Bug#467061: packages.debian.org ignores 'en' quality values when deciding which language to display package descriptions in

[Will Aoki <waoki@umnh.utah.edu>]

Package: www.debian.org

If I load (for example) <http://packages.debian.org/sid/putty> with my
Accept-Language string set to "en; q=1.0", then the page and the package
description strings all appear in English, and if I load the page with
Accept-Language set to "de; q=1.0, en; q=0.5", then the package
description all appear in German, as expected. If, however, I have my
Accept-Language set to "en; q=1.0, de; q=0.5", then I see the page in
English but the package description strings in German.

This problem also appears for other languages, when packages have
suitable translations available. For example, setting Accept-Language to
"en; q=1.0, fr; q=0.5" causes <http://packages.debian.org/sid/libc0.1>
to display in English, but with French package descriptions.

The quality values are not being flat-out ignored, it is not a case of a
value of 1.0 being ignored, and the problem is not positional: if I add
a third language, setting Accept-Language to "de; q=0.3, en; q=0.9, fr;
q=0.5", then I get most of the libc0.1 page in English but the
descriptions are in French, and if I set it to "de; q=0.7, en; q=0.9,
fr; q=0.4" gives most of the page in English and the package
descriptions in German. Only if I set both the French and German quality
values to zero do I get the package descriptions in English, even though
the rest of the page displays in English with any setting where English
outranks the other options.

I first noticed this problem while using Firefox, but I have verified
that it occurs using both w3m and lynx. There is no proxy in use.

Examples:

* With Accept-Language="en; q=1.0, de; q=0.1":

     dep: libc0.1 (>= 2.6-1) [kfreebsd-amd64, kfreebsd-i386]
        GNU C-Bibliothek: Dynamische Bibliotheken
        also a virtual package provided by libc0.1-udeb 

* With Accept-Language="de; q=1.0, en; q=0.1":

    dep: libc0.1 (>= 2.6-1) [kfreebsd-amd64, kfreebsd-i386]
        GNU C-Bibliothek: Dynamische Bibliotheken
        auch ein virtuelles Paket, bereitgestellt durch libc0.1-udeb

* With Accept-Language="en; q=1.0"

    dep: libc0.1 (>= 2.6-1) [kfreebsd-amd64, kfreebsd-i386]
        GNU C Library: Shared libraries
        also a virtual package provided by libc0.1-udeb

-- 
William Aoki     KD7YAF    waoki@umnh.utah.edu    5-1924