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Some packages are localizable when properly installed; the
programs they contain can be made to speak your own native language.
Most such packages use GNU gettext
. Other packages have their
own ways to internationalization, predating GNU gettext
.
By default, this package will be installed to allow translation of
messages. It will automatically detect whether the system already
provides the GNU gettext
functions. Installers may use special
options at configuration time for changing the default behaviour. The
command:
./configure --disable-nls
will totally disable translation of messages.
When you already have GNU gettext
installed on your system and
run configure without an option for your new package, configure
will probably detect the previously built and installed libintl
library and will decide to use it. If not, you may have to to use the
‘--with-libintl-prefix’ option to tell configure
where to
look for it.
Internationalized packages usually have many po/ll.po
files, where ll gives an ISO 639 two-letter code
identifying the language. Unless translations have been forbidden
at configure
time by using the ‘--disable-nls’ switch,
all available translations are installed together with the package.
However, the environment variable LINGUAS
may be set, prior
to configuration, to limit the installed set. LINGUAS
should
then contain a space separated list of two-letter codes, stating
which languages are allowed.