All external localization files observe the following basic syntax rules:
Comments start with a comment character and continue to the end of the line. The first character in the first line of the file is defined to be the comment character for the file.
Sections begin with a section heading and contain entries. Section headings use left and right delimiters. A section heading’s maximum length is 63 bytes, including delimiters.
The first line in the file that does not begin with a comment character defines section heading delimiters for the file. Its first character is defined to be left delimiter and its last character is defined to be the right delimiter.
Entries take the following form:
keyword = value_list
where:
keyword is the entry keyword and can be up to 63 bytes long.
value_list is a list of one or more values separated by the list separator character. Each value can be a quoted or unquoted string or a hexadecimal number. If no value_list is present, the entry keyword is assigned a single zero-length string (that is, a string that contains only a NULL terminator) as its value.
value_list can span multiple lines if each line except the last ends with the escape character.
value_list can be up to 511 bytes long.
Only one entry can appear on a line. An entry can be preceded by tabs and spaces.
Values can be hexadecimal numbers or quoted or unquoted strings.
Unquoted strings beginning with “0x” are interpreted as hexadecimal numbers.
Strings do not require quotes unless they contain list separators or spaces. List separators and spaces that occur inside a quoted string are treated as though they were preceded by the escape character.
You can use either apostrophes or quotation marks to quote strings. Apostrophes (‘) can appear in strings delimited by quotation marks (“string”) and quotation marks can appear in strings delimited by apostrophes.
If either the apostrophe or quotation mark is repeated, then the two characters are treated as a single instance of the character, not as string delimiters, for example, “Jean’s book.”
