[Freeciv-Dev] Re: (PR#19049) Problematic/buggy strings.

[Christian Knoke <chrisk@xxxxxxxxx>]

Per Inge Mathisen wrote on Aug 02, 09:26 (+0000):

> Yes, it is *so* much easier to make ruleset changes when you don't have to 
> rewrite a ton of helptext along with them. However, things have become so 
> generalized that it is, I think, impossible to generate good English 
> sentences in the helptext for it without mangling translations completely.
> 
> Take this example: In one ruleset I made, tiles with existing shield 
> production would be given a +2 shield production bonus if the government 
> was Communism and the city using the tile had a Factory. (Yes, this is 
> possible with ruleset nowadays.) How would you automatically generate an 
> English sentence to describe this?
> 
> Of course, one possibility is simply not to write any sentences, just use 
> keywords or illustrations. (One icon can replace many words.) Like this:
> 
>   Communism:
>     - Tiles +2 shields (Requires: Factory in city, Communism,
>       Already producing a shield in tile)

What we do is express rules here, which are logical preclauses. The
game can output these clauses (like you put it above, eg) and we
translate them in any language we want, including english.

This could be done in XML.

You can also get along with gettext, maybe. Print a logical meta
sentence like above and 'translate' it (with po files) into good
english language (and all the others).

Christian

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Christian Knoke            * * *            http://cknoke.de
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