Hi Vincent,
Vincent Lefevre wrote:
> LANGUAGE=
[...]
> LC_MESSAGES=fr_FR
[...]
> ypig% ssh localhost locale
> Connected to ypig (from ::1)
> LANG=POSIX
> LANGUAGE=en_US:en
[...]
> LC_MESSAGES=fr_FR
[...]
> LC_ALL=
[...]
> The problem is that the system sets LANGUAGE in the user's back, so
> that the standard user's choice (LC_MESSAGES=fr_FR) is no longer taken
> into account.
I agree that this is not very good. Before deciding how to fix it,
let's describe the mechanism.
1. On my local machine, I could not reproduce the same effect. That's
probably because no default locale is configured here. After making
the default locale de_DE.UTF-8 using "dpkg-reconfigure -plow locales",
/etc/environment is empty and /etc/default/locale looks like this
# File generated by update-locale
LANG=de_DE.UTF-8
#LANGUAGE=en_US
and "ssh localhost locale" still shows "LANGUAGE=". Any idea what's
different between your setup and mine?
2. openssh-server has the following in its default sshd/config:
AcceptEnv LANG LC_*
That is unfortunate. Independently of everything else, this list
ought to be expanded to include LANGUAGE.
3. The locale C.UTF-8 does not work like C for the sake of this feature:
$ LC_ALL=C LANGUAGE=de_DE cp
cp: missing file operand
Try `cp --help' for more information.
$ LC_ALL=C.UTF-8 LANGUAGE=de_DE cp
cp: Fehlendes Dateioperand
„cp --help“ gibt weitere Informationen.
If I understand the purpose of C.UTF-8 correctly, that's another bug
(independent, though).
4. Despite what the gettext manual[*] says, setting LANG does not cause
LANGUAGE to take effect. This is another bug, as far as I can tell.
$ LANG=en_US LANGUAGE=de_DE cp
cp: missing file operand
Try `cp --help' for more information.
5. As you mentioned, when LANGUAGE has an effect, it takes precedence
over LC_MESSAGES. The principle of least surprise might indicate
that the locale in LC_MESSAGES should be used in preference to
LANGUAGE, but that would make it impossible to express something
like what is currently meant by
LANGUAGE=fr:de
LC_MESSAGES=de
on an installation where most programs are translated to German.
(It means: programs using catgets should use German, while programs
using gettext should prefer French if possible. Intent: "I'd
prefer French, but barring that, please give me German instead of
English").
If one is willing to break with >10 years of gettext behavior, it
should be possible to change this without that downside by
prepending $LC_MESSAGES to LANGUAGE when and only when it is not
already an item in $LANGUAGE.
A nice side-effect would be the ability to partially work around
(2), as you mentioned.
What do you think? What pieces does the above description miss?
Thanks for your attention to detail.
Jonathan
[*]
http://www.gnu.org/software/gettext/manual/gettext.html#The-LANGUAGE-variable
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