Bug#402975: debian-policy: Introduce a requirement for internationalisation of debconf templates
Package: debian-policy
Version: 3.7.2.2
Severity: wishlist
Tags: patch
This should probably have been done for a long time but better late than
never.
The gettext-based system for debconf templates internationalisation is now
mature enough (it appeared immediately after the release of woody).
The i18n contributors have made big efforts last years to enforce i18n using
gettext for debconf templates and all packages which lack this feature have
been provided (and are still provided) with a patch to help their
maintainers doing the switch to po-debconf.
So, I think it's now time to enforce this and do this as soon as possible in
the etch-lenny release cycle.
Attached is a first draft of a patch that would turn the use of a
gettext-based system in packages which use debconf into a requirement.
I'm perfectly aware that this introduces a "must" without doing it a
"should" before, which is probably not very common practice. However, given
the low impact of this change after two NMU campaigns on existing packages
to make them switch to po-debconf, this would indeed be possible, in my
opinion.
-- System Information:
Debian Release: 4.0
APT prefers unstable
APT policy: (500, 'unstable')
Architecture: i386 (i686)
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/dash
Kernel: Linux 2.6.18-2-686
Locale: LANG=fr_FR.UTF-8, LC_CTYPE=fr_FR.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8) (ignored: LC_ALL set to fr_FR.UTF-8)
-- no debconf information
--- policy.sgml.old 2006-12-13 22:24:05.534361649 +0100
+++ policy.sgml 2006-12-13 22:26:52.159683953 +0100
@@ -1221,6 +1221,13 @@
</p>
<p>
+ Packages which use the Debian Configuration management
+ specification must allow for translation of their messages
+ by using a gettext-based system such as the one provided by
+ the <package>po-debconf</package> package.
+ </p>
+
+ <p>
Packages should try to minimize the amount of prompting
they need to do, and they should ensure that the user
will only ever be asked each question once. This means
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