[Bug 882308] [NEW] Choosing simplified chinese in isolinux menu causes corrupted characters and untranslated installer

[Mario Limonciello]

Public bug reported:

When booting an oneiric ISO, if you interrupt the initial
isolinux/syslinux menu, you can select a language.  Selecting simplified
chinese adds locale=zh_CN to the kernel command line of the boot option
you select.

Selecting the second option (install ubuntu) gives the appearance that
the installer has preselected simplified chinese for the language.  If
you don't make any changes on the language screen, later on in the
installer you will find several areas that are not showing translations.

Additionally (and arguably worse), the resultant install has parts of
the OS that don't render properly such as the date and time indicator.
Corrupted text is displayed instead.

Observing /etc/default/locale from an install like this, you'll see that
LANG is filled out with zh_CN rather than zh_CN.UTF-8.

$ cat /etc/default/locale
LANG="zh_CN"
LANGUAGE="zh_CN:"
LC_MESSAGES="zh_CN.UTF-8"
LC_CTYPE="zh_CN.UTF-8"
LC_COLLATE="zh_CN.UTF-8"

If you perform an install without making any selections in that
isolinux/syslinux menu, but instead choose simplified chinese in the
first language screen, /etc/default/locale will look like this:

$ cat /etc/default/locale
LANG="zh_CN.UTF-8"
LANGUAGE="zh_CN:zh"
LC_MESSAGES="zh_CN.UTF-8"
LC_CTYPE="zh_CN.UTF-8"
LC_COLLATE="zh_CN.UTF-8"

The logs attached to this bug are from a system that was installed with
the simplified chinese selected in the isolinux/syslinux menu.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 11.10
Package: ubiquity (not installed)
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.0.0-12.20-generic 3.0.4
Uname: Linux 3.0.0-12-generic x86_64
ApportVersion: 1.23-0ubuntu3
Architecture: amd64
Date: Thu Oct 27 10:18:56 2011
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 11.10 "Oneiric Ocelot" - Release amd64 (20111012)
SourcePackage: ubiquity
UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)

** Affects: ubiquity (Ubuntu)
     Importance: Undecided
         Status: New


** Tags: amd64 apport-bug oneiric running-unity ubiquity-2.8.7

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https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/882308

Title:
  Choosing simplified chinese in isolinux menu causes corrupted
  characters and untranslated installer

Status in “ubiquity” package in Ubuntu:
  New

Bug description:
  When booting an oneiric ISO, if you interrupt the initial
  isolinux/syslinux menu, you can select a language.  Selecting
  simplified chinese adds locale=zh_CN to the kernel command line of the
  boot option you select.

  Selecting the second option (install ubuntu) gives the appearance that
  the installer has preselected simplified chinese for the language.  If
  you don't make any changes on the language screen, later on in the
  installer you will find several areas that are not showing
  translations.

  Additionally (and arguably worse), the resultant install has parts of
  the OS that don't render properly such as the date and time indicator.
  Corrupted text is displayed instead.

  Observing /etc/default/locale from an install like this, you'll see
  that LANG is filled out with zh_CN rather than zh_CN.UTF-8.

  $ cat /etc/default/locale
  LANG="zh_CN"
  LANGUAGE="zh_CN:"
  LC_MESSAGES="zh_CN.UTF-8"
  LC_CTYPE="zh_CN.UTF-8"
  LC_COLLATE="zh_CN.UTF-8"

  If you perform an install without making any selections in that
  isolinux/syslinux menu, but instead choose simplified chinese in the
  first language screen, /etc/default/locale will look like this:

  $ cat /etc/default/locale
  LANG="zh_CN.UTF-8"
  LANGUAGE="zh_CN:zh"
  LC_MESSAGES="zh_CN.UTF-8"
  LC_CTYPE="zh_CN.UTF-8"
  LC_COLLATE="zh_CN.UTF-8"

  The logs attached to this bug are from a system that was installed
  with the simplified chinese selected in the isolinux/syslinux menu.

  ProblemType: Bug
  DistroRelease: Ubuntu 11.10
  Package: ubiquity (not installed)
  ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.0.0-12.20-generic 3.0.4
  Uname: Linux 3.0.0-12-generic x86_64
  ApportVersion: 1.23-0ubuntu3
  Architecture: amd64
  Date: Thu Oct 27 10:18:56 2011
  InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 11.10 "Oneiric Ocelot" - Release amd64 (20111012)
  SourcePackage: ubiquity
  UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)

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