Translating projects with qilinguist

qilinguist can be used with qt or gettext.

In the following tutorial, you will learn how to configure qilinguist, and how to use it to build and install translation files.

Using qilinguist with gettext

Suggested layout:

<worktree>
|__ hello
    |__ qiproject.xml
    |__ po
    |   |__ POTFILES.in
    |__ hello.cpp
<!-- qiproject.xml -->
<project version="3">
  <qilinguist name="hello" linguas="en_US fr_FR" tr="gettext" />
</project>

# po/POTFILES.in

hello.cpp

// hello.cpp

#include <libintl.h>
#define _(string) gettext(string)

setlocale(LC_ALL, "");
bindtextdomain("hello", ...);
textdomain("hello");

std::cout << _("Hello, world");
  • po/POTFILES.in should list every file that contains strings that should be translated.
  • The name of the qilinguist project in the qilinguist tag in qiproject.xml should match the argument of bindtextdomain and textdomain calls.

Creating or updating .po files

Run qilinguist update

This will create or update the .po files in the po directory, one for each language defined in the linguas attribute of the qilinguist tag in the qiproject.xml

Generating the .mo files

Run qilinguist release.

This will create all the .mo files from the .po files.

Using qilinguist with qt linguist

Suggested layout:

<worktree>
|__ hello
    |__ qiproject.xml
    |__ po
    |   |__ POTFILES.in
    |__ hello.cpp
<!-- qiproject.xml -->
<project version="3">
  <qilinguist name="hello" linguas="en_US fr_FR" tr="linguist" />
</project>

# po/POTFILES.in

hello.cpp

// hello.cpp

#include <QApplication>
#include <QTranslator>

QApplication app;
QTranslator translator;
translator.load(..., ...);
app.installTranslator(&translator);
QString hello = QApplication::tr("Hello world!");

Updating .ts files

Run qilinguist update

This will create or update the .ts files in the po directory, one for each language defined in the linguas attribute of the qilinguist tag in the qiproject.xml

Creating the .qm files

Run qilinguist release.

This will create all the .qm files from the .ts files.

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