Hello Gunnar, Gunnar Hjalmarsson [2010-10-07 22:34 -0000]: > Keeping the limited purpose of GDM's locale selector in mind, i.e. > allowing users to start a session in a different language, I believe > that _now_ the best way to serve that purpose is to update $LANGUAGE and > set $LC_MESSAGES, while leaving $LANG to language-selector.
If gdm's UI becomes a pure language selector, I agree. This requires some more intrusive code changes, though, and some thought about handling country specific languages like Portugese from Portugal vs. Brazil, or simplified/traditional Chinese. This should be coordinated/discussed in an upstream bug, since this is going to be a fairly large patch. > So, why do I persist, and claim that my method is better? As far as I > can tell, the patches I wrote make language-selector and GDM work > seamlessly together, without any cause left for users to get confused. Your gdm patch just changes how the result from the locale selector is handled, but it doesn't change the locale selector to become a language selector. So if I'm choosing "German (Switzerland)" on an en_US-by-default box, I'd get German strings, but time/currency/etc format would still be US. This would be by design with your idea (set LANGUAGE=de and keep LANG=en_US), but gdm shouldn't offer me three different country options for Germany, since they won't make a difference. > At the same time I can't see how going the other way, and just unset > $LANGUAGE, would be sufficient to prevent undesired user surprises. In my scenario above, unsetting $LANGUAGE when I change LANG away from the default en_US, would ensure that I actually get a fully German desktop. > * I decide to switch the language (and nothing else) to en_US, and do so > from GDM. You can't right now. en_US is not a language, it's a locale. > * While now seeing English in menus and messages, I also see those > ambigous American date formats etc., which I don't want. Right, I understand (see above). That's exactly my point above, gdm shouldn't offer a country selection if it stops being able to set country specific settings. > So, what else can I say? Suppose most that can be said have been said by > now, so I simply beg you to reconsider and give my patches a chance. If > I'm proved wrong, by you or somebody else, I promise that I'll shut my > mouth. But only then. ;-) Oh, please don't misunderstand me. I don't think your idea is wrong, it just changes some use cases. However, if we want to implement it, it should be done properly, not just halfway (and thus become even more inconsistent). Thanks, Martin -- Martin Pitt | http://www.piware.de Ubuntu Developer (www.ubuntu.com) | Debian Developer (www.debian.org) -- Set $LANGUAGE if the user picks a different locale in gdm, so that language-selector and gdm stop disagreeing https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/553162 You received this bug notification because you are a member of Ubuntu Desktop Bugs, which is subscribed to gdm in ubuntu. -- desktop-bugs mailing list desktop-bugs@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/desktop-bugs
