Remaining i18n/localization issues in Ubuntu 8.04 LTS, please fix your packages and use non-English yourself

[Timo Jyrinki]

Hi, some i18n nagging from me again, yay!

First of all, I'd hope that developers that are non-native English
speakers or otherwise handle other languages fluently, would use that
language in their desktop environment eg. for the rest of hardy cycle
at least occasionally. Most non-developers use their own language
anyway, but I think a large percentage of developers tend to use
English because of their long computer usage background. Having
developers using non-English would contribute to testing i18n in
hardy, and help translation volunteers like me. Most translators are
not software developers, so they don't understand what's causing
problems, so developers should take care of proper i18n (translators
should also file more bugs though!).

If you see English in your default installation of Ubuntu in a
well-translated language, it's always a i18n bug in the package or
some translations being not fetched from Rosetta or not available at
all in Rosetta. Ubuntu-specific changes often render packages not
completely translated.

Packages below are the ones causing problems for people not using
English at the moment in hardy, to my knowledge. Please add if you
know more highly visible i18n problems.

- hwtest-gtk: not translatable in Rosetta, lacks .desktop entry's
Ubuntu tag for its translation too.
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/hwtest/+bug/202447

- firefox: menu entry translations lost since firefox 3.
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/firefox/+bug/192333

- firefox: completely untranslated also otherwise, though on a
positive note ubufox translations are finally accepted in and no doubt
language support packages are being made for the final release.

- brasero: lacks Ubuntu tag in .desktop file preventing menu item
translation. https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/brasero/+bug/200532

- gnome-control-center: patch not yet landed that makes the new
randr-1.2 resolution tool translatable - until it has, I'm not certain
if it fixes all the issues or only some. discussed on ubuntu-x mailing
list, I provided a patch that should be a good start at least (the
strings in .glade file still need additional tweaking to not add new
strings, though new strings can also be translated if the new version
of control-center is uploaded fast enough)

- network-manager-applet: does not use X-Ubuntu-Gettext-Domain like
also some others.
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/network-manager-applet/+bug/201328
(also solved if the both, duplicate menu items are removed...)

- transmission: not translatable in Rosetta, even though in main.
https://bugs.launchpad.net/rosetta/+bug/201334

- ubiquity: partitioning window still lacks i18n love.
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/ubiquity/+bug/144741

- ubiquity: language support installation silently fails if no network
connection (should guide a person to enable network and maybe
otherwise increase information available).
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/ubiquity/+bug/81683

- example-content: Examples directory / link does not have a
translation solution. https://bugs.launchpad.net/baltix/+bug/45489

(in default installation in earlier Ubuntus, so relatively important
too for many people: - serpentine: lost .desktop translations.
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/serpentine/+bug/200539)

- help & support main page is not translated. fix committed, thanks!

Anyway, thanks for contributions so far to make Ubuntu 8.04 the best
localized Ubuntu so far! Each release has been getting better, though
each release always seems to have its own problems, too.

-Timo