String encapsulation for improved translation

The charme of the %<num> variant, as I see it, is that it does not leave translators with the feeling that there is something to translate about variable names / placeholders. Also, translators do not have to enter latin characters (which might be a bit of a hassle with some languages' character sets, I can imagine).

I think that the "wide char" problem might be relevant for %<num> syntax too, however. As far as I understand it, it is a result from the typical IME when you input complex characters, like the CJK charsets. In order to fit with the normal chars, the full-width version of entered latin chars is used. (That funny wide latin characters you see on that chinese-print manual page for your $gadget from ebay.)

And as opposed to format strings, the %<num> syntax is not position dependent and allows reordering.