[Date Prev][Date Next] [Thread Prev][Thread Next] [Date Index] [Thread Index]

Bug#522776: C.UTF-8 in squeeze



On Mon, Jan 10, 2011 at 08:44:10AM +0100, Aurelien Jarno wrote:
> Roger Leigh a écrit :
> > On Fri, Jan 07, 2011 at 09:14:47PM -0500, David Holland wrote:
> >> Can this please get done (adding a C.UTF-8 locale)? It is absolutely
> >> required for writing shell scripts that handle UTF-8 data, if you want
> >> those shell scripts to have anything like portable or reliable
> >> behavior.
> > 
> > This is really in the hands of the glibc maintainers.  I thought that
> > a bug had been filed months ago, but I can't find it.  I've done so
> > now.
> 
> I know some persons already tried to work on that, so if patches are
> already available, they will be really appreciated.
> 
> Providing a C.UTF-8 locale is quite easy, d-i is already doing that.
> Providing a C.UTF-8 *by default* is more complicated, as it has to be
> done in the GNU libc code, we can't really on the locale package
> generating one. This would mean this package should always be installed,
> and that we should trust on user to correctly regenerate the locales if
> they do.

Hi Aurelien,

I think that initially, simply guaranteeing the presence of C.UTF-8
as a standard locale, generated by localedef/gen will be sufficient.
This will allow packages to rely on its presence during normal
system operation e.g. in maintainer scripts, for lintian and other
programs requiring it.

I think having it hardcoded into libc is rather more difficult and
having it prior to /usr being mounted is not that important--all
of the known use cases do not require this.  So at least initially,
I think simply providing it outside libc will be more than sufficient.

I would like to see it in libc itself eventually, but I am concerned
about the UTF-8 codeset table being duplicated for every locale.  I'd
like to see it shared so that users using it don't have to pay a
large penalty for the needless duplication.  Possibly best looked at
upstream; I did already mention it a year or so back, but I didn't get
too far--it was more of a casual enquiry about the possibilities.

Regards,
Roger
-- 
  .''`.  Roger Leigh
 : :' :  Debian GNU/Linux             http://people.debian.org/~rleigh/
 `. `'   Printing on GNU/Linux?       http://gutenprint.sourceforge.net/
   `-    GPG Public Key: 0x25BFB848   Please GPG sign your mail.

Attachment: signature.asc
Description: Digital signature


Reply to: