[Freeciv-Dev] Re: Is it possible...

[Egbert Hinzen <egbert@xxxxxxxxxx>]

On Sun, 14 Nov 1999, Greg Wooledge wrote:

> But this is a more serious translation issue.  I'm not sure what the best
> way to avoid it would be.  And it's deeper than just "a" vs. "an" -- there
> are other problems.
> 
> E.g., consider this:
> 
>   _("Game: You caught a%s %s %s attempting sabotage in %s!"),

If the "a%s" happens with diplomats and spies I solved(?) the problem in
German by changing the she-spy to a he-spy to get the same gender for both
and used the sentence this way:

        "Game: %2$s %3$s attempting sabotage in %4$s caught!"
        "Spiel: %2$ser %3$s bei Sabotageversuch in %4$s gefaßt!"

In German this is acceptable.

All other phrases with "a%s" could be solved similar.

IF a similar solution is possible in ALL other languages, too, AND Greg
is right that there is no problem by "forgetting" a "%s", I don't think we
must change anything (now).

But the programmers should not create additional phrases of this kind in
the future!

-- 
Egbert Hinzen
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