Re: Apology to german users required in the release notes
* GOTO Masanori <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> [2004-09-01 01:30]: > At Tue, 31 Aug 2004 12:26:28 +0200, Helge Kreutzmann wrote: >> The Debian Project apologies for the unfortunate german quoting on the >> command line interface. A solution is worked on, but unfortunately >> hasn't made it into Sarge. As a workaround, switching to a UTF-8 based >> locale will avoid the problem. > > It's not good idea to enforce your opinion to the release > announcements because even some German guys do not think it's > acceptable currently. It's not good idea to enforce *your* opinion to the German language team because you do not think it's acceptable. Who are the "some German guys"? There will *always* be people thinking differently, but never ever I have seen such a vast majority _for_ the change, and you still object to apply it. Sorry, but you are being ignorant. So long, Alfie -- quit ~/quit -!- wenz [EMAIL PROTECTED] has quit [ircII2.8.2-EPIC3.004 --- Bloatware at its finest.] -- #debian.de signature.asc Description: Digital signature
Re: Bug#235759: Bug#228486: Apology to german users required in the release notes
Am 2004-08-31 16:27:03, schrieb Michael Stone: > On Tue, Aug 31, 2004 at 12:35:58PM -0700, Thomas Bushnell BSG wrote: > >No apology is necessary, because of (1). > > No apology is necessary because it's a ridiculous concept. > > I hesitate to tell people to use UTF-8 because full multibyte compliance > isn't guaranteed in sarge. This is not acceptabel, because many console programs do not support UFT-8 and run into trouble... The console will be unusable... I have tried de_DE.UTF-8 but failed with a couple of programs I use regulary. Now I am using iso-8859-(1,6,9,15) seperatly and it works perfect. > Mike Stone Greetings Michelle -- Linux-User #280138 with the Linux Counter, http://counter.li.org/ Michelle Konzack Apt. 917 ICQ #328449886 50, rue de Soultz MSM LinuxMichi 0033/3/8845235667100 Strasbourg/France IRC #Debian (irc.icq.com) signature.pgp Description: Digital signature
Re: Apology to german users required in the release notes
> > Frankly, I am getting tired of discussing this issue. I can't > > understand why you, gotom, are that stubborn and can't respect a > > decision taken by the German translation team. You already stated > > at the very beginning of this bug report, that you find it "not > > well inspected" [6]... To me your reluctance rather seems like a > > personal/social quirk. It's a pity :-( I am sorry that I have to > > say that, I don't intend to offend > > Well, I must say that even if you're right (you seem), yes you should > be sorry for saying that. I've been lucky enough for meeting Masanori > Goto at Debconf and I never felt him as a stubborn guy. As I said, I did not intend to offend gotom (though I might have :-(. I am very grateful for everybody spending her/his free time working for Debian and its users (e.g.: me). My statement was not in general but regarding this issue, where imho it is hard to see any reason why there is (still) so much reluctance on applying the patch and why the German translation team has been ignored. Sorry, if I offended gotom or anybody else. Jens
Re: Apology to german users required in the release notes
> At some point, gotom needs to either accept that the German team has > *done* the deep thinking, or else do it himself. So far he declared > it a wishlist item (AFAICT) and refused to either think about it *or* > take the German team's word for it. Well, maybebut being rude in words towards him doesn't help that much. Most involved parties are non-native English people and words must be very cerfully chosen in such arguments. My point was just enhancing this...deciding who is "right" and who isn't is not possible for me as I didn't follow the whole discussion. My other point was just sharing my feeling of Masanori Goto certainly not being a stubborn man
Re: Apology to german users required in the release notes
Christian Perrier <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > Changing the behaviour of the german locale is certainly something > that should not be done without deep thinking. The german team seems > to have done this with the help of others like Denis. That's fine. At some point, gotom needs to either accept that the German team has *done* the deep thinking, or else do it himself. So far he declared it a wishlist item (AFAICT) and refused to either think about it *or* take the German team's word for it. And now, it does seem a terrible shame that we aren't able to ship with a fixed version because of this. Thomas
Re: Apology to german users required in the release notes
> Frankly, I am getting tired of discussing this issue. I can't understand > why you, gotom, are that stubborn and can't respect a decision taken by > the German translation team. You already stated at the very beginning > of this bug report, that you find it "not well inspected" [6]... To me > your reluctance rather seems like a personal/social quirk. It's a > pity :-( I am sorry that I have to say that, I don't intend to offend Well, I must say that even if you're right (you seem), yes you should be sorry for saying that. I've been lucky enough for meeting Masanori Goto at Debconf and I never felt him as a stubborn guy. We even quite widely discussed about the addition of new locales to Debian and I felt him quite well opened to enhancements in this fieldas well as very aware of the hidden implications of locales changes. Certainly very careful at working on his tasks in Debian. Maybe too careful in your opinion but certainly not stubborn. Changing the behaviour of the german locale is certainly something that should not be done without deep thinking. The german team seems to have done this with the help of others like Denis. That's fine. Re-opening this issue was probably a good idea and re-trying to convince gotom also. But this can probably be done without falling into personal stuff, imho.
Re: Bug#228486: Apology to german users required in the release notes
On Tue, Aug 31, 2004 at 03:21:05PM -0700, Thomas Bushnell BSG wrote: Perhaps you could write down some of the more frequent problems that users with UTF-8 might expect to see No. I have no interest in this problem and don't care to work with you. I've reassigned the coreutils bug to libc6 and won't see further traffic on this issue. You've seen my warning about utf8 and can make of it what you will, it matters not in the least to me. Mike Stone
Re: Bug#228486: Apology to german users required in the release notes
On Tue, Aug 31, 2004 at 02:36:25PM -0700, Thomas Bushnell BSG wrote: I agree that an apology isn't necessary, but *some* kind of advice, given that sarge will be *removing* support for a large class of users, That's not true. Something is changing, arguably for the worse. Nobody is being unsupported. Inflating the hyperbole isn't productive. does seem relevant, and does warrant some kind of mention in the release notes to explain the situation. I don't recall saying that a mention in the release notes is inappropriate or unacceptable. I don't recall objecting to the proposed wording. The only thing I recall objecting to was the specific term "apology". The UTF-8 issue is something I said I'd "hesitate" to recommend. That was simply a way to raise a potential issue for consideration, as I had not seen it discussed previously in the thread--I didn't expect it to be taken as some sort of veto. Hesitating in order to consider doesn't mean that the proposal is wrong or invalid, nor is it any way pejorative. It's simply taking some time to make sure that the proposal won't bite anyone down the road. Mike Stone
Re: Bug#228486: Apology to german users required in the release notes
Michael Stone <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > On Tue, Aug 31, 2004 at 02:36:25PM -0700, Thomas Bushnell BSG wrote: > >I agree that an apology isn't necessary, but *some* kind of advice, > >given that sarge will be *removing* support for a large class of users, > > That's not true. Something is changing, arguably for the worse. Nobody > is being unsupported. Inflating the hyperbole isn't productive. Sorry, by "unsupported" I meant he previously reasonable German quotation marks have been turned into ones that no German speaker thinks are acceptable. > I don't recall saying that a mention in the release notes is > inappropriate or unacceptable. I don't recall objecting to the proposed > wording. The only thing I recall objecting to was the specific term > "apology". The UTF-8 issue is something I said I'd "hesitate" to > recommend. Ok, so how about we articulate problems might occur? Perhaps we should have a file about it, b/c we shouldn't put more than a single paragraph in the release notes in my opinion. Perhaps you could write down some of the more frequent problems that users with UTF-8 might expect to see (especially any actual bugs you know of; you suggested there were some but I may have misunderstood), and this could be included. Thomas
Re: Bug#228486: Apology to german users required in the release notes
On Tue, Aug 31, 2004 at 02:29:21PM -0700, Thomas Bushnell BSG wrote: But the problem here is that you seem totally unable to seek compromise. I'll try again. Good grief, this isn't personal. Maybe you should just relax and come back tomorrow. Mike Stone
Re: Bug#228486: Apology to german users required in the release notes
On Tue, Aug 31, 2004 at 02:14:48PM -0700, Thomas Bushnell BSG wrote: Actually that's not a "real technical reason". If you could point to a package with a bug that would be a serious problem if people used UTF-8, then that would be a real technical reason. But saying "it isn't required for sarge" doesn't mean that it actually doesn't *work*. I didn't say it did. I pointed to a potential problem. For all I know, in an exclusively german context UTF-8 won't cause problems at all. What I did say is that full multibyte compliance isn't guaranteed. That's a fact. Now, those suggesting that a bunch of people who aren't currently using UTF-8 suddenly start using it should look at the current state of affairs and decide whether that's a good idea. IOW, is the quote issue a big enough problem that we should suggest that all german users by default use a less tested environment? I would suggest that those proposing the change bear some responsibility for testing that configuration from scratch to see what kind of impact it might have on a new user's experience, compared to the current mode of operation. If someone were to do that in a comprehensive fashion then I'd have no question at all about the proposed change--but I doubt there's really time for that given the number of packages in sarge. FWIW, I use a UTF-8 locale on sarge and sid exclusively, and I have seen no multibyte-related problems. I also use a UTF-8 locale, and I can assure you that there are. Most are surmountable, but will raise the complexity of an installation. (It's not just "use LANG=de_DE.UTF-8 and everything will magically work" in an upgrade scenario. Maybe not even in a new install--I don't know. Think things like terminal emulator settings, fonts, remote sessions, etc.) There are definately, e.g., issues with multibyte support in coreutils. How much impact the issues have in the current context, I don't know. Several weeks into the freeze might not be the right time to start quantifying this. Mike Stone
Re: Apology to german users required in the release notes
Roland Bauerschmidt <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > Thomas Bushnell BSG wrote: > > "The XXX locale for German unfortunately uses a bad way of > > representing open quotation marks. We have retained it this way in > > order to preserve compatibility with other Linux distributions, and > > we hope that in the future it will be fixed. Meanwhile, the YYY > > locale can be used, which fully supports German with the correct > > quotation marks." > > Just to be picky here, "meanwhile" sounds to me as though YYY was an > inferior solution, which I don't think it is. It implies that one might > want to switch back to XXX, once that's fixed. I'd suggest the following > wording instead (or something along those lines): > > "[...] We suggest that you switch to the YYY locale, which fully > supports German with the correct quotation marks, and, using Unicode > encoding, has better support for other languages as well." Mike Stone has concerns that multibyte support may not be up to the task. I don't know what his concerns really are, because he hasn't given details, and the relevant bug reports in coreutils seem on my brief look to be not terribly serious. But I have certainly not attempted any comprehensive look. (For example the only current one in coreutils that I noticed is "filenames don't line up in ls output", which some people can't get to be reproduced at all, and is a cosmetic issue equally with "quotes look ugly".) I think it's safest to say that YYY has problems with ugly quotes, and XXX may have problems which we are unaware of, and let users make up their own mind about which they prefer. I'm entirely comfortable with recommending UTF-8; the fact that we don't guarantee UTF-8 works doesn't carry much weight with me. We don't guarantee bugfree packages in general. We don't guarantee that single-byte coding systems work either, right? Indeed, it is true that there are surely bugs which occur for UTF-8 and not for latin-1. But those bugs may not matter to users, who might well prefer having good-looking quotes, and it seems good to just give all the relevant information so that users can make their own informed choices. One advantage of advocating UTF-8, of course, is that it will generate pressure on developers to fix the UTF-8-related bugs which they have been ignoring on the grounds that "UTF-8 isn't required." But I only suggest that in jest. Thomas
Re: Bug#228486: Apology to german users required in the release notes
Michael Stone <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > On Tue, Aug 31, 2004 at 02:29:21PM -0700, Thomas Bushnell BSG wrote: > >But the problem here is that you seem totally unable to seek > >compromise. I'll try again. > > Good grief, this isn't personal. Maybe you should just relax and come > back tomorrow. I believe it was you that said it was "ludicrous" and a trivial issue and not worth attention. I'm trying to find a compromise here, and so far, you've articulated your position and given no indication whatsoever of what would be satisfactory to you other than getting exactly what you want. Is there something other than getting exactly what you want which would be satisfactory to you? Thomas
Re: Apology to german users required in the release notes
Thomas Bushnell BSG wrote: > "The XXX locale for German unfortunately uses a bad way of > representing open quotation marks. We have retained it this way in > order to preserve compatibility with other Linux distributions, and > we hope that in the future it will be fixed. Meanwhile, the YYY > locale can be used, which fully supports German with the correct > quotation marks." Just to be picky here, "meanwhile" sounds to me as though YYY was an inferior solution, which I don't think it is. It implies that one might want to switch back to XXX, once that's fixed. I'd suggest the following wording instead (or something along those lines): "[...] We suggest that you switch to the YYY locale, which fully supports German with the correct quotation marks, and, using Unicode encoding, has better support for other languages as well." Roland
Re: Bug#228486: Apology to german users required in the release notes
On Tue, Aug 31, 2004 at 02:09:36PM -0700, Thomas Bushnell BSG wrote: Are you willing to compromise? What is there for me to compromise about? I pointed out a potential *technical* problem with your proposal and you jumped all over me and suggested that my phone number be put in the release notes. Do you have any response to my *technical* concern? If there are issues with multibyte support in sarge it would be necessary to weigh the chance of breaking things (remember, setting the locale to UTF-8 affects a *lot* more than quotation marks) against the aesthetics of quote transliteration. If the german translation team decides that the quotes are more important than the potential breakage, so be it. Personally I think that's an incredible overreaction, but I'm not using a german locale and have no particular stake in what recommendation is made. Mike Stone
Re: Bug#228486: Apology to german users required in the release notes
Michael Stone <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > I didn't say it did. I pointed to a potential problem. For all I know, > in an exclusively german context UTF-8 won't cause problems at all. What > I did say is that full multibyte compliance isn't guaranteed. So how about a release note that describes the situation completely, and explains the choice that german users have? I'm looking for a good solution here that can answer everyone's concerns, rather than trying to identify who is more ludicrous. I agree that an apology isn't necessary, but *some* kind of advice, given that sarge will be *removing* support for a large class of users, does seem relevant, and does warrant some kind of mention in the release notes to explain the situation. Thomas
Re: Bug#228486: Apology to german users required in the release notes
Michael Stone <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > On Tue, Aug 31, 2004 at 02:09:36PM -0700, Thomas Bushnell BSG wrote: > >Are you willing to compromise? > > What is there for me to compromise about? I pointed out a potential > *technical* problem with your proposal and you jumped all over me and > suggested that my phone number be put in the release notes. It's not a technical problem. It's a guess. > Do you have any response to my *technical* concern? If there are > issues with multibyte support in sarge it would be necessary to > weigh the chance of breaking things (remember, setting the locale to > UTF-8 affects a *lot* more than quotation marks) against the > aesthetics of quote transliteration. You say this as if nobody has tested UTF-8. As if people have been ignoring it. As if there aren't *already* gobs of Debian users using UTF-8. But the problem here is that you seem totally unable to seek compromise. I'll try again. Why not a release announcement that says something like: "The XXX locale makes very ugly German quotes, and it's like that to preserve compatibility with other Linux distributions. We hope to have it fixed in the next release. Meanwhile, you can use the YYY locale (but please be aware that there may be multibyte problems, though there aren't any that we are aware of)." That's the gist; the details could be different of course. It seems to me that this answers your objection, by giving the facts to the users so they can decide whether this risk of multibyte problems is more important to them than the broken quotation marks or not. There's no reason we have to dictate a choice to anyone. Thomas
Re: Bug#228486: Apology to german users required in the release notes
On Tue, Aug 31, 2004 at 01:33:00PM -0700, Thomas Bushnell BSG wrote: Are you just trying to make it as difficult as possible to solve the problem? No, I'm aghast that the concept of including an *apology* in the release notes for a typographical ugliness is being given any consideration at all. Talking about solutions is fine, but singling something like this out for an apology is ludicrous. English quotation marks have never looked good. But the German ones, with the most natural German locale, are now looking *worse than they used to*. It's one thing to say "it's not as good as it could be", but when you insist that it's ok to *make things worse* on the grounds that English is already sucky, you aren't going to win points. Personally, *I don't care* what quotes are used in german, since I'm unlikely to ever use a german locale. The purpose of bringing up the english example is to demonstrate that people *can* and *do* live with stupid looking quotes. I'd far prefer a solution where everyone is happy, but running around like headless chickens proclaiming the end of the world and demanding apologies because quotation marks look stupid is, well, silly. Nor is this about winning points. No, it's not. It's about being a little more reasonable when demanding changes. Sometimes you get what you want and sometimes you don't. Marshal your arguments and do something productive. At this point it looks like focusing attention upstream is going to be more productive than continuing with gotom. Alternatively, someone could try the TC route. Either way it's too late for sarge, but that *really isn't* the end of the world. I get the feeling that you wish those annoying furriners would go away with their funny marks and quaint obscure languages. But Debian has already decided we are going to support non-English languages as well as we can, and it is inappropriate for you to attempt to subvert that for whatever reason. It is inappropriate (and, frankly, offensive) for you to make insuations about my motives. Some background: the logic behind using ,," isn't that ,," is commonly used as a quote in german any more than `' or ``'' is commonly used as a quote in english. The logic is that the computer screen (and printed output) should try to *look* like the original quote even if the current locale doesn't have an appropriate glyph to represent the quotation mark. Personally I think that's a damn stupid idea, but arguments about ,," not being a standard quotation mark completely miss the point of what is being done and why. I'd like to see a rational debate about the overall goals of transliterating quotes, but the chances of that seem remote in the current context. The bottom line isn't that this isn't some conspiracy to foist some non-standard quote off on germans, this is simply a difference in goals and expectations. The German l10n team gets to decide how German localization happens, not you, and not me. So you should butt out too, right? Take your high horse with you. It's sadly too late to get a fix into sarge (and it's a shame that the Debian glibc maintainers acted like jerks about it). I've had my own problems in that area, but *I didn't demand a damned apology in the release notes*. I hesitate to tell people to use UTF-8 because full multibyte compliance isn't guaranteed in sarge. How about we publish your home phone number so that they can complain to you directly? "If you don't like the way German quotes work in Debian, then call Michael Stone at XXX-XXX-." If you're right that this is a trivial issue which nobody will care about, you should be happy with that solution, right? Don't be an ass. I replied with a real technical reason why you might not want hordes of people switching to UTF-8 and you suggest *that* as a reasonable response? I had thought better of you. Mike Stone
Re: Bug#228486: Apology to german users required in the release notes
Michael Stone <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > Don't be an ass. I replied with a real technical reason why you might > not want hordes of people switching to UTF-8 and you suggest *that* as a > reasonable response? I had thought better of you. Actually that's not a "real technical reason". If you could point to a package with a bug that would be a serious problem if people used UTF-8, then that would be a real technical reason. But saying "it isn't required for sarge" doesn't mean that it actually doesn't *work*. FWIW, I use a UTF-8 locale on sarge and sid exclusively, and I have seen no multibyte-related problems. Thomas
Re: Bug#228486: Apology to german users required in the release notes
Michael Stone <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > No, I'm aghast that the concept of including an *apology* in the release > notes for a typographical ugliness is being given any consideration at > all. Talking about solutions is fine, but singling something like this > out for an apology is ludicrous. Which is why my proposal. I'm trying to reach *compromise*, which implies that I'm not going to get everything I want. Are you willing to compromise?
Re: Bug#228486: Apology to german users required in the release notes
On Tue, Aug 31, 2004 at 12:35:58PM -0700, Thomas Bushnell BSG wrote: No apology is necessary, because of (1). No apology is necessary because it's a ridiculous concept. I hesitate to tell people to use UTF-8 because full multibyte compliance isn't guaranteed in sarge. Mike Stone
Re: Bug#228486: Apology to german users required in the release notes
Michael Stone <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > On Tue, Aug 31, 2004 at 12:35:58PM -0700, Thomas Bushnell BSG wrote: > >No apology is necessary, because of (1). > > No apology is necessary because it's a ridiculous concept. Are you just trying to make it as difficult as possible to solve the problem? If so, please stop helping. English quotation marks have never looked good. But the German ones, with the most natural German locale, are now looking *worse than they used to*. It's one thing to say "it's not as good as it could be", but when you insist that it's ok to *make things worse* on the grounds that English is already sucky, you aren't going to win points. Nor is this about winning points. I get the feeling that you wish those annoying furriners would go away with their funny marks and quaint obscure languages. But Debian has already decided we are going to support non-English languages as well as we can, and it is inappropriate for you to attempt to subvert that for whatever reason. It is certainly true that sarge will have a problem in this area. It doesn't require an apology because there is an alternative solution, but it's a pretty good thing to be upset about if you are German. The German l10n team gets to decide how German localization happens, not you, and not me. It's sadly too late to get a fix into sarge (and it's a shame that the Debian glibc maintainers acted like jerks about it). > I hesitate to tell people to use UTF-8 because full multibyte compliance > isn't guaranteed in sarge. How about we publish your home phone number so that they can complain to you directly? "If you don't like the way German quotes work in Debian, then call Michael Stone at XXX-XXX-." If you're right that this is a trivial issue which nobody will care about, you should be happy with that solution, right? Thomas
Re: Bug#228486: Apology to german users required in the release notes
Mario Lang <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > It feels to me as if you are intentionally failing to get my point. > I have no problems reading ``this'' as double quotes, but ,,this" is just > a double comma. Can you explain the difference? Both seem ugly to me. Though: ,,this" is inconsistent. It should at least be ,,this''. But really, it's awful either way. Use Unicode. Use Unicode. Use Unicode. End these stupid flame wars. Thomas
Re: Bug#228486: Apology to german users required in the release notes
Michael Stone <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > On Tue, Aug 31, 2004 at 04:59:05PM +0200, Mario Lang wrote: >>Michael Stone <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: >>> Once again, the english quotes are also stupid: mv -iv foo bar >>> `foo' -> `bar' >>> >>> It is not clear why german users are the only ones who need an "apology" >>> because they get stupid-looking quotes. >> >>The english quotes at least stick to the idea that one character is one >> symbol. > > Ooh, you've never seen english double quotes represented like this: ``foo'' It feels to me as if you are intentionally failing to get my point. I have no problems reading ``this'' as double quotes, but ,,this" is just a double comma. -- CYa, Mario pgpMywOjEn0uC.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Bug#228486: Apology to german users required in the release notes
Michael Stone <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > On Tue, Aug 31, 2004 at 08:28:14PM +0200, Mario Lang wrote: > >It feels to me as if you are intentionally failing to get my point. > > Likewise. :) > >I have no problems reading ``this'' as double quotes, but ,,this" is just > >a double comma. > > Well, `` isn't a double quote any more than ,, is--it's a pair of grave > accents. There is a proper double opening quote for english in UTF-8, > just like there's a proper double opening quote for german in UTF-8. The > only difference is that (until my previous post) english-speaking users > haven't demanded an apology for misusing punctuation. This can be entirely sidestepped, because Debian *does* support German properly, if you use the correct locale. We should tell people: 1) Use such-and-such a locale if you want good German support, and 2) The thus-and-so locale has freaky quotation marks because we want to preserve consistency with other Linux distributions. No apology is necessary, because of (1). Thomas
Re: Apology to german users required in the release notes
Jens Nachtigall <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > Can you give some pointers to this? If you follow the long bug report > [1], you'll see that there is agreement that the current ,," quoting is > by far the worst transliteration. 2 opinions stated that the > transliteration towards »« might be problematic [2] [3]. One of them > [2] because in Switzerland's German they use «» (reversed, as in > French) -- Denis <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> stated , that Swiss users > already live with »« on debian.org and Gnome [4]. The other opinion [3] > found so many refutations that you'll have to read the whole second > part of the bug report rather then having me pointing at all of these > refutations. I don't think anyone has said that the commas thing is acceptible. The person you are responding to didn't say it was. And, I still ask, why did the upstream maintainer put this in libc, since he is, after all, German? I'm curious. > Frankly, I am getting tired of discussing this issue. I can't understand > why you, gotom, are that stubborn and can't respect a decision taken by > the German translation team. You already stated at the very beginning > of this bug report, that you find it "not well inspected" [6]... To me > your reluctance rather seems like a personal/social quirk. It's a > pity :-( I am sorry that I have to say that, I don't intend to offend > you, but it is hard to overcome the impression that giving all the > reasons and time was useless from the very beginning. I think it's easy to say that it needs to be fixed, but it doesn't require an apology as if German isn't properly supported anymore. The use of UTF-8 completely avoids the problem; so German is in fact supported, and supported correctly. What would be very nice is a description of this fact in the release notes, perhaps something like: "The XXX locale for German unfortunately uses a bad way of representing open quotation marks. We have retained it this way in order to preserve compatibility with other Linux distributions, and we hope that in the future it will be fixed. Meanwhile, the YYY locale can be used, which fully supports German with the correct quotation marks." Thomas
Re: Bug#228486: Apology to german users required in the release notes
On Tue, Aug 31, 2004 at 08:28:14PM +0200, Mario Lang wrote: It feels to me as if you are intentionally failing to get my point. Likewise. :) I have no problems reading ``this'' as double quotes, but ,,this" is just a double comma. Well, `` isn't a double quote any more than ,, is--it's a pair of grave accents. There is a proper double opening quote for english in UTF-8, just like there's a proper double opening quote for german in UTF-8. The only difference is that (until my previous post) english-speaking users haven't demanded an apology for misusing punctuation. Mike Stone
Re: Apology to german users required in the release notes
> It's not good idea to enforce your opinion to the release > announcements because even some German guys do not think it's > acceptable currently. Can you give some pointers to this? If you follow the long bug report [1], you'll see that there is agreement that the current ,," quoting is by far the worst transliteration. 2 opinions stated that the transliteration towards »« might be problematic [2] [3]. One of them [2] because in Switzerland's German they use «» (reversed, as in French) -- Denis <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> stated , that Swiss users already live with »« on debian.org and Gnome [4]. The other opinion [3] found so many refutations that you'll have to read the whole second part of the bug report rather then having me pointing at all of these refutations. Alternatively, it was also said that quotes like "" would be very much preferred over ,," [5]. [5] is actually a nice summary of this long story. Frankly, I am getting tired of discussing this issue. I can't understand why you, gotom, are that stubborn and can't respect a decision taken by the German translation team. You already stated at the very beginning of this bug report, that you find it "not well inspected" [6]... To me your reluctance rather seems like a personal/social quirk. It's a pity :-( I am sorry that I have to say that, I don't intend to offend you, but it is hard to overcome the impression that giving all the reasons and time was useless from the very beginning. Best Regards, Jens [1] http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=235759 [2] http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=235759&msg=39 [3] http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=235759&msg=78 [4] http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=235759&msg=48 [5] http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=235759&msg=51 [6] http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=235759&msg=18
Re: Apology to german users required in the release notes
Andreas Barth <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > > It's hardly a workaround--it seems to me that we should encourage > > UTF-8 wherever we can. So we do support German, we even support it > > correctly, with correct quoting, and the way to get it is to turn on > > the UTF-8 based locale. > > In my opinion, this is a regression. Non-utf-8 did work before, and if > we break it, it's a regression. And, if we cannot fix a regression, we > should apologies for that. Fair enough: but it's not like we need to apologize for "not supporting German right". Rather, we no longer support German in this way, but we still do in that way. I want to avoid the tone that somehow we have callously screwed over all Germans by failing to get their language right, because that's not what the facts are.
Re: Apology to german users required in the release notes
At Tue, 31 Aug 2004 12:26:28 +0200, Helge Kreutzmann wrote: > The Debian Project apologies for the unfortunate german quoting on the > command line interface. A solution is worked on, but unfortunately > hasn't made it into Sarge. As a workaround, switching to a UTF-8 based > locale will avoid the problem. It's not good idea to enforce your opinion to the release announcements because even some German guys do not think it's acceptable currently. Regards, -- gotom > Rational: > The current quoting for german locales (german, swiss, austrian, ...) > tries to mimic proper german quoting (if UTF-8 is not present) and > fails miserably: > > Opening quotes: ,, > Closing quotes: " > > The opening quotes use 2 characters, are visually clearly different > from the closing quotes and users are confused because they read the > opening quotes as "two commas" and not "opening quote". Consider > > [EMAIL PROTECTED]:/scratch/incoming/MO/jan02$ /bin/mv -iv bla ~ > ,,bla" -> ,,/home/helge/bla" > ,,bla" entfernt > > Bugs have been filled on this issue quite a while back ([1], [2]). The > entire list [3] has expressed that the this behaviour is highly > undesirable. Essentially two solutions have been proposed, and > intensivly discussed[4]: > > A) Using the same quotes as in english, i.e., "" > B) Using inversed french quotes »« > > The vast majority (c.f. the thread starting at [4]) believes that either > solution is much better than the current state. However, the > glibc-maintainers expressed concernes about diverging from upstream > and pointed out that the bugs where minor and (implicitly) should be > fixed at some later stage. > > Hence the appology is needed, since -- given Debians history -- users of > stable employing a german locale will experience the (unambiguously > perceived as ugly) quotes for the years to come. > > The (almost) complete discussion is archived both in various threads > on debian-l10n-german and in the bug reports [1] and [2]. > > Please CC: me as I am not subscribed to debian-release. > > Greetings > > Helge > > > [1] http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=228486 > [2} http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=235759 > [3] http://lists.debian.org/debian-l10n-german/2004/07/msg00172.html > [4] http://lists.debian.org/debian-l10n-german/2004/07/msg00149.html > -- > Helge Kreutzmann, Dipl.-Phys. [EMAIL PROTECTED] > gpg signed mail preferredgpg-key: finger [EMAIL PROTECTED] > 64bit GNU powered http://www.itp.uni-hannover.de/~kreutzm >Help keep free software "libre": http://www.freepatents.org/ > [2 ] >
Re: Bug#228486: Apology to german users required in the release notes
On Tue, Aug 31, 2004 at 04:59:05PM +0200, Mario Lang wrote: Michael Stone <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: Once again, the english quotes are also stupid: mv -iv foo bar `foo' -> `bar' It is not clear why german users are the only ones who need an "apology" because they get stupid-looking quotes. The english quotes at least stick to the idea that one character is one symbol. Ooh, you've never seen english double quotes represented like this: ``foo'' Now can I file a bug and cross post a message demanding an immediate fix and an apology for all english speakers? This is ridiculous. Mike Stone
Re: Bug#228486: Apology to german users required in the release notes
Michael Stone <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > On Tue, Aug 31, 2004 at 12:26:28PM +0200, you wrote: >>A) Using the same quotes as in english, i.e., "" > > Once again, the english quotes are also stupid: >> mv -iv foo bar > `foo' -> `bar' > > It is not clear why german users are the only ones who need an "apology" > because they get stupid-looking quotes. The english quotes at least stick to the idea that one character is one symbol. I find the ,, ascii art-like behaviour for German very ugly, and in fact, for me as a braille user, it is even more confusing than it is probably for a sighted user. What I see there are two commas, I have no way of even guessing that this should look like a open quote. The situation will be even worse for people using speech. Naming a single character with a substitution is a common feature in screen readers, but I wouldn't know how to tell such a program that ",," is to be pronounced as "open quote". Even if it were possible in some cases, the posibility of false-positives is still there. All in all, if this can't be fixed in time, I second the idea of an apology in the release notes. -- CYa, Mario pgpUQCxTau1CA.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Apology to german users required in the release notes
On Tue, Aug 31, 2004 at 12:26:28PM +0200, Helge Kreutzmann wrote: > the release notes need to contain a note to users using the german > locale along the lines: The contact address for the release notes is [EMAIL PROTECTED] -- Colin Watson [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Apology to german users required in the release notes
* Thomas Bushnell BSG ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) [040831 12:55]: > Helge Kreutzmann <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > > The Debian Project apologies for the unfortunate german quoting on the > > command line interface. A solution is worked on, but unfortunately > > hasn't made it into Sarge. As a workaround, switching to a UTF-8 based > > locale will avoid the problem. > Um, why not simply say that UTF-8 is required for the German locale? > It's hardly a workaround--it seems to me that we should encourage > UTF-8 wherever we can. So we do support German, we even support it > correctly, with correct quoting, and the way to get it is to turn on > the UTF-8 based locale. In my opinion, this is a regression. Non-utf-8 did work before, and if we break it, it's a regression. And, if we cannot fix a regression, we should apologies for that. Cheers, Andi -- http://home.arcor.de/andreas-barth/ PGP 1024/89FB5CE5 DC F1 85 6D A6 45 9C 0F 3B BE F1 D0 C5 D1 D9 0C
Re: Bug#228486: Apology to german users required in the release notes
* Michael Stone <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> [2004-08-31 06:59]: > On Tue, Aug 31, 2004 at 12:26:28PM +0200, you wrote: >>A) Using the same quotes as in english, i.e., "" > > Once again, the english quotes are also stupid: >>mv -iv foo bar > `foo' -> `bar' > > It is not clear why german users are the only ones who need an "apology" > because they get stupid-looking quotes. English-speaking users have been > living with the problem for years. You are free to request something along the same lines. In fact I would second that. On the other hand we as native German speakers and the debian-l10n-german team after all can't know of the problems that might be there in e.g. Russian translations, or whatever else. It is quite natural that we address the problems that we are faced with in our daily work, instead of the problems that refer to things we don't see (or don't know about). >>Hence the appology is needed, since -- given Debians history -- users of >>stable employing a german locale will experience the (unambiguously >>perceived as ugly) quotes for the years to come. > > Just like people employing an english locale! There is no contradiction forbidding that. Though, weren't the "ugly" english quotes there from the start? The ugly german quotes are happening just recently. So long, Alfie -- () | Ich bin anders, nur soviel anders wie der Himmel, wie das Meer am Horizont. /\ | Oder anders, vielleicht anders - was heisst schon anders? | -- Alfons Haider, 2001 signature.asc Description: Digital signature
Re: Bug#228486: Apology to german users required in the release notes
On Tue, Aug 31, 2004 at 12:26:28PM +0200, you wrote: A) Using the same quotes as in english, i.e., "" Once again, the english quotes are also stupid: mv -iv foo bar `foo' -> `bar' It is not clear why german users are the only ones who need an "apology" because they get stupid-looking quotes. English-speaking users have been living with the problem for years. Hence the appology is needed, since -- given Debians history -- users of stable employing a german locale will experience the (unambiguously perceived as ugly) quotes for the years to come. Just like people employing an english locale! Mike Stone
Re: Apology to german users required in the release notes
Helge Kreutzmann <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > The Debian Project apologies for the unfortunate german quoting on the > command line interface. A solution is worked on, but unfortunately > hasn't made it into Sarge. As a workaround, switching to a UTF-8 based > locale will avoid the problem. Um, why not simply say that UTF-8 is required for the German locale? It's hardly a workaround--it seems to me that we should encourage UTF-8 wherever we can. So we do support German, we even support it correctly, with correct quoting, and the way to get it is to turn on the UTF-8 based locale. Surely there are even better things that we could do, but we don't need to apologize just because it isn't done as well as possible. It would be nice to have a Latin-1 based version, but we don't. We do, however, have a UTF-8 one, and UTF-8 is generally better anyhow. Using commas for open-quote is crazy--I totally agree--but we can simply tell users not to use that locale, right? > The vast majority (c.f. the thread starting at [4]) believes that either > solution is much better than the current state. However, the > glibc-maintainers expressed concernes about diverging from upstream > and pointed out that the bugs where minor and (implicitly) should be > fixed at some later stage. As it happens, upstream is German (unless Ulrich has moved on to other things). What does he say about it? Thomas
Apology to german users required in the release notes
Hello, the release notes need to contain a note to users using the german locale along the lines: The Debian Project apologies for the unfortunate german quoting on the command line interface. A solution is worked on, but unfortunately hasn't made it into Sarge. As a workaround, switching to a UTF-8 based locale will avoid the problem. Rational: The current quoting for german locales (german, swiss, austrian, ...) tries to mimic proper german quoting (if UTF-8 is not present) and fails miserably: Opening quotes: ,, Closing quotes: " The opening quotes use 2 characters, are visually clearly different from the closing quotes and users are confused because they read the opening quotes as "two commas" and not "opening quote". Consider [EMAIL PROTECTED]:/scratch/incoming/MO/jan02$ /bin/mv -iv bla ~ ,,bla" -> ,,/home/helge/bla" ,,bla" entfernt Bugs have been filled on this issue quite a while back ([1], [2]). The entire list [3] has expressed that the this behaviour is highly undesirable. Essentially two solutions have been proposed, and intensivly discussed[4]: A) Using the same quotes as in english, i.e., "" B) Using inversed french quotes »« The vast majority (c.f. the thread starting at [4]) believes that either solution is much better than the current state. However, the glibc-maintainers expressed concernes about diverging from upstream and pointed out that the bugs where minor and (implicitly) should be fixed at some later stage. Hence the appology is needed, since -- given Debians history -- users of stable employing a german locale will experience the (unambiguously perceived as ugly) quotes for the years to come. The (almost) complete discussion is archived both in various threads on debian-l10n-german and in the bug reports [1] and [2]. Please CC: me as I am not subscribed to debian-release. Greetings Helge [1] http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=228486 [2} http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=235759 [3] http://lists.debian.org/debian-l10n-german/2004/07/msg00172.html [4] http://lists.debian.org/debian-l10n-german/2004/07/msg00149.html -- Helge Kreutzmann, Dipl.-Phys. [EMAIL PROTECTED] gpg signed mail preferredgpg-key: finger [EMAIL PROTECTED] 64bit GNU powered http://www.itp.uni-hannover.de/~kreutzm Help keep free software "libre": http://www.freepatents.org/ pgp80vNqsosvR.pgp Description: PGP signature
