Re: [boost] [locale] Formal review of Boost.Locale library EXTENDED

Subject: Re: [boost] [locale] Formal review of Boost.Locale library EXTENDED
From: Artyom (artyomtnk_at_[hidden])
Date: 2011-04-19 09:05:06

> From: Edward Diener <eldiener_at_[hidden]>
> On 4/19/2011 3:17 AM, Matus Chochlik wrote:
> > On Tue, Apr 19, 2011 at 2:10  AM, Edward Diener<eldiener_at_[hidden]>   
>wrote:
> >> On 4/18/2011 9:53 AM, Paul A. Bristow wrote:
> >> 
> >> My personal objection to Gnu gettext and its English bias has  nothing to 
do
> >> with any desire myself to use a language other than  English in order to
> >> communicate, since English ( or perhaps  Americanese ) is the language of 
>the
> >> country in which I was born,  but nearly everything to do with my sense of
> >> the problems of  translating even computer program phraseology from one
> >> language to  another without complicating things by having to put some 
other
> >>  language, even a very popular one, in the middle.
> >> 
> >> Was  that a single sentence ? I wonder if it can be translated to Japanese 
?
> > 
> > These are all valid points Speaking in a particular language  means
> > to be thinking in a certain way and many things can be lost in the  
>translation.
> > But I don't see above any solutions to the actual  problem.
> > 
> >> From how I see it there are several ways to handle  this:
> > 
> > 1) Stick to English phrases
> > [snip]
> > 
> > Take your pick :-)
> 
> My pick is to use  what the language currently provides,
> which is wchar_t, which can represent  UTF-16,

No it can not represent UTF-16, it represents
either UTF-32 (on most platforms around) or UTF-16
(on one specific platform Microsoft Windows).

> a popular Unicode variant which also happens to be the standard for wide  
>characters on Windows,
> which just happens to be the dominant operating system in  the world ( by alot 
>) in terms of end-users.
> 

That is questionable statement especially
that there are so much iPhones, Andriods, 
Servers and Services not using
Windows but directly communicating with 
end user.

But your statement has nothing to do with
support of Unicode in C++ world

> What I object  to is not the way that
> Locale currently works but that the 
> author of the library  seems to have a 
> closed mind about this issue. He thinks
> that UTF-8 must be the  standard because
> it is what Linux uses,

I bake your pardon?

UTF-8 is standard far beyond what
Linux is uses.

I suggest to study a facts about it
a little.

Buzzwords: xml, web, Unicode and more
and more and more.

About UTF-16, I assume you are not
familiar with this:

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1049947/should-utf-16-be-considered-harmful

Despite this Boost.Locale fully supports UTF-16/wchar_t on
windows.

> and he thinks  that everyone must
> follow  the way that gnu gettext
> does things because that also
> comes from the Linux  world about
> which he is knowledgable.
>
> Even when it is pointed out
> to him the  flaw in gnu gettext
> which forces other languages to
> go through English to be  translated,
> he feels that this is correct on the
> basis that English is the  dominant
> language in computer programming,
> so every programmer must know it to
> write computer programmers in C++.

- How many translation system do you know?
- How many have you tested?
- How many have you really used?
- How many programs have you ever localized,
  translated?

All systems use English as the base as
it is the best practice.

> [snip]
> Claiming that all programmers  must 
> know English to do programming, 
> or that translating through English
> is a  rote job I also find absurd.
> [snip]

Despite the fact that it is what is done
all over the world very successfully.

Artyom