Ubuntu and language packs

[Sense Hofstede]

2009/2/3 Surfaz Gemon Meme <surfaz28 at gmail.com>:
> Hi! I have some doubts
>
> * Why Ubuntu install English support by default, although I chose
> Spanish support?
>
> I don't want waste 130~ mb space of my hard disk.
>
> It strikes me that during the installation of Ubuntu is uninstalled
> many languages (first, why install many languages? I only want one!!),
> but no English.
>
> In a few words, I think these packages are not required in any
> non-English installation:
>
> " aspell-en gimp-help-en hunspell-en-us language-pack-en
> language-pack-en-base language-pack-gnome-en
> language-pack-gnome-en-base language-support-en
> language-support-translations-en language-support-writing-en
> myspell-en-au myspell-en-gb myspell-en-za openoffice.org-help-en-gb
> openoffice.org-help-en-us openoffice.org-hyphenation-en-us
> openoffice.org-l10n-en-gb openoffice.org-l10n-en-za
> openoffice.org-thesaurus-en-au openoffice.org-thesaurus-en-us
> thunderbird-locale-en-gb wamerican wbritish "
>
> In addition of English support, there are other things that I want to comment
>
> * Why Ubuntu install thunderbird support by default (installing
> Spanish support) althougt I no use thunderbird... and thunderbird is
> no installed by default... O_o
>
> * If it were the case I use thunderbird, why install Ubuntu packages
> package thunderbird-locale-es-ar and thunderbird-locale-es-es?
>
> I say that Depends field of "language-support-translations-es"
> meta-package should be:
>
> "Depends: openoffice.org-help-es, openoffice.org-l10n-es,
> thunderbird-locale-es-ar | thunderbird-locale-es-es, gimp-help-es"
>
> instead of:
>
> "Depends: openoffice.org-help-es, openoffice.org-l10n-es,
> thunderbird-locale-es-ar, thunderbird-locale-es-es, gimp-help-es"
>
> In this way at least I could uninstall "thunderbird-locale-es-ar"
> without uninstall "language-support-translations-es" package.
>
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>
Hello,

That's an intriguing questions. It is of course not necessary to
install a language you don't use. However, English is being used as
the fall-back language in case something hasn't been fully translated.
So I think it would be reasonable to leave at least a part of the
English language packs at the system. If all help files and spell
checkers are needed is another thing.

If I recall it correctly there has done some work on allowing the user
to select his preferred fall back language. This would especially be
useful for people using a local language like Frisian that isn't fully
translated; they would be able to select Dutch as the fall-back
language.

In that case you could say it wouldn't be necessary to keep the
English language packs. However, what if the system isn't fully
translated in the fall-back language either? That could be solved by
only allowing completed languages to be selected as fall-back, but I'm
not sure if that would be well received and I also think that it isn't
a perfect solution.

Regards,
-- 
Sense Hofstede
<http://www.qense.nl/>