vasilito
facf0c92e0
Red Bear OS is a full fork. All sources must be available from git clone with zero network access. Removed gitignore rules that excluded fetched source trees under recipes/*/source/, local/recipes/kde/*/source/, local/recipes/qt/*/source/, and vendor source trees. Build artifacts (target/, build/, source.tar, *.o, *.so) remain excluded. 127291 files added — kernel, relibc, base, bootloader, pkgar, all KDE/Qt frameworks, mesa, wayland, DRM drivers, and every other recipe source.
376 lines
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HTML
376 lines
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HTML
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/html401/loose.dtd">
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<head>
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<title>GNU gettext utilities: 2. The User's View</title>
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<meta name="description" content="GNU gettext utilities: 2. The User's View">
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<meta name="keywords" content="GNU gettext utilities: 2. The User's View">
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</head>
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<body lang="en" bgcolor="#FFFFFF" text="#000000" link="#0000FF" vlink="#800080" alink="#FF0000">
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<table cellpadding="1" cellspacing="1" border="0">
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<tr><td valign="middle" align="left">[<a href="gettext_1.html#SEC1" title="Beginning of this chapter or previous chapter"> << </a>]</td>
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<td valign="middle" align="left">[<a href="gettext_3.html#SEC16" title="Next chapter"> >> </a>]</td>
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<td valign="middle" align="left"> </td>
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<td valign="middle" align="left"> </td>
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<td valign="middle" align="left"> </td>
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<td valign="middle" align="left"> </td>
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<td valign="middle" align="left"> </td>
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<td valign="middle" align="left">[<a href="gettext_toc.html#SEC_Top" title="Cover (top) of document">Top</a>]</td>
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<td valign="middle" align="left">[<a href="gettext_toc.html#SEC_Contents" title="Table of contents">Contents</a>]</td>
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<td valign="middle" align="left">[<a href="gettext_21.html#SEC389" title="Index">Index</a>]</td>
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<td valign="middle" align="left">[<a href="gettext_abt.html#SEC_About" title="About (help)"> ? </a>]</td>
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</tr></table>
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<hr size="2">
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<a name="Users"></a>
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<a name="SEC7"></a>
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<h1 class="chapter"> <a href="gettext_toc.html#TOC7">2. The User's View</a> </h1>
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<p>Nowadays, when users log into a computer, they usually find that all
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their programs show messages in their native language – at least for
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users of languages with an active free software community, like French or
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German; to a lesser extent for languages with a smaller participation in
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free software and the GNU project, like Hindi and Filipino.
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</p>
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<p>How does this work? How can the user influence the language that is used
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by the programs? This chapter will answer it.
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</p>
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<a name="System-Installation"></a>
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<a name="SEC8"></a>
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<h2 class="section"> <a href="gettext_toc.html#TOC8">2.1 Operating System Installation</a> </h2>
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<p>The default language is often already specified during operating system
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installation. When the operating system is installed, the installer
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typically asks for the language used for the installation process and,
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separately, for the language to use in the installed system. Some OS
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installers only ask for the language once.
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</p>
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<p>This determines the system-wide default language for all users. But the
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installers often give the possibility to install extra localizations for
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additional languages. For example, the localizations of KDE (the K
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Desktop Environment) and LibreOffice are often bundled separately, as one
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installable package per language.
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</p>
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<p>At this point it is good to consider the intended use of the machine: If
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it is a machine designated for personal use, additional localizations are
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probably not necessary. If, however, the machine is in use in an
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organization or company that has international relationships, one can
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consider the needs of guest users. If you have a guest from abroad, for
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a week, what could be his preferred locales? It may be worth installing
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these additional localizations ahead of time, since they cost only a bit
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of disk space at this point.
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</p>
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<p>The system-wide default language is the locale configuration that is used
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when a new user account is created. But the user can have his own locale
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configuration that is different from the one of the other users of the
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same machine. He can specify it, typically after the first login, as
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described in the next section.
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</p>
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<a name="Setting-the-GUI-Locale"></a>
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<a name="SEC9"></a>
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<h2 class="section"> <a href="gettext_toc.html#TOC9">2.2 Setting the Locale Used by GUI Programs</a> </h2>
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<p>The immediately available programs in a user's desktop come from a group
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of programs called a “desktop environment”; it usually includes the window
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manager, a web browser, a text editor, and more. The most common free
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desktop environments are KDE, GNOME, and Xfce.
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</p>
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<p>The locale used by GUI programs of the desktop environment can be specified
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in a configuration screen called “control center”, “language settings”
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or “country settings”.
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</p>
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<p>Individual GUI programs that are not part of the desktop environment can
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have their locale specified either in a settings panel, or through environment
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variables.
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</p>
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<p>For some programs, it is possible to specify the locale through environment
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variables, possibly even to a different locale than the desktop's locale.
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This means, instead of starting a program through a menu or from the file
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system, you can start it from the command-line, after having set some
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environment variables. The environment variables can be those specified
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in the next section (<a href="#SEC10">Setting the Locale through Environment Variables</a>); for some versions of
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KDE, however, the locale is specified through a variable <code>KDE_LANG</code>,
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rather than <code>LANG</code> or <code>LC_ALL</code>.
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</p>
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<a name="Setting-the-POSIX-Locale"></a>
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<a name="SEC10"></a>
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<h2 class="section"> <a href="gettext_toc.html#TOC10">2.3 Setting the Locale through Environment Variables</a> </h2>
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<p>As a user, if your language has been installed for this package, in the
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simplest case, you only have to set the <code>LANG</code> environment variable
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to the appropriate ‘<samp><var>ll</var>_<var>CC</var></samp>’ combination. For example,
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let's suppose that you speak German and live in Germany. At the shell
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prompt, merely execute
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‘<samp>setenv LANG de_DE</samp>’ (in <code>csh</code>),
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‘<samp>export LANG; LANG=de_DE</samp>’ (in <code>sh</code>) or
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‘<samp>export LANG=de_DE</samp>’ (in <code>bash</code>). This can be done from your
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‘<tt>.login</tt>’ or ‘<tt>.profile</tt>’ file, once and for all.
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</p>
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<a name="Locale-Names"></a>
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<a name="SEC11"></a>
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<h3 class="subsection"> <a href="gettext_toc.html#TOC11">2.3.1 Locale Names</a> </h3>
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<p>A locale name usually has the form ‘<samp><var>ll</var>_<var>CC</var></samp>’. Here
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‘<samp><var>ll</var></samp>’ is an ISO 639 two-letter language code, and
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‘<samp><var>CC</var></samp>’ is an ISO 3166 two-letter country code. For example,
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for German in Germany, <var>ll</var> is <code>de</code>, and <var>CC</var> is <code>DE</code>.
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You find a list of the language codes in appendix <a href="gettext_18.html#SEC373">Language Codes</a> and
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a list of the country codes in appendix <a href="gettext_19.html#SEC376">Country Codes</a>.
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</p>
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<p>You might think that the country code specification is redundant. But in
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fact, some languages have dialects in different countries. For example,
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‘<samp>de_AT</samp>’ is used for Austria, and ‘<samp>pt_BR</samp>’ for Brazil. The country
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code serves to distinguish the dialects.
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</p>
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<p>Many locale names have an extended syntax
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‘<samp><var>ll</var>_<var>CC</var>.<var>encoding</var></samp>’ that also specifies the character
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encoding. These are in use because between 2000 and 2005, most users have
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switched to locales in UTF-8 encoding. For example, the German locale on
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glibc systems is nowadays ‘<samp>de_DE.UTF-8</samp>’. The older name ‘<samp>de_DE</samp>’
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still refers to the German locale as of 2000 that stores characters in
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ISO-8859-1 encoding – a text encoding that cannot even accommodate the Euro
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currency sign.
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</p>
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<p>Some locale names use ‘<samp><var>ll</var>_<var>CC</var>@<var>variant</var></samp>’ instead of
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‘<samp><var>ll</var>_<var>CC</var></samp>’. The ‘<samp>@<var>variant</var></samp>’ can denote any kind of
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characteristics that is not already implied by the language <var>ll</var> and
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the country <var>CC</var>. It can denote a particular monetary unit. For example,
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on glibc systems, ‘<samp>de_DE@euro</samp>’ denotes the locale that uses the Euro
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currency, in contrast to the older locale ‘<samp>de_DE</samp>’ which implies the use
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of the currency before 2002. It can also denote a dialect of the language,
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or the script used to write text (for example, ‘<samp>sr_RS@latin</samp>’ uses the
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Latin script, whereas ‘<samp>sr_RS</samp>’ uses the Cyrillic script to write Serbian),
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or the orthography rules, or similar.
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</p>
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<p>On other systems, some variations of this scheme are used, such as
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‘<samp><var>ll</var></samp>’. You can get the list of locales supported by your system
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for your language by running the command ‘<samp>locale -a | grep '^<var>ll</var>'</samp>’.
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</p>
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<p>There is also a special locale, called ‘<samp>C</samp>’.
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When it is used, it disables all localization: in this locale, all programs
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standardized by POSIX use English messages and an unspecified character
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encoding (often US-ASCII, but sometimes also ISO-8859-1 or UTF-8, depending on
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the operating system).
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</p>
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<a name="Locale-Environment-Variables"></a>
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<a name="SEC12"></a>
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<h3 class="subsection"> <a href="gettext_toc.html#TOC12">2.3.2 Locale Environment Variables</a> </h3>
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<p>A locale is composed of several <em>locale categories</em>, see <a href="gettext_1.html#SEC4">Aspects in Native Language Support</a>.
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When a program looks up locale dependent values, it does this according to
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the following environment variables, in priority order:
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</p>
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<ol>
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<li><a name="IDX33"></a>
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</li><li> <code>LANGUAGE</code>
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<a name="IDX34"></a>
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</li><li> <code>LC_ALL</code>
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<a name="IDX35"></a>
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<a name="IDX36"></a>
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<a name="IDX37"></a>
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<a name="IDX38"></a>
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<a name="IDX39"></a>
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<a name="IDX40"></a>
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</li><li> <code>LC_xxx</code>, according to selected locale category:
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<code>LC_CTYPE</code>, <code>LC_NUMERIC</code>, <code>LC_TIME</code>, <code>LC_COLLATE</code>,
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<code>LC_MONETARY</code>, <code>LC_MESSAGES</code>, ...
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<a name="IDX41"></a>
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</li><li> <code>LANG</code>
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</li></ol>
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<p>Variables whose value is set but is empty are ignored in this lookup.
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</p>
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<p><code>LANG</code> is the normal environment variable for specifying a locale.
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As a user, you normally set this variable (unless some of the other variables
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have already been set by the system, in ‘<tt>/etc/profile</tt>’ or similar
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initialization files).
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</p>
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<p><code>LC_CTYPE</code>, <code>LC_NUMERIC</code>, <code>LC_TIME</code>, <code>LC_COLLATE</code>,
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<code>LC_MONETARY</code>, <code>LC_MESSAGES</code>, and so on, are the environment
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variables meant to override <code>LANG</code> and affecting a single locale
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category only. For example, assume you are a Swedish user in Spain, and you
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want your programs to handle numbers and dates according to Spanish
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conventions, and only the messages should be in Swedish. Then you could
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create a locale named ‘<samp>sv_ES</samp>’ or ‘<samp>sv_ES.UTF-8</samp>’ by use of the
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<code>localedef</code> program. But it is simpler, and achieves the same effect,
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to set the <code>LANG</code> variable to <code>es_ES.UTF-8</code> and the
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<code>LC_MESSAGES</code> variable to <code>sv_SE.UTF-8</code>; these two locales come
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already preinstalled with the operating system.
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</p>
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<p><code>LC_ALL</code> is an environment variable that overrides all of these.
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It is typically used in scripts that run particular programs. For example,
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<code>configure</code> scripts generated by GNU autoconf use <code>LC_ALL</code> to make
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sure that the configuration tests don't operate in locale dependent ways.
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</p>
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<p>Some systems, unfortunately, set <code>LC_ALL</code> in ‘<tt>/etc/profile</tt>’ or in
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similar initialization files. As a user, you therefore have to unset this
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variable if you want to set <code>LANG</code> and optionally some of the other
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<code>LC_xxx</code> variables.
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</p>
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<p>The <code>LANGUAGE</code> variable is described in the next subsection.
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</p>
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<a name="The-LANGUAGE-variable"></a>
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<a name="SEC13"></a>
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<h3 class="subsection"> <a href="gettext_toc.html#TOC13">2.3.3 Specifying a Priority List of Languages</a> </h3>
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<p>Not all programs have translations for all languages. By default, an
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English message is shown in place of a nonexistent translation. If you
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understand other languages, you can set up a priority list of languages.
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This is done through a different environment variable, called
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<code>LANGUAGE</code>. GNU <code>gettext</code> gives preference to <code>LANGUAGE</code>
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over <code>LC_ALL</code> and <code>LANG</code> for the purpose of message handling,
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but you still need to have <code>LANG</code> (or <code>LC_ALL</code>) set to the primary
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language; this is required by other parts of the system libraries.
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For example, some Swedish users who would rather read translations in
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German than English for when Swedish is not available, set <code>LANGUAGE</code>
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to ‘<samp>sv:de</samp>’ while leaving <code>LANG</code> to ‘<samp>sv_SE</samp>’.
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</p>
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<p>Special advice for Norwegian users: The language code for Norwegian
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bokmål changed from ‘<samp>no</samp>’ to ‘<samp>nb</samp>’ recently (in 2003).
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During the transition period, while some message catalogs for this language
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are installed under ‘<samp>nb</samp>’ and some older ones under ‘<samp>no</samp>’, it is
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recommended for Norwegian users to set <code>LANGUAGE</code> to ‘<samp>nb:no</samp>’ so that
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both newer and older translations are used.
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</p>
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<p>In the <code>LANGUAGE</code> environment variable, but not in the other
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environment variables, ‘<samp><var>ll</var>_<var>CC</var></samp>’ combinations can be
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abbreviated as ‘<samp><var>ll</var></samp>’ to denote the language's main dialect.
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For example, ‘<samp>de</samp>’ is equivalent to ‘<samp>de_DE</samp>’ (German as spoken in
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Germany), and ‘<samp>pt</samp>’ to ‘<samp>pt_PT</samp>’ (Portuguese as spoken in Portugal)
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in this context.
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</p>
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<p>Note: The variable <code>LANGUAGE</code> is ignored if the locale is set to
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‘<samp>C</samp>’. In other words, you have to first enable localization, by setting
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<code>LANG</code> (or <code>LC_ALL</code>) to a value other than ‘<samp>C</samp>’, before you can
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use a language priority list through the <code>LANGUAGE</code> variable.
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</p>
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<a name="Working-in-a-Windows-console"></a>
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<a name="SEC14"></a>
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<h2 class="section"> <a href="gettext_toc.html#TOC14">2.4 Obtaining good output in a Windows console</a> </h2>
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<p>On Windows, consoles such as the one started by the <code>cmd.exe</code>
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program do input and output in an encoding, called “OEM code page”,
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that is different from the encoding that text-mode programs usually use,
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called “ANSI code page”. (Note: This problem does not exist for
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Cygwin consoles; these consoles do input and output in the UTF-8
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encoding.) As a workaround, you may request that the programs produce
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output in this “OEM” encoding. To do so, set the environment variable
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<code>OUTPUT_CHARSET</code> to the “OEM” encoding, through a command such as
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</p><table><tr><td> </td><td><pre class="smallexample">set OUTPUT_CHARSET=CP850
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</pre></td></tr></table>
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<p>Note: This has an effect only on strings looked up in message catalogs;
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other categories of text are usually not affected by this setting.
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Note also that this environment variable also affects output sent to a
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file or to a pipe; output to a file is most often expected to be in the
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“ANSI” or in the UTF-8 encoding.
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</p>
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<p>Here are examples of the “ANSI” and “OEM” code pages:
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</p>
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<table>
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<thead><tr><th><p> Territories </p></th><th><p> ANSI encoding </p></th><th><p> OEM encoding
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</p></th></tr></thead>
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<tr><td><p> Western Europe </p></td><td><p> CP1252 </p></td><td><p> CP850
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</p></td></tr>
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<tr><td><p> Slavic countries (Latin 2) </p></td><td><p> CP1250 </p></td><td><p> CP852
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</p></td></tr>
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<tr><td><p> Baltic countries </p></td><td><p> CP1257 </p></td><td><p> CP775
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</p></td></tr>
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<tr><td><p> Russia </p></td><td><p> CP1251 </p></td><td><p> CP866
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</p></td></tr>
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</table>
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<a name="Installing-Localizations"></a>
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<a name="SEC15"></a>
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<h2 class="section"> <a href="gettext_toc.html#TOC15">2.5 Installing Translations for Particular Programs</a> </h2>
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<p>Languages are not equally well supported in all packages using GNU
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<code>gettext</code>, and more translations are added over time. Usually, you
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use the translations that are shipped with the operating system
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or with particular packages that you install afterwards. But you can also
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install newer localizations directly. For doing this, you will need an
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understanding where each localization file is stored on the file system.
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</p>
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<a name="IDX42"></a>
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<p>For programs that participate in the Translation Project, you can start
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looking for translations here:
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<a href="https://translationproject.org/team/index.html">https://translationproject.org/team/index.html</a>.
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</p>
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<p>For programs that are part of the KDE project, the starting point is:
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<a href="https://l10n.kde.org/">https://l10n.kde.org/</a>.
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</p>
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<p>For programs that are part of the GNOME project, the starting point is:
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<a href="https://wiki.gnome.org/TranslationProject">https://wiki.gnome.org/TranslationProject</a>.
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</p>
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<p>For other programs, you may check whether the program's source code package
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contains some ‘<tt><var>ll</var>.po</tt>’ files; often they are kept together in a
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directory called ‘<tt>po/</tt>’. Each ‘<tt><var>ll</var>.po</tt>’ file contains the
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message translations for the language whose abbreviation of <var>ll</var>.
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</p>
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<table cellpadding="1" cellspacing="1" border="0">
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<tr><td valign="middle" align="left">[<a href="#SEC7" title="Beginning of this chapter or previous chapter"> << </a>]</td>
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<td valign="middle" align="left">[<a href="gettext_3.html#SEC16" title="Next chapter"> >> </a>]</td>
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<td valign="middle" align="left"> </td>
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<td valign="middle" align="left"> </td>
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<td valign="middle" align="left"> </td>
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<td valign="middle" align="left"> </td>
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<td valign="middle" align="left"> </td>
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<td valign="middle" align="left">[<a href="gettext_toc.html#SEC_Top" title="Cover (top) of document">Top</a>]</td>
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<td valign="middle" align="left">[<a href="gettext_toc.html#SEC_Contents" title="Table of contents">Contents</a>]</td>
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<td valign="middle" align="left">[<a href="gettext_21.html#SEC389" title="Index">Index</a>]</td>
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<td valign="middle" align="left">[<a href="gettext_abt.html#SEC_About" title="About (help)"> ? </a>]</td>
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</tr></table>
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<p>
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<font size="-1">
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This document was generated by <em>Bruno Haible</em> on <em>February, 21 2024</em> using <a href="https://www.nongnu.org/texi2html/"><em>texi2html 1.78a</em></a>.
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</p>
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