Is there a preferred line length for the po files?

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Hi Maren,

Sorry for the delay. I don't read all the entries in the Answers section, and just noticed when the status changed to expired...

As far as I can tell, there's no line length limit for PO files. Most of the Inkscape PO files are formated in 80 columns when they are updated with msgmerge (IIRC correctly, it's a default behavior) and POedit. But it could well be completely different, without significant effect on how we use them.

The main issue with diffs on PO files is when the translations warden updates the strings list or content while you're working on a local translation file. In that specific case, you can have very big diff files (sometimes even bigger than the PO file itself). That's the reason why most translators post their PO files and not diffs.

I'll try to review your tutorials later this week (I'm back for 10 days in the deep countryside with almost no phone and internet connection, and my todo/toread list is quite long). At first glance they look good, but I haven't applied the diff to the repository and checked for format or markup errors yet.

Don't hesitate to use my email directly when I'm too long to answer ;)

Merci beaucoup, Nicolas!

I've since switched to lokalize, the KDE translation software.

It's far more useful than poedit for me, as it allows to update two files in parallel (work on one, and all changes are automatically put into the other), and also allows to merge two files.

It doesn't even offer any options for line length... ;) - and doesn't produce any large diffs because of accidental line length changes, so Eduard and I can still see which changes the other made. It's really great for collaborative editing (you see I'm quite enthusiastic about it :) ).