[Bug 553162] [NEW] Set $LANGUAGE if the user picks a different locale in gdm, so that language-selector and gdm stop disagreeing

[Launchpad Bug Tracker]

You have been subscribed to a public bug by Gunnar Hjalmarsson (gunnarhj):

Binary package hint: gdm

This is a follow-up to bug 407300, which has been fixed but a separate
issue remains. I'm opening a separate task for language-selector, as it
refers to the interaction between it and gdm.

The problem is basically that GDM seems to always override the LANG
values set by language selector, and quite easily one can get to a
situation where LANGUAGE and LANG differ and the desktop is a mixture of
two languages.

Steps to reproduce (a):

 * New install, choosing Catalan in the installer
 * I log in without doing any changes to the language in GDM
 * I start System > Administration > Language support
 * I choose English there
 * I log out
 * I log back in without doing any changes in the GDM language chooser
 * My session is half English and half Catalan due to LANGUAGE=en and LANG=ca_ES.utf8 (Firefox in Catalan, gnome-panel in English, gnome-menus in Catalan).

Steps to reproduce (b):

 * Perform a full installation in English, as per http://testcases.qa.ubuntu.com/Install/NonEnglishLanguage#Installation%20Full%20Network%20Support
 * Go to System > Administration > Language Support
 * Install the Traditional Chinese language
 * Bring Traditional Chinese to the top of the list to become the main desktop language
 * Press the "Apply System-wide..." button
 * Reboot
 * When entering the session, you'll notice the desktop half translated in English, half in Chinese. The most noticeable parts shown in English are all the menus and Firefox. These applications seem to ignore the LANGUAGE variable
 * Running 'locale' on the terminal shows that LANG=en_US.UTF-8 and LANGUAGE=zh_K:en_US:en

I understand that this might be a problem in each application, as they
should give LANGUAGE preference. Rather than filing a bug in each app
right now, would it not make more sense to ensure that at least the
first locale in LANGUAGE, the one in LANG and LC_MESSAGES are the same?
(assuming it is possible to do such a thing, of course).

Also see the related bug 552664

** Affects: ubuntu-translations
     Importance: High
         Status: Triaged

** Affects: gdm (Ubuntu)
     Importance: High
     Assignee: Martin Pitt (pitti)
         Status: In Progress

** Affects: language-selector (Ubuntu)
     Importance: Undecided
         Status: In Progress


** Tags: patch
-- 
Set $LANGUAGE if the user picks a different locale in gdm, so that language-selector and gdm stop disagreeing
https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/553162
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