[MPlayer-dev-eng] Re: install localized manpages + [PATCH#2]

[Dan Christiansen]

On Monday, February 17, 2003, at 11:04 PM, Gabucino wrote:

> Andreas Hess wrote:
>>> This doesn't suck, this is the way to go.
>> This way leads into the wrong direction ;) So what is wrong, if 
>> mplayer
>> just installs the english version when no $LINGUAS is present?
> Then r=1 users will only see the english manpage. Is that what you 
> want?
> Look, using the LANG variable was about the second thing I learnt on 
> Linux
> (about seven years ago). The LINGUAS variable? Yesterday was the first 
> day
> I heard about it.
> Discussion ended?

It seems to me that the absence of either LINGUAS or LANG indicates 
that the system isn't localised.

The logical thing to do on a non-localised system is not to localise. I 
come from a small country, and understand why people want their 
computer to speak their language native. I, however, want my computer 
to speak English, and I don't necessarily want all sorts of languages - 
which I do not understand - installed on my computer. People _choose_ 
to use another language than English, and since English is default, 
unless it is detected that the user has made such a choice or another 
choice is made, English should be the only language to be installed.

>> it's about the majority of the users, and I don't believe, that they
>> will be happy, if mplayer installs so much bloat.
> Look, many ppl translated that large manpage with tiresome work, so 
> let's just
> install them and forget.

If you force localisation onto people, you are not helping promote 
localisation. On the contrary, since all you will succeed in is 
convincing people that localisation adds unnecessary bloat and clogs 
their system with meaningless files. A file containing a Czech or 
Bulgarian localisation is less useful to me than a file containing a 
series of random numbers. Same thing goes for a Danish localisation to 
people who don't speak Danish. Done properly, localisation helps people 
who need it, and means nothing to those who don't. Basically, this 
means only installing the languages people explicitly request.

Please, don't install all sorts of language files into all sorts of 
places as default. The only thing you will succeed in is annoying 
everyone, since hardly anyone speaks every single languages you support.

> Personally neither do I like unneeded bloat, but this time I think it's
> the Right Thing(c)(r)(tm)

The Right Thing would be to have it install English only as default, 
with an option to install other languages. Perhaps the "--language=xx" 
switch combined with some sort of auto detection.

>
> -- 
> Gabucino
> MPlayer Core Team
>  - Debian? - "This is our project and we can do whatever we want with 
> it."
> 				Michael Stone <mstone#debian.org>
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