Re: [PATCH 2/2] object-name: make ambiguous object output translatable

[Jeff King <peff@peff.net>]

On Mon, Oct 04, 2021 at 10:26:10AM +0200, Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason wrote:

> >> +		/*
> >> +		 * TRANSLATORS: The argument is the list of ambiguous
> >> +		 * objects composed in show_ambiguous_object(). See
> >> +		 * its "TRANSLATORS" comment for details.
> >> +		 */
> >> +		advise(_("The candidates are:\n\n%s"), sb.buf);
> >
> > Here's where the extra newline.
> >
> > I understand why the earlier ones were changed for RTL languages. But
> > this one is always line-oriented. Is the point to help bottom-to-top
> > languages? I can buy that, though it feels like that would be something
> > that the terminal would deal with (because even with this, you're still
> > getting the "error:" line printed separately, for example).
> >
> > I don't think what this is doing is wrong (at first I wondered about the
> > "hint:" lines, but because advise() looks for embedded newlines, we're
> > OK). But if the translation doesn't need to reorder things across lines,
> > this extra format-into-a-strbuf step doesn't seem necessary. We can just
> > call advise() directly in show_ambiguous_object(), as before.
> >
> > If it is necessary, then note that you leak "sb" here.
> 
> I'll keep that bit as-is, it's not strictly necessary, but it gives
> translators a bit more context.

If it's just for the context, wouldn't this do the same thing:

  /*
   * TRANSLATORS: This is followed by the list of ambiguous
   * objects composed in show_ambiguous_object(). See its
   * "TRANSLATORS" comments for details.
   */
  advise(_("The candidates are:"));
  ...
  if (oid_array_for_each(&collect, show_ambiguous_object, &ds))
     ...

I.e., leave the code as-is, and just add the extra comment. There is no
need for the extra struct or any change of ordering between this
advise() and the others.

I would think it is worthwhile if we are de-lego-ing a message that is
made in chunks, but in this case the we have to construct an opaque "%s"
to represent the individual lines for each object, because we don't know
how many of them there will be.

-Peff

PS In my "something like this" commit message, I indicated that the
   "candidates" message was getting translated, but it actually is
   already translated in the pre-image. So I think we would not need to
   touch that line at all.