The bashrc bash configuration files
The default shell in most Linux distributions is the bash shell. Contrary to all the usability work that has been done to the GUI, the shell is most neglected area.
Depicting a shell is not an easy task; in the screenshot above we only show the default prompt. It has the following disadvantages,
- It does not differentiate visually between the username and hostname.
- It shows the relative path only, making it difficult to realize quickly the full path for the current working directory.
- Cannot copy the path using the mouse by double-clicking on it. The ~ is not included in the highlighted text, that one needs to paste and add the remaining part of the path (such as /home/user/)
- The point of input changes position on the command line, depending on the size of the path. As you cd into directories, the point of input moves further to the right.
This is the prompt with the bashrc project configuration files. It solves the problems described with the default configuration files found in Linux distributions.
Obviously, there are more to the shell’s configuration files than a usable prompt. For example,
- the ability to show the partial matches when you press Tab for the first time
- enabling the shopt options to reasonable values
- have reasonable aliases for . .. … / -
- adding –verbose, –interactive to basic utilities such as cp, mv, rm
- show the exit value of an application if it is other than 0 ($?)
There is a EnhancedBash project for the Ubuntu Linux distribution which might be able to break apart and provide better default configuration files.
If you want to help and add more to the proposed configuration, visit http://github.com/simos/bashrc/
To use the bashrc shell, you need to
- Download the latest package from http://github.com/simos/bashrc/ (note the Download button).
- Extract the package, open a terminal window and enter the newly created directory.
- Run make install
- Open a new shell window. The new settings should be activated.
Designing a command-line translation tool for GNOME
One messy task with GNOME translations is the whole workflow of getting the PO files, translating/updating/fixing them, and then uploading them back. One would need to use command line, and several different commands to accomplish this.
KDE and KBabel has a nice feature that allows you to easily grab all translation files, work on them, then commit through SVN. All through the GUI! It helps a bit here that the translation files for a specific language are located under a single directory.
The current workflow in GNOME translations typically consists of
- Getting the PO file from the L10n server (for example, GNOME 2.22 Greek) (also possible to use intltool-update within po/)
- Translate using KBabel, POEdit, GTranslator, vim, emacs, etc.
- svn co the package making sure you have the correct branch. One may limit to the po/ directory.
- Put the updated file in po/
- Update the ChangeLog (either with emacs, or with that Perl script)
- Commit the translation.
- (If you committed on a branch, also commit on HEAD)
Tools such as Transifex (used currently in Fedora) take away altogether the use of command line tools, and one works here through a web-based interface. Apparently, Transifex is having a command-line tool in the TODO list.
What I would like to see in GNOME translations, is a tool that one can use to
- Grab all or a section of the PO files from GNOME 2.22. Put them in a local folder.
- Use the tools of my preference (translation tools, scripts, etc) to update those translations I need to update.
- Commit those translation files that changed (using my SVN account), automatically add ChangeLog entries, also commit to HEAD if required.
I would prefer to have a command-line tool for this, for now, though it would be great if GUI tools would get the same functionality at some point. For a command line tool, the workflow would look like
The workflow would be something like
$ ssh-add Enter passphrase for /home/simos/.ssh/id_rsa: Identity added: /home/simos/.ssh/id_dsa (/home/simos/.ssh/id_dsa)
$ tsfx --project=gnome-2.22 --language=el --collection=gnome-desktop --user=simos --action=checkout
Reading from http://svn.gnome.org/svn/damned-lies/trunk/releases.xml.in... done.
Getting alacarte (HEAD)... done.
Getting bug-buddy (branch: xyz)... done.
...
Completed in 4:11s.
$ _
Now we translate any of the files we downloaded, and we push back upstream (of course, only those files that were changed).
$ tsfx --action=commit
Found local repository, Project: gnome-2.22, Language: el, Collection: gnome-desktop, User: simos
Reading local files...
Found 6 changed files.
Uploading alacarte (HEAD)... done.
Uploading bug-buddy (branch:xyz, HEAD)... done.
...
Completed uploading translation files to gnome-2.22, language el.
$ _
