Re: [PATCH] i18n: disable i18n for shell scripts if NO_GETTEXT defined

From: Alex Riesen <raa.lkml@gmail.com>
Date: Jan 19, 2012, 09:13 UTC
Message-ID: <CALxABCbaBmP6k5TYrYLCYm8oiv=9cF=N7_opSTKUnbkz5b-cwg@mail.gmail.com>
In-Reply-To: <CACBZZX4tB6DGV-1tiuOamq7ACPk0a-=1Pb9Vk1SgyDqAq-EFOw@mail.gmail.com>

On Thu, Jan 19, 2012 at 00:18, Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason <avarab@gmail.com> wrote:

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> On Wed, Jan 18, 2012 at 19:57, Alex Riesen <raa.lkml@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> Well, if I say NO_GETTEXT, I kind of want none of local gettext,
>> whether it works, or not.
>
> That's not what NO_GETTEXT means, and not what it *should* mean. It
> means that your output won't be translated, but we might still make
> use of a locally installed library to provide the gettext() and
> eval_gettext() functions.

I would never guess all that by its name: NO_GETTEXT. I wanted to say: there is no gettext in this installation, don't even try it.

> This approach has worked everywhere so far (Linux, OSX, *BSD etc.),
> and you want to change *everywhere* because you have some completely
> broken Cygwin install.

Just as I said.

> How did you even get that install? Is it a known issue? Some ancient
> now-fixed bug?

It is very likely. Or probably just a one installation problem: the problem is not consistently everywhere here. Some installations work (if slow).

> What version of Cygwin / gettext etc.

No idea. The person or persons who did this to me have no idea either.

> Now I'm not saying that we shouldn't fix this, I just don't think that
> this is the right way to go about it.

And I agree.

Show 9 quoted lines

> But in summary: We shouldn't be *always* using fallback functions
> whether they're the C stuff in compat/* or the gettext fallbacks in
> git-sh-i18n.sh just because there's some version out there of the
> system-supplied functions that's broken.
>
> It makes sense to prefer the system functions by default in both
> cases, but when the OS one can be broken or lacking we can just add
> probes or Makefile options like we do for fnmatch() with the
> NO_FNMATCH_CASEFOLD switch.

Yes, and I personally shall welcome a chance to insult the local IT by suggesting BROKEN_SH_GETTEXT. Not that they get the point...