 years. Since its 0.19 release on 2014-06-02 it's been able to recognize TRANSLATOR comments in the standard Git comment syntax[1].

Usually we'd like to keep compatibility with software that's that young, but in this case literally the only person who needs to be using a gettext newer than 3 years old is Jiang Xin (the only person who runs & commits "make pot" results), so I think in this case we can make an exception.

This xgettext parsing feature was added after a thread on the Git mailing list[2] which continued on the bug-gettext[3] list, but we never subsequently changed our style & styleguide, do so.

There are already longstanding changes in git that use the standard comment style & have their TRANSLATORS comments extracted properly without getting the literal "*"'s mixed up in the text, as would happen before xgettext 0.19.

Commit 7ff2683253 ("builtin-am: implement -i/--interactive", 2015-08-04) added one such comment, which in commit df0617bfa7 ("l10n: git.pot: v2.6.0 round 1 (123 new, 41 removed)", 2015-09-05) got picked up in the po/git.pot file with the right format, showing that Jiang already runs a modern xgettext.

The xgettext parser does not handle the sort of non-standard comment style that I'm amending here in sequencer.c, but that isn't standard Git comment syntax anyway. With this change to sequencer.c & "make pot" the comment in the pot file is now correct:

     #. TRANSLATORS: %s will be "revert", "cherry-pick" or
    -#. * "rebase -i".
    +#. "rebase -i".
1. http://git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/gettext.git/commit/?id=10af7fe6bd
2. <2ce9ec406501d112e032c8208417f8100bed04c6.1397712142.git.worldhello.net@gmail.com>
   (https://public-inbox.org/git/2ce9ec406501d112e032c8208417f8100bed04c6.1397712142.git.worldhello.net@gmail.com/)
3. https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-gettext/2014-04/msg00016.html
Signed-off-by: Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason <avarab@gmail.com>
---
On Thu, May 11, 2017 at 10:43 PM, Brandon Williams <bmwill@google.com> wrote:
Show 22 quoted lines
> On 05/11, Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason wrote:
>> On Thu, May 11, 2017 at 10:21 PM, Brandon Williams <bmwill@google.com> wrote:
>> > On 05/11, Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason wrote:
>> >> [...]
>> >> +#ifdef NO_PTHREADS
>> >> +             else if (num_threads && num_threads != 1) {
>> >> +                     /* TRANSLATORS: %s is the configuration
>> >> +                        variable for tweaking threads, currently
>> >> +                        grep.threads */
>> >
>> > nit: this comment isn't formatted properly:
>> >   /*
>> >    * ... comment ...
>> >    */
>>
>> Comments for translators use a different style, see cbcfd4e3ea ("i18n:
>> mention "TRANSLATORS:" marker in Documentation/CodingGuidelines",
>> 2014-04-18). Otherwise the "*" gets interpolated into the string the
>> translators see in their UI.
>>
>
> Ah got it, I wasn't aware of that.

As it turns out this is just something we've been cargo-culting for years for no reason. Will fix this comment in my v2, but first let's do this.

 Documentation/CodingGuidelines | 10 +++++-----
 bisect.c                       |  6 ++++--
 builtin/blame.c                | 15 +++++++++------
 builtin/notes.c                |  6 ++++--
 builtin/remote.c               |  7 +++++--
 notes-utils.c                  |  7 +++++--
 parse-options.c                |  6 ++++--
 ref-filter.c                   | 12 ++++++++----
 sequencer.c                    |  3 ++-
 9 files changed, 46 insertions(+), 26 deletions(-)
diff --git a/Documentation/CodingGuidelines b/Documentation/CodingGuidelines
index a4191aa388..9fd7383819 100644
--- a/Documentation/CodingGuidelines
+++ b/Documentation/CodingGuidelines
@@ -256,12 +256,12 @@ For C programs:
 
    Note however that a comment that explains a translatable string to
    translators uses a convention of starting with a magic token
-   "TRANSLATORS: " immediately after the opening delimiter, even when
-   it spans multiple lines.  We do not add an asterisk at the beginning
-   of each line, either.  E.g.
+   "TRANSLATORS: ", e.g.
 
-	/* TRANSLATORS: here is a comment that explains the string
-	   to be translated, that follows immediately after it */
+	/*
+	 * TRANSLATORS: here is a comment that explains the string to
+	 * be translated, that follows immediately after it.
+	 */
 	_("Here is a translatable string explained by the above.");
 
  - Double negation is often harder to understand than no negation
diff --git a/bisect.c b/bisect.c
index 08c9fb7266..c5d5a2b64b 100644
--- a/bisect.c
+++ b/bisect.c
@@ -995,8 +995,10 @@ int bisect_next_all(const char *prefix, int no_checkout)
 
 	steps_msg = xstrfmt(Q_("(roughly %d step)", "(roughly %d steps)",
 		  steps), steps);
-	/* TRANSLATORS: the last %s will be replaced with
-	   "(roughly %d steps)" translation */
+	/*
+	 * TRANSLATORS: the last %s will be replaced with "(roughly %d
+	 * steps)" translation.
+	 */
 	printf(Q_("Bisecting: %d revision left to test after this %s\n",
 		  "Bisecting: %d revisions left to test after this %s\n",
 		  nr), nr, steps_msg);
diff --git a/builtin/blame.c b/builtin/blame.c
index 07506a3e45..ca9ebe40e7 100644
--- a/builtin/blame.c
+++ b/builtin/blame.c
@@ -2688,12 +2688,15 @@ int cmd_blame(int argc, const char **argv, const char *prefix)
 		blame_date_width = sizeof("2006-10-19");
 		break;
 	case DATE_RELATIVE:
-		/* TRANSLATORS: This string is used to tell us the maximum
-		   display width for a relative timestamp in "git blame"
-		   output.  For C locale, "4 years, 11 months ago", which
-		   takes 22 places, is the longest among various forms of
-		   relative timestamps, but your language may need more or
-		   fewer display columns. */
+		/*
+		 * TRANSLATORS: This string is used to tell us the
+		 * maximum display width for a relative timestamp in
+		 * "git blame" output.  For C locale, "4 years, 11
+		 * months ago", which takes 22 places, is the longest
+		 * among various forms of relative timestamps, but
+		 * your language may need more or fewer display
+		 * columns.
+		 */
 		blame_date_width = utf8_strwidth(_("4 years, 11 months ago")) + 1; /* add the null */
 		break;
 	case DATE_NORMAL:
diff --git a/builtin/notes.c b/builtin/notes.c
index 7b891471c4..fb856e53b6 100644
--- a/builtin/notes.c
+++ b/builtin/notes.c
@@ -340,8 +340,10 @@ static struct notes_tree *init_notes_check(const char *subcommand,
 
 	ref = (flags & NOTES_INIT_WRITABLE) ? t->update_ref : t->ref;
 	if (!starts_with(ref, "refs/notes/"))
-		/* TRANSLATORS: the first %s will be replaced by a
-		   git notes command: 'add', 'merge', 'remove', etc.*/
+		/*
+		 * TRANSLATORS: the first %s will be replaced by a git
+		 * notes command: 'add', 'merge', 'remove', etc.
+		 */
 		die(_("refusing to %s notes in %s (outside of refs/notes/)"),
 		    subcommand, ref);
 	return t;
diff --git a/builtin/remote.c b/builtin/remote.c
index addf97ad29..9054e2858e 100644
--- a/builtin/remote.c
+++ b/builtin/remote.c
@@ -1151,8 +1151,11 @@ static int show(int argc, const char **argv)
 			url_nr = states.remote->url_nr;
 		}
 		for (i = 0; i < url_nr; i++)
-			/* TRANSLATORS: the colon ':' should align with
-			   the one in "  Fetch URL: %s" translation */
+			/*
+			 * TRANSLATORS: the colon ':' should align
+			 * with the one in " Fetch URL: %s"
+			 * translation.
+			 */
 			printf_ln(_("  Push  URL: %s"), url[i]);
 		if (!i)
 			printf_ln(_("  Push  URL: %s"), _("(no URL)"));
diff --git a/notes-utils.c b/notes-utils.c
index 24a33616a4..8f9ad7d1f8 100644
--- a/notes-utils.c
+++ b/notes-utils.c
@@ -132,8 +132,11 @@ struct notes_rewrite_cfg *init_copy_notes_for_rewrite(const char *cmd)
 		c->mode_from_env = 1;
 		c->combine = parse_combine_notes_fn(rewrite_mode_env);
 		if (!c->combine)
-			/* TRANSLATORS: The first %s is the name of the
-			   environment variable, the second %s is its value */
+			/*
+			 * TRANSLATORS: The first %s is the name of
+			 * the environment variable, the second %s is
+			 * its value.
+			 */
 			error(_("Bad %s value: '%s'"), GIT_NOTES_REWRITE_MODE_ENVIRONMENT,
 					rewrite_mode_env);
 	}
diff --git a/parse-options.c b/parse-options.c
index a23a1e67f0..e5ad34a2c3 100644
--- a/parse-options.c
+++ b/parse-options.c
@@ -589,8 +589,10 @@ static int usage_with_options_internal(struct parse_opt_ctx_t *ctx,
 
 	fprintf_ln(outfile, _("usage: %s"), _(*usagestr++));
 	while (*usagestr && **usagestr)
-		/* TRANSLATORS: the colon here should align with the
-		   one in "usage: %s" translation */
+		/*
+		 * TRANSLATORS: the colon here should align with the
+		 * one in "usage: %s" translation.
+		 */
 		fprintf_ln(outfile, _("   or: %s"), _(*usagestr++));
 	while (*usagestr) {
 		if (**usagestr)
diff --git a/ref-filter.c b/ref-filter.c
index 3a640448fd..5632841753 100644
--- a/ref-filter.c
+++ b/ref-filter.c
@@ -1251,13 +1251,17 @@ char *get_head_description(void)
 			    state.branch);
 	else if (state.detached_from) {
 		if (state.detached_at)
-			/* TRANSLATORS: make sure this matches
-			   "HEAD detached at " in wt-status.c */
+			/*
+			 * TRANSLATORS: make sure this matches "HEAD
+			 * detached at " in wt-status.c
+			 */
 			strbuf_addf(&desc, _("(HEAD detached at %s)"),
 				state.detached_from);
 		else
-			/* TRANSLATORS: make sure this matches
-			   "HEAD detached from " in wt-status.c */
+			/*
+			 * TRANSLATORS: make sure this matches "HEAD
+			 * detached from " in wt-status.c
+			 */
 			strbuf_addf(&desc, _("(HEAD detached from %s)"),
 				state.detached_from);
 	}
diff --git a/sequencer.c b/sequencer.c
index 10c3b4ff81..b77f359ca2 100644
--- a/sequencer.c
+++ b/sequencer.c
@@ -464,7 +464,8 @@ static int do_recursive_merge(struct commit *base, struct commit *next,
 
 	if (active_cache_changed &&
 	    write_locked_index(&the_index, &index_lock, COMMIT_LOCK))
-		/* TRANSLATORS: %s will be "revert", "cherry-pick" or
+		/*
+		 * TRANSLATORS: %s will be "revert", "cherry-pick" or
 		 * "rebase -i".
 		 */
 		return error(_("%s: Unable to write new index file"),

-- 
2.11.0
Previous: Brandon WilliamsNext: Jonathan Nieder
Message 54 of 61 in “Easy to review grep & pre-PCRE changes”
  1. 00/29 Easy to review grep & pre-PCRE changesÆvar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, May 11, 2017
  2. 02/29 grep & rev-list doc: stop promising libpcre for --perl-regexpÆvar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, May 11, 2017
  3. 03/29 test-lib: rename the LIBPCRE prerequisite to PCREÆvar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, May 11, 2017
  4. 01/29 Makefile & configure: reword inaccurate comment about PCREÆvar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, May 11, 2017
  5. 04/29 log: add exhaustive tests for pattern style options & configÆvar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, May 11, 2017
  6. Junio C HamanoMay 12, 2017
  7. Ævar Arnfjörð BjarmasonMay 13, 2017
  8. 06/29 grep: add a test for backreferences in PCRE patternsÆvar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, May 11, 2017
  9. 05/29 grep: add a test asserting that --perl-regexp dies when !PCREÆvar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, May 11, 2017
  10. 08/29 grep: add tests for --threads=N and grep.threadsÆvar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, May 11, 2017
  11. Brandon WilliamsMay 11, 2017
  12. Ævar Arnfjörð BjarmasonMay 11, 2017
  13. 09/29 grep: amend submodule recursion test for regex engine testingÆvar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, May 11, 2017
  14. Junio C HamanoMay 12, 2017
  15. Ævar Arnfjörð BjarmasonMay 13, 2017
  16. 10/29 grep: add tests for grep pattern types being passed to submodulesÆvar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, May 11, 2017
  17. 07/29 grep: change non-ASCII -i test to stop using --debugÆvar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, May 11, 2017
  18. Brandon WilliamsMay 11, 2017
  19. Ævar Arnfjörð BjarmasonMay 11, 2017
  20. Brandon WilliamsMay 11, 2017
  21. 12/29 grep: prepare for testing binary regexes containing rx metacharactersÆvar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, May 11, 2017
  22. 13/29 grep: add tests to fix blind spots with \0 patternsÆvar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, May 11, 2017
  23. 14/29 perf: add a GIT_PERF_MAKE_COMMAND for when *_MAKE_OPTS won't doÆvar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, May 11, 2017
  24. 11/29 grep: add a test helper function for less verbose -f \0 testsÆvar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, May 11, 2017
  25. Junio C HamanoMay 12, 2017
  26. Ævar Arnfjörð BjarmasonMay 13, 2017
  27. Junio C HamanoMay 15, 2017
  28. 15/29 perf: emit progress output when unpacking & buildingÆvar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, May 11, 2017
  29. 16/29 perf: add a performance comparison test of grep -G, -E and -PÆvar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, May 11, 2017
  30. 18/29 grep: catch a missing enum in switch statementÆvar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, May 11, 2017
  31. Brandon WilliamsMay 11, 2017
  32. Stefan BellerMay 11, 2017
  33. Ævar Arnfjörð BjarmasonMay 11, 2017
  34. 17/29 perf: add a performance comparison of fixed-string grepÆvar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, May 11, 2017
  35. 19/29 grep: remove redundant regflags assignment under PCREÆvar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, May 11, 2017
  36. 20/29 grep: remove redundant `regflags &= ~REG_EXTENDED` assignmentsÆvar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, May 11, 2017
  37. 21/29 grep: factor test for \0 in grep patterns into a functionÆvar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, May 11, 2017
  38. Brandon WilliamsMay 11, 2017
  39. Ævar Arnfjörð BjarmasonMay 11, 2017
  40. 22/29 grep: change the internal PCRE macro names to be PCRE1Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, May 11, 2017
  41. Brandon WilliamsMay 11, 2017
  42. 23/29 grep: change internal *pcre* variable & function names to be *pcre1*Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, May 11, 2017
  43. 24/29 grep: move two functions to avoid forward declarationÆvar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, May 11, 2017
  44. Brandon WilliamsMay 11, 2017
  45. Ævar Arnfjörð BjarmasonMay 11, 2017
  46. 25/29 test-lib: add a PTHREADS prerequisiteÆvar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, May 11, 2017
  47. 26/29 pack-objects & index-pack: add test for --threads warningÆvar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, May 11, 2017
  48. Brandon WilliamsMay 11, 2017
  49. Ævar Arnfjörð BjarmasonMay 11, 2017
  50. 28/29 grep: given --threads with NO_PTHREADS=YesPlease, warnÆvar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, May 11, 2017
  51. Brandon WilliamsMay 11, 2017
  52. Ævar Arnfjörð BjarmasonMay 11, 2017
  53. Brandon WilliamsMay 11, 2017
  54. C style: use standard style for "TRANSLATORS" commentsÆvar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, May 11, 2017
  55. Jonathan NiederMay 11, 2017
  56. Brandon WilliamsMay 11, 2017
  57. Johannes SixtMay 12, 2017
  58. Jiang XinMay 30, 2017
  59. Junio C HamanoMay 30, 2017
  60. 27/29 pack-objects: fix buggy warning about threadsÆvar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, May 11, 2017
  61. 29/29 grep: assert that threading is enabled when calling grep_{lock,unlock}Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason, May 11, 2017

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