Hi All! On Fri, 2006-12-22 at 09:37 +0100, Javier Fernández-Sanguino Peña wrote: > > IMHO, either that software should be modified to support i18n text or the > admin would have to choose wether he prefers to *understand* the logfile or > to be able to parse it with automatic programs (I believe you are talking > about tools such as logcheck or log-analysis [1][2]).
Yes, I talk about this programs. > > So it could be realy straightforward to convert a text mesage like this > (from logcheck's kernel violation.d rules): Yes, but if you try to convert all logcheck rule into all language, that will be a lot more regular expression, and because of this log analyzing will need a lot more time. > Or even have logcheck use those PO files directly by introducing some tokens > in its regexps. I think it's may have problems. For example what about this log message: syslog(_("This is a log message. problem='%m', severity='%s"), severity); What do I do if I want to hide this mesage, if severity lower or equal to warning? (I want to say that sometimes the log messages merged from two or more part) > For those logparsing programs that would not had i18n support, the user (or > admin) would at least have the *option* to make a decission. I think log messages (which may be sent in network, archived, read by more than one user, etc.) wouldn't be changed in any circumvent. Of course it's my opinion. > Consider this situation: a user that can not even *read* english (since he > doesn't understand the written language as he uses different script) should > be able to weight which option is more important to him: And every command name is translated? And every shell command too? I don't think so. And some log messages isn't too understandable, even if it's in someone's native language. For example in this log message: 2006-12-17T06:41:09+0100 fw ntpd[621]: sendto(148.6.0.1): Bad file descriptor the good question is not that how can I translate it to Hungarian, because it will not help. The good question is, what it cause, and how can I avoid this. But tho answer this an expert is more important than the exact meaning of the message. And as Gabor said for this a stable form of log is very important. > a.- be able to use software that generates reports from logfiles with english > messages, and not being able to understand the logfiles themselves and > (probably) not the reports either (if the reporting software is not i18nised) > > b.- be able to read the non-english logfiles, but unable to use software to > geenrate reports or summarise logs (until such a software is adapted to > support non-english messages). Hmm. It's a hard question. It's especially hard because I think that to be a system administrator it's important to know english. And not just because the log messages, but because the commands and documentations. And I think an average home user never look into the logs, only if somebody ask he to do it. So as a conclusion, I think a.- is my answer.