PoEdit is a PO editing tool that will run on Linux or Windows. It has a clean yet simple interface as well as quite a good translation memory. Its catalogue manager does not seem logical at first but is powerful in that it allows you to manage multiple projects.
When you first run poEdit you will be asked for some information. These items are stored in the header of the PO files and include your name, email address etc. The tabbed dialogue that appears needs the following information:
Click OK and you are presented with the PO editing interface.
Once POEdit is started you will see the translation interface.
Click file open to open and existing PO file. If you have no PO file or only a POT file. Then simply copy the POT file so that it ends in .po
With a PO file open you will see all strings in the top part of the interface. Strings are shown in different colours:
Cyan | untranslated |
Yellow | fuzzy - needs to be examined and might need to be retranslated |
White | translated |
You translate in the lower half of the interface. The original string or English string appears in the left. You type your translations in the bottom right hand section. It seems that keyboard navigation does not work properly so you will have to select each new string with the mouse.
Don’t forget to save regularly using Ctrl-S
Press F1 at anytime for the POEdit user manual. We recommend that you browse it now.
The catalogue manager allows you to manage projects with multiple PO files.
File -> Catalog manager
Click on create new translation project. Then for each directory that has PO files add it to the project.