[Microproject] describe: pluralize tag/commit count messages

[Microproject] describe: pluralize tag/commit count messages

[Antoni Borowski]

These two verbose messages hardcoded the English plural form
("tags"/"commits") inside _(), which is wrong both grammatically
(e.g. "found 1 tags") and for i18n, since other languages have
different plural rules than English.

Switch both to Q_() so gettext picks the correct singular/plural
form based on the count.

Signed-off-by: Antoni Borowski <antekborowski11@gmail.com>
---
 builtin/describe.c | 6 ++++--
 1 file changed, 4 insertions(+), 2 deletions(-)

diff --git a/builtin/describe.c b/builtin/describe.c
index c0abc931a5..9fbb982417 100644
--- a/builtin/describe.c
+++ b/builtin/describe.c
@@ -481,10 +481,12 @@ static void describe_commit(struct commit *cmit, struct strbuf *dst)
 				label_width, _(prio_names[t->name->prio]),
 				t->depth, t->name->path);
 		}
-		fprintf(stderr, _("traversed %lu commits\n"), seen_commits);
+		fprintf(stderr, Q_("traversed %lu commit\n",
+				   "traversed %lu commits\n", seen_commits), seen_commits);
 		if (gave_up_on) {
 			fprintf(stderr,
-				_("found %i tags; gave up search at %s\n"),
+				Q_("found %i tag; gave up search at %s\n",
+				   "found %i tags; gave up search at %s\n", max_candidates),
 				max_candidates,
 				oid_to_hex(&gave_up_on->object.oid));
 		}
-- 
2.56.0

Re: [Microproject] describe: pluralize tag/commit count messages

[Jeff King]

On Tue, Oct 13, 2026 at 10:43:51PM +0200, Antoni Borowski wrote:

> These two verbose messages hardcoded the English plural form
> ("tags"/"commits") inside _(), which is wrong both grammatically
> (e.g. "found 1 tags") and for i18n, since other languages have
> different plural rules than English.
> 
> Switch both to Q_() so gettext picks the correct singular/plural
> form based on the count.

OK. The patch looks obviously correct, though I do find it a little
funny that we bother to translate these debug messages in the first
place.

I wonder if there is even really value in keeping "--debug" here at all.
But that is a somewhat bigger change.

The patch here seems OK to me in the meantime (and totally fine for a
microproject).

-Peff

Re: [Microproject] describe: pluralize tag/commit count messages

[Junio C Hamano]

Jeff King <peff@peff.net> writes:

> OK. The patch looks obviously correct, though I do find it a little
> funny that we bother to translate these debug messages in the first
> place.
>
> I wonder if there is even really value in keeping "--debug" here at all.
> But that is a somewhat bigger change.
>
> The patch here seems OK to me in the meantime (and totally fine for a
> microproject).

Yeah, but a microproject that convincingly argues that output from
the "--debug" option should not even be translated and undoes _()
would make a much better case to see how a new person works well ;-).