PO Editor

A JetBrains IDE plugin for editing gettext .po translations and .pot templates in a table.

What is PO Editor?

PO Editor is a localization plugin for JetBrains IDEs. It helps developers create, edit, validate, and compile GNU gettext translation files directly in the IDE.

Instead of editing .po and .pot files as plain text, you can work with a simple table:

Identifier	Source text	Translation
button.save	Save	Сохранить
page.title	Home page	Главная страница

The plugin is useful for projects that use gettext, Babel, Flask-Babel, Jinja2, or any other localization workflow based on .po, .pot, and .mo files.

Features

• Edit .po translation files in a three-column table.
• Edit .pot translation templates in the same table interface.
• Create new .po and .pot files from the New menu.
• Add and delete translation rows from the table editor.
• Attach a .pot template to a .po file.
• Update .po files from a .pot template without overwriting existing non-empty translations.
• Mark translations that were removed from the template.
• Scan project source code and update a .pot template with new translation keys.
• Validate .po syntax with msgfmt.
• Compile .po files to .mo files.
• Highlight untranslated, fuzzy, completed, source-equal, and removed entries.
• Highlight repeated spaces, tabs, and line breaks in the text fields.

Supported file types

File type	Purpose	Plugin support
.pot	Translation template	Table editor, source scan, template update
.po	Translation catalog	Table editor, template sync, syntax check, .mo compilation
.mo	Compiled binary catalog	Custom file icon

Recommended gettext format

PO Editor works best with gettext context-based entries:

msgctxt "button.save"
msgid "Save"
msgstr "Сохранить"

In this format:

• msgctxt is the stable translation identifier.
• msgid is the source text.
• msgstr is the translated text.

This keeps translation keys stable even when the source text changes.

Installation

Option 1: JetBrains Marketplace

1. Open your JetBrains IDE.
2. Go to Settings / Preferences → Plugins → Marketplace.
3. Search for PO Editor.
4. Click Install.
5. Restart the IDE if requested.

Option 2: Install from a GitHub Release ZIP

You can also install the plugin manually from GitHub Releases.

1. Open the repository Releases page.
2. Download the plugin ZIP from the latest release assets.
3. Do not unzip the archive.
4. Open your JetBrains IDE.
5. Go to Settings / Preferences → Plugins.
6. Click the gear icon.
7. Choose Install Plugin from Disk....
8. Select the downloaded .zip file.
9. Restart the IDE if requested.

This is useful when the plugin is not yet available on Marketplace, when you need a specific version, or when you want to test a pre-release build.

Option 3: Build from source

./gradlew buildPlugin

The installable ZIP will be created in:

build/distributions/

Install it with Settings / Preferences → Plugins → Install Plugin from Disk....

Quick start

Create a translation template

1. Right-click a directory in the Project view.
2. Choose New → POT Translation Template.
3. Open the created .pot file.
4. Add rows manually or click Update Template to scan the project for translation keys.

Create a translation file

1. Right-click a directory in the Project view.
2. Choose New → PO Translation File.
3. Open the created .po file.
4. Click Choose Template and select a .pot file.
5. Click Update Translations to add missing rows from the template.
6. Fill the translations in the table or in the large text fields below it.

Update translations after source code changes

A common workflow:

1. Add new translation calls in the source code.
2. Open the .pot file.
3. Click Update Template.
4. Open a .po file.
5. Click Update Translations.
6. Translate the new rows.

Existing non-empty translations are preserved.

Source code scanning

PO Editor can scan project files and collect static translation keys from calls like:

t("button.save")
i18n("button.save")
translate("button.save")
gettext("button.save")
$t("button.save")
tr("button.save")
_("button.save")

Jinja2 examples:

<title>{{ _('page_title') }}</title>
<p>{{ gettext("page_description") }}</p>

Only static string literals are collected. Dynamic keys are ignored because they cannot be safely written to a gettext template.

Syntax validation and MO compilation

PO Editor uses msgfmt for syntax validation and .mo compilation.

Install GNU gettext first:

# macOS
brew install gettext

# Debian / Ubuntu
sudo apt install gettext

The plugin looks for msgfmt in:

/opt/homebrew/bin/msgfmt
/usr/local/bin/msgfmt
PATH

Development

Requirements:

• JDK 21
• Gradle Wrapper from this repository
• IntelliJ Platform 2026.1 or newer

Useful commands:

./gradlew test
./gradlew runIde
./gradlew buildPlugin
./gradlew verifyPlugin

What these commands do:

Command	Purpose
./gradlew test	Run tests
./gradlew runIde	Start a sandbox IDE with the plugin installed
./gradlew buildPlugin	Build the installable plugin ZIP
./gradlew verifyPlugin	Check plugin compatibility with JetBrains IDEs

Project structure:

src/main/kotlin/ru/aksenov/poeditor/
  actions/   Toolbar and New-file actions
  editor/    Table editor and UI model
  parser/    PO parsing and writing
  scanner/   Source scanning and template synchronization

Release process

1. Update pluginVersion in gradle.properties.
2. Update CHANGELOG.md.
3. Update <change-notes> in src/main/resources/META-INF/plugin.xml.
4. Run local checks:

./gradlew clean test buildPlugin verifyPlugin

5. Commit the release changes.
6. Create a Git tag, for example:

git tag v1.0.0
git push origin v1.0.0

7. Create a GitHub Release for the same tag.
8. The release workflow signs and publishes the plugin, then attaches the signed ZIP archive to the GitHub Release.

Changing the plugin version

The main plugin version is defined in:

# gradle.properties
pluginVersion=1.0.0

The Gradle build uses this value as the project version:

version = providers.gradleProperty("pluginVersion").get()

For a 1.0.0 release, use:

pluginVersion=1.0.0

Then create the matching Git tag:

git tag v1.0.0
git push origin v1.0.0

The release workflow expects the tag version and pluginVersion to match.

Publishing

The repository includes GitHub Actions for build checks and release publishing.

See docs/MARKETPLACE.md for Marketplace setup, signing secrets, and the release checklist.

Contributing

Contributions are welcome. Please read CONTRIBUTING.md before opening a pull request.

For security issues, follow SECURITY.md.

License

PO Editor is released under the MIT License.