[bug-gettext] [bug #53516] $LANGUAGE doesn't take "en" into account

[Maxime Buquet]

URL:
  <http://savannah.gnu.org/bugs/?53516>

                 Summary: $LANGUAGE doesn't take "en" into account
                 Project: GNU gettext
            Submitted by: ppjet
            Submitted on: Thu 29 Mar 2018 05:50:56 PM UTC
                Category: None
                Severity: 3 - Normal
              Item Group: None
                  Status: None
                 Privacy: Public
             Assigned to: None
             Open/Closed: Open
         Discussion Lock: Any

    _______________________________________________________

Details:

I am filling this following
https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/gnome-shell/issues/114.

I wanted to try out $LANGUAGE, here is what I have in /etc/locale.conf:
LANG=en_GB.UTF-8
LC_ALL=en_GB.UTF-8
LANGUAGE=en:fr:ja

(Note the man says LC_ALL may not be configured in this file, but it's not the
point here).

I get applications displaying text in "en", "fr", and "ja", whereas I would
only get "en" without $LANGUAGE set.

This doesn't only apply to GNOME software, but most projects using gettext out
there I have used.

Please tell me if this analysis is wrong: I believe projects often use english
as their default language, and when $LANGUAGE is set, gettext will look for
available translations in the order declared, won't find any for english, then
look for other languages, and then fallback on msgid if nothing is found.

What could be done to fix this is to ask projects to use actual translations
for english (having an en.po), or a better solution might be to allow them to
declare that msgid is actually a language, and what language it is, (setting
"en" as default probably?).




    _______________________________________________________

Reply to this item at:

  <http://savannah.gnu.org/bugs/?53516>

_______________________________________________
  Message sent via/by Savannah
  http://savannah.gnu.org/