Compiling a message file

Compiling a message file is accomplished with the mkcatdecl command, which generates the message declaration files and message catalogs from a message specification file. The following arguments are recognized by mkcatdecl:

-i moduleIdfile

This flag specifies the path to module declaration file If this option is not specified, and environment variable MODULEIDDECl is checked for the location of the file.

-n

If specified, a message catalog source file (.gen) is not generated.

-g

If specified, message declaration files are not generated.

-c

If specified, all message declaration files will be generated in the current directory, regardless of the path specified in the $moduleset directive.

-m modid

If specified, only the message declaration files for the listed module IDs are generated. This option may be specified multiple times.

-M masterMessageFile

This compares the current message description file with another message description file and notes inconsistencies between the messages defined in each one as well as the positional parameters used in the text. This ensures that when message files are defined for more than one locale, they all work correctly.

msgSpecFile.msg

This is the message specification file, it must end with at .msg extension.

Here is a sample command:

mkcatdecl -i moduleIdFile stuff.msg

If you have declarations for multiple modules in one message file, you may want to selectively generate the files for a single module:

mkcatdecl -i moduleIdFile -m SCO_PIZZA stuff.msg

If you have a message description file for a non-default locale, you do not need to generate message declaration files for it, since the message declaration files should be generated from the message description file for the default locale. You can use the -g option to generate only the message catalog source file on which you can run gencat(CP) - this file has a .gen extension:

mkcatdecl -g -i moduleIdFile -m SCO_PIZZA stuff_icelandic.msg
gencat -X stuff_icelandic.cat stuff_icelandic.gen

The -M option can automate checking message files against each other for consistency. Discrepancies with the file specified by the -M option are noted:

mkcatdecl -M stuff.msg stuff_icelandic.msg