[i18n] Input Method and Fonts improvements for Gutsy

[Matt Zimmerman]

On Mon, Aug 13, 2007 at 08:35:33AM +0200, Martin Pitt wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> Matt Zimmerman [2007-08-10 15:13 +0100]:
> > On Fri, Aug 10, 2007 at 06:35:34PM +0800, Arne Goetje wrote:
> > > Well, if I need to input Chinese and Japanese on an English system, I
> > > don't want to install a few dozen files from the language packs,
> > > especially if the translations are useless for me anyways. ;)
> > 
> > Please note that language-pack and language-support are currently
> > independent, though I'm not sure that's still necessary.
> 
> It is, the reasons haven't changed.
> 
> Conceptually, a user (usually) wants one language-pack-* for the
> language he prefers to see his desktop in, and several
> language-support-* for all languages he wants to create documents in.
> 
> So it is useful to install a language-support-* without the
> corresponding language-pack-*, which is why they do not depend on
> them, just recommend.

Is the small amount of space occupied by language-packs worth the confusion
of maintaining two separate sets of packages?  I think this is something
which is fairly clear to us, but not to random developers and users.

> OTOH it does not make much sense to install a language-pack-* without
> the matching language-support-*. Ideally there would be a dependency,
> but since l-support is so big, we cannot fit them on the CD.

There is some debate over whether the level of translation we ship on the CD
is appropriate.  Ubiquity ships translations for all languages regardless of
the language packs installed, and having only partial language support on
the CD can give a negative or confusing impression: why is the panel
translated, but not Firefox or OpenOffice?

-- 
 - mdz