NGETTEXT(3) Library Functions Manual NGETTEXT(3)
NAME
ngettext, dngettext, dcngettext - translate message and choose plural
form
SYNOPSIS
#include <libintl.h>
char * ngettext (const char * msgid, const char * msgid_plural,
unsigned long int n);
char * dngettext (const char * domainname,
const char * msgid, const char * msgid_plural,
unsigned long int n);
char * dcngettext (const char * domainname,
const char * msgid, const char * msgid_plural,
unsigned long int n, int category);
DESCRIPTION
The ngettext, dngettext and dcngettext functions attempt to translate a
text string into the user's native language, by looking up the appro-
priate plural form of the translation in a message catalog.
Plural forms are grammatical variants depending on the a number. Some
languages have two forms, called singular and plural. Other languages
have three forms, called singular, dual and plural. There are also lan-
guages with four forms.
The ngettext, dngettext and dcngettext functions work like the gettext,
dgettext and dcgettext functions, respectively. Additionally, they
choose the appropriate plural form, which depends on the number n and
the language of the message catalog where the translation was found.
In the "C" locale, or if none of the used catalogs contain a transla-
tion for msgid, the ngettext, dngettext and dcngettext functions return
msgid if n == 1, or msgid_plural if n != 1.
RETURN VALUE
If a translation was found in one of the specified catalogs, the appro-
priate plural form is converted to the locale's codeset and returned.
The resulting string is statically allocated and must not be modified
or freed. Otherwise msgid or msgid_plural is returned, as described
above.
ERRORS
errno is not modified.
BUGS
The return type ought to be const char *, but is char * to avoid warn-
ings in C code predating ANSI C.
SEE ALSO
gettext(3), dgettext(3), dcgettext(3)
GNU gettext 0.20.1.124-32cf May 2001 NGETTEXT(3)
Generated by dwww version 1.16 on Mon Jul 13 21:02:53 CEST 2026.