xgettext(1) manual page
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xgettext - extract gettext call strings from C programs
xgettext
[ -ns ] [ -a [ -x exclude-file ] ] [ -c comment-tag ] [ -d default-domain ] [
-j ] [ -m prefix ] [ -M suffix ] [ -p pathname ] -| filename ...
xgettext -h
SUNWloc
xgettext is used to automate
the creation of portable message files (.po). A .po file contains copies of
‘C’ strings that are found in ANSI C source code in filename or the standard
input if ‘-’ is specified on the command line. The .po file can be used as
input to the msgfmt(1)
utility, which produces a binary form of the message
file that can be used by application during run-time.
xgettext writes
msgid strings from gettext(3I)
calls in filename to the default output
file messages.po. The default output file name can be changed by -d option.
msgid strings in dgettext() calls are written to the output file domainname.po
where domainname is the first parameter to the dgettext() call.
By default,
xgettext creates a .po file in the current working directory, and each
entry is in the same order the strings are extracted from filenames. When
the -p option is specified, the .po file is created in the pathname directory.
An existing .po file is overwritten.
Duplicate msgids are written to
the .po file as comment lines. When the -s option is specified, the .po
is sorted by the msgid string, and all duplicated msgids are removed. All
msgstr directives in the .po file are empty unless the -m option is used.
- -n
- Add comment lines to the output file indicating file name and
line number in the source file where each extracted string is encountered.
These lines appear before each msgid in the following format:
## File: filename, line: line-number
- -s
- Generate output sorted by msgids
with all duplicate msgids removed.
- -a
- Extract all strings, not just those
found in gettext(3I)
, and dgettext () calls. Only one .po file is created.
- -c comment-tag
- The comment block beginning with comment-tag as the first
token of the comment block is added to the output .po file as # delimited
comments. For multiple domains, xgettext directs comments and messages to
the prevailing text domain.
- -d default-domain
- Rename default output file from
messages.po to default-domain .po.
- -j
- Join messages with existing message files.
If a .po file does not exist, it is created. If a .po file does exist, new
messages are appended. Any duplicate msgids are commented out in the resulting
.po file. Domain directives in the existing .po file are ignored. Results
not guaranteed if the existing message file has been edited.
- -m prefix
- Fill
in the msgstr with prefix. This is useful for debugging purposes. To make
msgstr identical to msgid, use an empty string ("") for prefix.
- -M suffix
- Fill in the msgstr with suffix. This is useful for debugging purposes.
- -p
pathname
- Specify the directory where the output files will be placed. This
option overrides the current working directory.
- -x exclude-file
- Specify a .po file that contains a list of msgids that are
not to be extracted from the input files. The format of exclude-file is identical
to the .po file. However, only the msgid directive line in exclude-file is
used. All other lines are simply ignored. The -x option can only be used
with the -a option.
- -h
- Print a help message on the standard output.
msgfmt(1)
,
gettext(3I)
xgettext is not able to extract cast strings, for example
ANSI C casts of literal strings to (const char *). This is unnecessary anyway,
since the prototypes in <libintl.h> already specify this type.
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