Attempt to get a simpler setup of console fonts for systems installed by D-I
The mechanism currently used in D-I to decide which *console* font is
to be made the default for the Linux console (i.e. in non graphical
environment) is based on a per-language decision.
Deopending on the language used for the installation, different
console fonts are used (nothing to do with graphical environments).
This is determined by the (somewhat cryptic) languagelist file of
localechooser.
When grepping this list for languages which currently setup a console
fonts (aka languages for which at least one complete console font
exists, which leaves CJK, Arabic, Indic and such languages aside), we
have the following:
Albanian;kbd=lat0-sun16(utf8)
Basque;kbd=lat0-sun16(utf8)
Belarusian;cyr=uni,16,utf-8,by(ctrl_shift_toggle)
Bosnian;kbd=ter-v16f(utf8)
Bulgarian;kbd=ruscii_8x16(cp1251)
Catalan;kbd=lat0-sun16(utf8)
Croatian;kbd=lat2-sun16(utf8)
Czech;kbd=lat2-sun16(utf8)
Danish;kbd=lat0-sun16(utf8)
Dutch;kbd=lat0-sun16(utf8)
English;kbd=lat0-sun16(utf8)
Esperanto;kbd=LatArCyrHeb-16(utf8)
Estonian;kbd=lat0-sun16(utf8)
Finnish;kbd=lat0-sun16(utf8)
French;kbd=lat9u-16(utf8)
Galician;kbd=lat0-sun16(utf8)
German;kbd=lat0-sun16(utf8)
Greek;kbd=iso07.f16(utf8)
Hebrew;kbd=LatArCyrHeb-16(utf8)
Hungarian;kbd=lat2-sun16(utf8)
Icelandic;kbd=lat9u-16(utf8)
Indonesian;kbd=lat0-sun16(utf8)
Italian;kbd=lat0-sun16(utf8)
Kurdish;kbd=ter-916f(utf8)
Latvian;kbd=lat7-14(utf8)
Lithuanian;kbd=LatArCyrHeb-16(utf8)
Malagasy;kbd=lat0-sun16(utf8)
Macedonian;kbd=iso05.f16(utf8)
Northern Sami;kbd=lat0-sun(utf8)
Norwegian Bokmaal;kbd=lat0-sun16(utf8)
Norwegian Nynorsk;kbd=lat0-sun16(utf8)
Persian;kbd=iso06.f16(utf8)
Polish;kbd=lat2-sun16(utf8)
Portuguese (Brazil);kbd=lat1-16(utf8)
Portuguese;kbd=lat0-sun16(utf8)
Romanian;kbd=ter-g16f(utf8)
Russian;cyr=uni,16,koi8-r,ru_ms(ctrl_shift_toggle)
Slovak;kbd=lat2-sun16(utf8)
Slovenian;kbd=lat2-sun16(utf8)
Spanish;kbd=lat0-sun16(utf8)
Swedish;kbd=lat0-sun16(utf8)
Tagalog;kbd=lat0-sun16(utf8)
Turkish;kbd=ter-916f(utf8)
Ukrainian;kbd=ruscii_8x16(utf8)
Welsh;kbd=iso14.f16(utf8)
Xhosa;kbd=lat0-sun16(utf8)
In short, a big mess..:-)
Each language triggers its own console font:
-"kbd=" entries will use fonts from the console-data package, namely
what follows the "=" sign
-"ter=" entries will use fonts from the console-terminus package
-"cyr=" will use fonts from the console-cyrillic package
All chosen fonts are OK for the selected languages, however:
-they often can only display characters from one charset only (ie
Latin1 fonts will not include several Latin2 characters and so on)
-even among similar language families, there is no real consistency
(why different fonts for pt_BR and pt?)
I made a few tests and, actually, some fonts from the
"console-terminus" package could be well-suited for many of the above
languages. Indeed the "ter-v16*" fonts are 512 glyphs fonts and thus
cover Latin-1 (so called Western European), Latin-2 (so called Central
European), Latin-9 (Turkish), Romanian, Latin-7 (Latvian), Slavian
Cyrillic and Asian Cyrillic
As a consequence, I think we could simplify all this.
As a first attempt, I propose changing the default font to "ter-v16f"
for all languages of the Latin-1, Latin-2 families, as well as
Turkish, Kurdish, Romanian.
The case of Cyrillic languages might be more complicated as a few
glyphs may be missing for some of them (Eugenyi....your skills here
could help).
So, please, translators, make the following tests at the Linux console
(aka outside X):
1) backup /etc/console-tools/config
2) aptitude install console-terminus
3) change the SCREEN_FONT entry in /etc/console-tools/config to
"ter-v16f"
4) reconfigure the console: "/etc/init.d/console-screen.sh start"
Then, try displaying text files in your languages, possibly with all
its characters. You can find such files in
installer/build/needed-characters in a D-I SVN checkout. Or you can
type some yourselves!
I propose doing this change AFTER D-I BETA2, so you have plenty of
time for testing AND GETTING FEEDBACK from users of your languages.
I also CC Anton Zinoviev, who maintains console-terminus, to this
mail. Anton, your help might be required if deeply technical issues
are raised.....:-)
Please comment about this proposal....this is a medium term goal, we
have time to discuss it.
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