NAME

       po2debconf - merge master templates file and PO files

SYNOPSIS

       po2debconf [-v] [-h] [--podir=DIR] [-o FILE] [-e STRING] master

DESCRIPTION

       This program reads all PO files and a single templates file, and produces a Debconf templates file
       containing all translations, similar to the one produced by debconf-mergetemplate(1) (from the
       "debconf-utils" package).  PO files are by default searched in the po subdirectory below the location of
       the master file.

       To help the language code transition for Norwegian Bokmål, the no and nb language codes are handled
       specially.  If no.po exists, it should be renamed to nb.po.  Using nb.po will make both "-no" and "-nb"
       translations available in the templates file.

       Lines beginning with a number sign ("#") are comments in templates files.  They are useful to give hints
       to translators, and are discarded by po2debconf.  Special comments have been introduced in "po-debconf"
       1.0.  They are in the form "#flag:directive".  The "#flag:partial" is the only directive interpreted by
       po2debconf.  Normally when a field is composed of several paragraphs (like "__Choices" and
       "_Description"), it is translated if all paragraphs are translated.  When a field contains
       "#flag:partial", translated strings may be mixed with untranslated strings.

OPTIONS

       -h, --help
           Display a usage summary and exit.

       -v, --verbose
           Process in verbose mode.

       --podir=DIR
           Set  directory for PO files.  Default is to search PO files in the po subdirectory below the location
           of the master file.

       -o, --output=FILE
           Set output filename (default is standard output).

       -e, --encoding=STRING
           Convert encoding.  Argument can take 3 values:  "utf8"  (convert  to  UTF-8),  "po"  (do  not  change
           encoding)  and  "popular"  (convert  encoding  of  input  files  depending  on  their  language;  the
           "PODEBCONF_ENCODINGS" environment variable must point to a name of a  file  containing  the  encoding
           map).

           Such a filename looks like:

             #
             #   Number is comment sign
             #
             cs       ISO-8859-2
             da       ISO-8859-1
             de       ISO-8859-1
             el       ISO-8859-7

           etc.

           Default encoding used to be "popular", and has been switched to "utf8" since po-debconf 0.9.0.

OUTPUT FORMAT

       Since  debconf  1.2.0,  templates  format  has  changed,  encoding  is part of field names, i.e. they are
       "foo-lang.encoding".  When older debconf encounter such fields, they are silently  ignored,  which  means
       that original text is displayed.

       If  present, a po/output file can override defaults for encoding and output format.  It contains a single
       line with two fields. The first field is the output format (currently valid values are 1  for  fields  in
       the form "foo-lang", and 2 for "foo-lang.encoding") and the second field is the encoding, e.g.

          echo '2 utf8' > po/output

       let po2debconf convert text to UTF-8.

       When  encoding  is  set to "po" or "utf8", output format is always set to 2, so that older debconf do not
       try to display text with wrong encodings.

SEE ALSO

       debconf-gettextize(1), debconf-updatepo(1), po-debconf(7).

AUTHOR

         Denis Barbier <barbier@linuxfr.org>

                                                   2020-12-30                                      PO2DEBCONF(1)