Qingjiang (Brian) Yuan wrote: > Hi, Dave, > I didn't find any information about localization packages installation, > do you have any plan to cover it later? >
I had some basic information on issues from a presentation that our staff received from globalization engineering a couple of months ago, but I hadn't gone back to close the loop and fold it into the paper yet. Thanks for bringing it up! Shows that I usually just install the C locale, doesn't it? ;-) > The current situation is, unless you choose customize install and check > some or all GEOs one by one, only C locale plus the locales of one of > the 9 big rules languages (if you manually choose that language instead > of the default English as the installation language) will be installed. > > We have got more and more questions about how to add more non English > locales to an English only OS and also a lot of complains or even > escalations, and I think it's the time to revise the localization > packages install strategy. Localization packages include two different > sets of packages: > 1. Locale enabling packages for locale shared objects, fonts, input > methods, iconv modules, X11 modules, etc. > 2. Pure translation packages for the translations of messages in ON, > Gnome, Firefox, Thunderbird, Realplayer, etc. > > The following are some options of the localization packages installation: > > 1. Current solution, only C locale will be installed unless you choose > one of the big rules language as the installation language or manually > check GEOs from customized install. > 2. Install all locales by default, inform customers to deselect some > only if the disk space is limited > 3. Separate locale enabling packages from pure translation packages and > install all locale enabling packages by default, and install other > translation packages by manually selection during installation, but this > should be clearly explained to customers before they choose "Default > Install" or "Customize Install". > 4. Provide downloadable, easily installable and removable locale patches > or packages so that customers can add/remove locales easily. > > Most Linux distros are using the 2nd option, but I prefer the 3rd and > also the 4th :-) > Clearly there's dissatisfaction with the current solution, so we'll just rule out #1 right off the bat :-). #2 is attractive, in that it's similar to the proposed answer to the driver problem - you may not know you need it until much later, and then having to hunt around for the right one is a painful experience, so let's just not make you do it. I'd guess it's the simplest in some ways. I'm not sure what the engineering implications for #3 or #4 are (how much restructuring of existing packages, etc.), if you can elaborate on that it would be helpful. I also don't have the stats for the amount of disk space that #2 consumes vs. what might be saved by the other alternatives; if you have some rough guesses, that would be useful data, too. Dave
