Unable to override locale within Python

[Mattia Verga]

I'm running KDE/Plasma on Wayland both in my main workstation and in my
development virtual machine. On both machine it looks like Python is
unable to change the system's locale when running a script [1] in
Konsole, while the same script from a linux terminal runs fine.

I tried to create a new user and logging in as this new user the script
runs fine in Konsole also. I cannot find any setting which may cause
that, I also tried to delete the konsole configuration file under
.config so as to reset from scratch, but with my main user I can't get
to run the script right.

Any idea where I might look to find the cause?

Mattia

[1]
https://github.com/rpm-software-management/rpmlint/issues/786#issuecommen...

[Ondrej Mosnacek]

On Thu, Jan 13, 2022 at 2:44 PM Mattia Verga
<mattia.verga(a)protonmail.com&gt; wrote:
>  I'm running KDE/Plasma on Wayland both in my main workstation and
> in my
>  development virtual machine. On both machine it looks like Python is
>  unable to change the system's locale when running a script [1] in
>  Konsole, while the same script from a linux terminal runs fine.
>
>  I tried to create a new user and logging in as this new user the script
>  runs fine in Konsole also. I cannot find any setting which may cause
>  that, I also tried to delete the konsole configuration file under
>  .config so as to reset from scratch, but with my main user I can't get
>  to run the script right.
>
>  Any idea where I might look to find the cause? 
I believe your problem lies in the LANGUAGE environment variable
(probably set to your local language by ~/.bashrc, ~/.bash_profile, or
such), not in Konsole or KDE.

In my environment I was able to reproduce a similar behavior as in
your bug report with the linked Python snippet and adding
LANGUAGE='en_US' to the env dict changed the strings to the English
language for me.

Cheers,

-- 
Ondrej Mosnacek
Software Engineer, Linux Security - SELinux kernel
Red Hat, Inc.

[Mattia Verga]

Il 13/01/22 15:24, Ondrej Mosnacek ha scritto:
>  On Thu, Jan 13, 2022 at 2:44 PM Mattia Verga
>  <mattia.verga(a)protonmail.com&gt; wrote:
> > I'm running KDE/Plasma on Wayland both in my main workstation and in my
> > development virtual machine. On both machine it looks like Python is
> > unable to change the system's locale when running a script [1] in
> > Konsole, while the same script from a linux terminal runs fine.
> >
> > I tried to create a new user and logging in as this new user the script
> > runs fine in Konsole also. I cannot find any setting which may cause
> > that, I also tried to delete the konsole configuration file under
> > .config so as to reset from scratch, but with my main user I can't get
> > to run the script right.
> >
> > Any idea where I might look to find the cause?
>  I believe your problem lies in the LANGUAGE environment variable
>  (probably set to your local language by ~/.bashrc, ~/.bash_profile, or
>  such), not in Konsole or KDE.
>
>  In my environment I was able to reproduce a similar behavior as in
>  your bug report with the linked Python snippet and adding
>  LANGUAGE='en_US' to the env dict changed the strings to the English
>  language for me.
>
>  Cheers,
>
>  --
>  Ondrej Mosnacek
>  Software Engineer, Linux Security - SELinux kernel
>  Red Hat, Inc. 
Thanks, your hint has made me making some progress.

By comparing the `printenv` output in linux terminal and in konsole I
see that both have `LANG=it_IT.UTF-8` (which is correct), but konsole
adds `LANGUAGE=it:en_US` which seems a strange value.
Unset the LANGUAGE variable make the script run fine.

I now have to find out what KDE setting is injecting the LANGUAGE
variable... there's nothing in bashrc or bash_profile, so it may be some
KDE setting.

Mattia

[Vitaly Zaitsev]

On 13/01/2022 17:09, Mattia Verga wrote:
>  By comparing the `printenv` output in linux terminal and in konsole
> I
>  see that both have `LANG=it_IT.UTF-8` (which is correct), but konsole
>  adds `LANGUAGE=it:en_US` which seems a strange value.
>  Unset the LANGUAGE variable make the script run fine. 
$ printenv | grep LANG
LANGUAGE=
LANG=en_IE.UTF-8

-- 
Sincerely,
   Vitaly Zaitsev (vitaly(a)easycoding.org)

[Laurent Rineau]

On Thursday, January 13, 2022 5:09:10 PM CET Mattia Verga wrote:
>  By comparing the `printenv` output in linux terminal and in konsole
> I
>  see that both have `LANG=it_IT.UTF-8` (which is correct), but konsole
>  adds `LANGUAGE=it:en_US` which seems a strange value. 
LANGUAGE is a variable that can specify a list of prefered languages, with `:` as the
separator. See the documentation here in the manual of gettext:

 
https://www.gnu.org/software/gettext/manual/html_node/The-LANGUAGE-variab...

>  I now have to find out what KDE setting is injecting the LANGUAGE
>  variable... there's nothing in bashrc or bash_profile, so it may be some
>  KDE setting. 
In KDE System Settings, section "Regional Settings/Language", you probably have
specified that you prefer "italiano" and then "American English". That
is wky konsole sets that variable.

>  Unset the LANGUAGE variable make the script run fine. 
As documented, LANGUAGE has a precedence over LANG or LC_* variables. See also:

 
https://www.gnu.org/software/gettext/manual/html_node/Locale-Environment-...

By unsetting it, you let the code fallback to the other variables.

[Mattia Verga]

Il 14/01/22 12:26, Laurent Rineau ha scritto:
>  On Thursday, January 13, 2022 5:09:10 PM CET Mattia Verga wrote:
> > By comparing the `printenv` output in linux terminal and in konsole I
> > see that both have `LANG=it_IT.UTF-8` (which is correct), but konsole
> > adds `LANGUAGE=it:en_US` which seems a strange value.
>  LANGUAGE is a variable that can specify a list of prefered languages, with `:` as the
> separator. See the documentation here in the manual of gettext:
>
>    
> https://www.gnu.org/software/gettext/manual/html_node/The-LANGUAGE-variab...
>
> > I now have to find out what KDE setting is injecting the LANGUAGE
> > variable... there's nothing in bashrc or bash_profile, so it may be some
> > KDE setting.
>  In KDE System Settings, section "Regional Settings/Language", you probably have
> specified that you prefer "italiano" and then "American English". That
> is wky konsole sets that variable.
>
> > Unset the LANGUAGE variable make the script run fine.
>  As documented, LANGUAGE has a precedence over LANG or LC_* variables. See also:
>
>    
> https://www.gnu.org/software/gettext/manual/html_node/Locale-Environment-...
>
>  By unsetting it, you let the code fallback to the other variables. 
Searching online I had read that setting LC_ALL=C should have overridden
LANGUAGE also... and, indeed, after having played with Konsole language
settings and env variables it does. I'm not sure why my previous
attempts were unsuccessful.

Anyway, problem solved, thanks all for the input.

Mattia