Translating darktable

Working on a translation

If you are a first contributor, the first important step is to contact previous translators to coordinate the work with them.

By cloning the repository

Translatable strings are tagged in the C source code, so they can automatically be fetched and compiled into a translation database. The translations are stored in po.

1. Get darktable repository with Git (git needs to be installed on your computer):

$ git clone https://github.com/darktable-org/darktable.git
$ cd darktable/po

2. Update the translatable strings from the C and C++ source code with intltool (which needs to be installed on your computer too):

$ intltool-update -pot

3. Init or update your language support:

$ intltool-update CODE

where CODE has to be replaced by your ISO 639-1 language code (2 letters).

4. Open the translation file in Poedit GUI (which needs to be installed on your computer) :

$ poedit CODE.po

From that point, you only need to deal with Poedit to translate strings, command line work is done.

5. Save the .po file from Poedit and send it to us, either by:
   • opening a pull request
   • mailing it as attachment to darktable-dev@lists.darktable.org

Without cloning

An alternative solution without cloning the repository can be found here, Translation. This may be easier when the goal is to only work on translation.