Major inconsistencies in localized resource files

[Dmitry Timoshkov]

"Vincent Béron" <vberon at mecano.gme.usherb.ca> wrote:

> > We have major discrepancies in different language resource files. Some missing
> > stuff like font dialog (except few buttons and text). Some have not been updated
> > in ages.
> >
> > Should we net them together adding what's missing from English resources? And
> > set policy: if you do change resource file, change them all!
>
> That's usually impossible (most people don't know all the languages for
> which we have resource files). And adding a copy of the English
> strings/dialogs is counter-productive: Windows already fallbacks to
> English if something doesn't exist in the current locale.

Fallback to English doesn't help if a dialog misses controls, or have them
rearranged or changed (like the text or an id). I agree with Vitaliy here,
we have to ask to change all resource files simultaneously for all languages.

> I had developped a tool to verify the coverage of other locales by
> comparing them to English, after Dimi put together a simpler one. But it
> was never finished. The last person to work on it was Marcelo Duarte.
> The result was a set of HTML pages with colors indicating the coverage
> of each locales. I don't know when I'll get the time/motivation to
> resume work on it.

That suggests that the policy to update all the language resources needs
to be forced, otherwise it will lead to incomplete/bad resources which
nobody maintains.

--
Dmitry.