how to make user account partially bi-lingual?

[William Mattison]

(Fedora-18; all desktops)

A user needs all
* menu entries, buttons, prompts, messages, application icon labels, etc.
within
* desktops (Gnome, KDE, Xfce, etc.), all LibreOffice applications, vi, etc.
to be English.

But he needs to be able to both
* enter and view
text in both
* English and  simplified Chinese
within
* vi, all LibreOffice applications, internet e-mail (Yahoo mail, gmail, etc.), etc.
where most files/messages will contain a mix of English and simplified Chinese.


How does root and/or the user set up his account so he always has these abilities?  In
effect, we want the account to be bi-lingual, with English as the primary language, and
simplified Chinese being a secondary language.

Thank-you in advance for your help.
Bill.

how to make user account partially bi-lingual? [CLOSED]

[William Mattison]

>  From: William Mattison <wcmattison(a)yahoo.com&gt;
> To: &quot;users(a)lists.fedoraproject.org&quot; <users(a)lists.fedoraproject.org&gt; 
> Sent: Tuesday, April 16, 2013 9:03 PM
> Subject: how to make user account partially bi-lingual? 
> (Fedora-18; all desktops)
>
> A user needs all
> * menu entries, buttons, prompts, messages, application icon labels, etc.
> within
> * desktops (Gnome, KDE, Xfce, etc.), all LibreOffice applications, vi, etc.
> to be English.
>
>
> But he needs to be able to both
> * enter and view
> text in both
> * English and  simplified Chinese
> within
> * vi, 
 all LibreOffice applications, internet e-mail (Yahoo mail, gmail, etc.),
etc.
> where most files/messages will contain a mix of English and simplified
> Chinese.
>
> How does root and/or the user set up his account so he always has these abilities?  In
> effect, we want the account to be bi-lingual, with English as the primary language, and
> simplified Chinese being a secondary language.
>
>
> Thank-you in advance for your help.
> Bill. 
When diagnosing and solving this started involving screen captures, I decided to take this
off-line with Ed Greshko.    With a lot of
 excellent help from Ed, everything I believe I want or need to do, I can now do somehow. 
It would take a lot to spell it all out.  I'll try to summarize.  I'll keep
referring to Chinese (meaning "simplified" Chinese) here, but I suspect this
applies to some other languages as well.


* It may be necessary to download RPMs for Chinese.  You'll need Chinese fonts and
"ibus" (the tool needed for input of Chinese characters).
* In the chosen desktop's customization GUI, a user can select more than one
language.  He should make sure English is the display language.  But the list of available
languages must include Chinese.
* The "ibus" tool should be chosen for input of Chinese.  "ibus" is
configurable.
* UTF-8 is the preferred encoding for text in files.
* Make sure the encoding in terminal windows and LibreOffice applications is set
correctly.  The encoding in terminal windows and LibreOffice applications must match the
encoding of the text in the files being edited.
* Make sure the font in terminal windows and LibreOffice applications is set to something
that provides glyphs for Chinese.
* The "file" command is useful for determining the encoding within many (but not
all) files.
* The "iconv" command is useful for converting files from one encoding to
another.

Along the way, four bugs were found.  Two bugs were already reported in Bugzilla:

https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=890474

https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=918308

One new bug was reported by Ed:

https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=956512

One bug was reported by myself in both
 Redhat and LibreOffice (freedesktop):

https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=960768
https://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=64678

There are work-arounds to all four bugs if you're not tied to one desktop manager and
one terminal, and you're flexible about font face and size.

The last two bugs (Redhat #960768 and LibreOffice #64678) appear to be already closed,
prematurely in my opinion.  The others appear to still be open. 
 Therefore, I termed this thread "[CLOSED]", not "[SOLVED]".

I thank Ed for all his help on this.

Bill.

[William Mattison]

>  > But the Chinese still doesn't display correctly in vi in
> Konsole and XTerrm.
>  >
>  > There are other issues, but I will initiate separate threads for those.
>
>  I could understand it not displaying properly in an 
 xterm.....
>  I've no problem konsole.  Should check Advanced profile settings to make sure the
> Encoding is set to UTF-8. 
In the Gnome terminal, doing a "more" on a UTF-8 text file containing simplified
Chinese does display everything, but it's mixing fonts (both face and font).  I'll
open a new thread on that.

In the Gnome terminal, vi-ing a UTF-8 text file containing simplified Chinese, same thing
- including mixed fonts.  I configured ibus to toggle with control-space, but when I type
an 'o' to open a new line and try to insert new text, control-space brings up the
message "E29: No inserted text yet", and "Press ENTER or type command to
continue".  I typed an 'o' again to open a new line, then control-space, and
this time nothing happened.  I had to toggle the language up in the upper right corner in
the screen.  Then ibus worked.  But newly inserted characters show up in a mix of two
fonts
 - two faces, two sizes.

I had to install kde-l10n and the Chinese language pack.  But it seemed to not help.  I
did all the settings and configuring I could find.  In KDE, in a Konsole terminal, when
vi-ing a file, I cannot find a way to enter Chinese.  It seems to not know about ibus. 
Doing "more" behaved the same as in the Gnome Terminal in Gnome.

Bill.

[Ed Greshko]

On 04/19/13 10:25, William Mattison wrote:
> > The ISO-8859 text is a good indication that the file is encoded
> in GB2312.
> > So, you'll want
> >
> > -f GB2312
> > -t UTF-8
> >
> > That is all....
>  Progress.  That made the file display in vi in Terminal correctly.  Thank-you, Ed.
>
>  But the Chinese still doesn't display correctly in vi in Konsole and XTerrm.
>
>  There are other issues, but I will initiate separate threads for those. 
I could understand it not displaying properly in an xterm.....

I've no problem konsole.  Should check Advanced profile settings to make sure the
Encoding is set to UTF-8.


-- 
> From now on, at least during winter time, Im going to blame all
> spelling an grammar erros on the cat sitting on my chest every time I sit down at the
> computer....

[William Mattison]

>  The ISO-8859 text is a good indication that the file is encoded in
> GB2312. 
>  
>  So, you'll want
>  
>  -f GB2312
>  -t UTF-8
>  
>  That is all.... 
Progress.  That made the file display in vi in Terminal correctly.  Thank-you, Ed.

But the Chinese still doesn't display correctly in vi in Konsole and XTerrm.

There are other issues, but I will initiate separate threads for those.

Bill.

[Ed Greshko]

On 04/19/13 09:31, William Mattison wrote:
>  > What do you get when you type....
>  >
>  > file filename  ?
>  >
>  > I don't remember, but I think in the Fedora 9 days Unicode may not have been the
> default.  The encoding you have may be GB2312.
>  >
>  > You can try running....
>  >
>  > iconv -f GB2312 -t UTF8 filename > filename.utf8
>  >
>  > and then vi the resulting file....
>
>  On the Redhat 9 system, for a simplified Chinese file, I get "ISO-8859 text".
>
>  On the Fedora-18 system, for a simplified Chinese file imported from the Redhat 9 system,
> I get "ISO-8859 text".
>
>  On the Fedora-18 system, for a new simplified Chinese file, I get "UTF-8 Unicode
> text".
>
>  I have not yet tried an iconv.  When I try it, what should the f and t arguments be, and
> do I need any other arguments?
>
>  
The ISO-8859 text is a good indication that the file is encoded in GB2312.

So, you'll want

-f GB2312
-t UTF-8

That is all....

-- 
> From now on, at least during winter time, Im going to blame all
> spelling an grammar erros on the cat sitting on my chest every time I sit down at the
> computer....

[William Mattison]

>  What do you get when you type....
>
>  file filename  ?
>
>  I don't remember, but I think in the Fedora 9 days Unicode may not have been the
> default.  The encoding you have may be GB2312.
>
>  You can try running....
>
>  iconv -f GB2312 -t UTF8 filename > filename.utf8
>
>  and then vi the resulting file.... 
On the Redhat 9 system, for a simplified Chinese file, I get "ISO-8859 text".

On the Fedora-18 system, for a simplified Chinese file imported from the Redhat 9 system,
I get "ISO-8859 text".

On the Fedora-18 system, for a new simplified Chinese file, I get "UTF-8 Unicode
text".

I have not yet tried an iconv.  When I try it, what should the f and t arguments be, and
do I need any other arguments?

thanks,
Bill.

[Ed Greshko]

On 04/18/13 11:42, Ed Greshko wrote:
>  On 04/18/13 11:23, William Mattison wrote:
> > I imported from a Redhat 9 system many files created by vi and containing a mix of
> English and simplified Chinese.  When I load any of those into vi(m) on the Fedora-18
> system, the simplified Chinese is not displayed properly.  I notice at the bottom of the
> Konsole/XTerm/Terminal, there is a message saying "converted".  I don't know
> if there's a connection.  Both the message and the failure to properly display the
> simplified Chinese happen regardless of the simplified Chinese encoding that I choose in
> the terminal's preferences.  Any ideas/suggestions anyone?
>  What do you get when you type....
>
>  file filename  ?
>
>  I don't remember, but I think in the Fedora 9 days Unicode may not have been the
> default.  The encoding you have may be GB2312.
>
>  You can try running....
>
>  iconv -f GB2312 -t UTF8 filename > filename.utf8
>
>  and then vi the resulting file....
>  
Wondering if that worked?


-- 
> From now on, at least during winter time, Im going to blame all
> spelling an grammar erros on the cat sitting on my chest every time I sit down at the
> computer....

[Ed Greshko]

On 04/18/13 11:23, William Mattison wrote:
>  I imported from a Redhat 9 system many files created by vi and
> containing a mix of English and simplified Chinese.  When I load any of those into vi(m)
> on the Fedora-18 system, the simplified Chinese is not displayed properly.  I notice at
> the bottom of the Konsole/XTerm/Terminal, there is a message saying "converted".
>  I don't know if there's a connection.  Both the message and the failure to
> properly display the simplified Chinese happen regardless of the simplified Chinese
> encoding that I choose in the terminal's preferences.  Any ideas/suggestions anyone?
What do you get when you type....

file filename  ?

I don't remember, but I think in the Fedora 9 days Unicode may not have been the
default.  The encoding you have may be GB2312.

You can try running....

iconv -f GB2312 -t UTF8 filename > filename.utf8

and then vi the resulting file....

-- 
> From now on, at least during winter time, Im going to blame all
> spelling an grammar erros on the cat sitting on my chest every time I sit down at the
> computer....

[William Mattison]

>  (Fedora-18; all desktops)
>  ...
>  How does root and/or the user set up his account so he always has these abilities?
>  In effect, we want the account to be bi-lingual, with English as the primary language,
>  and simplified Chinese being a secondary language.
>
>  Thank-you in advance for your help.
>  Bill. 
Ed Greshko answered:
>  Run "im-chooser" and then select ibus as the input method. 
> You'll then need to
>  configure the input methods to add whatever method you want for Simplified Chinese.
>  I'm pretty sure this gets you want you want since you seem most in need of inputting
> in
>  Chinese.  Viewing shouldn't be an issue. 
In addition to what Ed suggested, it was also needed to add simplified Chinese within the
"System Settings" GUI under the user name in the upper right corner of the
screen.  I also wrestled with preferences in Konsole, Terminal, and XTerm.  Things now
seem to be fine in LibreOffice.  I can create a new simplified Chinese or mixed file with
vi(m).  But...

I imported from a Redhat 9 system many files created by vi and containing a mix of English
and simplified Chinese.  When I load any of those into vi(m) on the Fedora-18 system, the
simplified Chinese is not displayed properly.  I notice at the bottom of the
Konsole/XTerm/Terminal, there is a message saying "converted".  I don't know
if there's a connection.  Both the message and the failure to properly display the
simplified Chinese happen regardless of the simplified Chinese encoding that I choose in
the terminal's preferences.  Any ideas/suggestions anyone?

thanks,
Bill.

[Ed Greshko]

On 04/17/13 09:03, William Mattison wrote:
>  (Fedora-18; all desktops)
>
>  A user needs all
>  * menu entries, buttons, prompts, messages, application icon labels, etc.
>  within
>  * desktops (Gnome, KDE, Xfce, etc.), all LibreOffice applications, vi, etc.
>  to be English.
>
>  But he needs to be able to both
>  * enter and view
>  text in both
>  * English and  simplified Chinese
>  within
>  * vi, all LibreOffice applications, internet e-mail (Yahoo mail, gmail, etc.), etc.
>  where most files/messages will contain a mix of English and simplified Chinese.
>  
Run "im-chooser" and then select ibus as the input method.  You'll then need
to configure the input methods to add whatever method you want for Simplified Chinese.

I'm pretty sure this gets you want you want since you seem most in need of inputting
in Chinese.  Viewing shouldn't be an issue.

-- 
> From now on, at least during winter time, Im going to blame all
> spelling an grammar erros on the cat sitting on my chest every time I sit down at the
> computer....

[Ed Greshko]

On 04/23/13 09:22, William Mattison wrote:
> >> But the Chinese still doesn't display correctly in vi in Konsole and XTerrm.
> >>
> >> There are other issues, but I will initiate separate threads for those.
> > I could understand it not displaying properly in an
>   xterm.....
> > I've no problem konsole.  Should check Advanced profile settings to make sure the
> Encoding is set to UTF-8.
>  In the Gnome terminal, doing a "more" on a UTF-8 text file containing
> simplified Chinese does display everything, but it's mixing fonts (both face and
> font).  I'll open a new thread on that. 
I really don't know what that means.  Probably not enough coffee.  Can you post an
image someplace?
>  In the Gnome terminal, vi-ing a UTF-8 text file containing simplified Chinese, same thing
> - including mixed fonts.  I configured ibus to toggle with control-space, but when I type
> an 'o' to open a new line and try to insert new text, control-space brings up the
> message "E29: No inserted text yet", and "Press ENTER or type command to
> continue".  I typed an 'o' again to open a new line, then control-space, and
> this time nothing happened.  I had to toggle the language up in the upper right corner in
> the screen.  Then ibus worked.  But newly inserted characters show up in a mix of two
> fonts
>   - two faces, two sizes. 
Can you send the file you're testing with?

>  I had to install kde-l10n and the Chinese language pack.  But it seemed to not help.  I
> did all the settings and configuring I could find.  In KDE, in a Konsole terminal, when
> vi-ing a file, I cannot find a way to enter Chinese.  It seems to not know about ibus. 
> Doing "more" behaved the same as in the Gnome Terminal in Gnome.
>  
Have a look at these....

https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=0B2H9v1dYNcvpeFlXT291V0FITE0&u...



-- 
The only thing worse than a poorly asked question is a cryptic answer.