ubuntu-phone team mailing list archive

[Kyle Nitzsche <kyle.nitzsche@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On 04/17/2014 09:22 AM, Rodney Dawes wrote:
> On Thu, 2014-04-17 at 09:09 -0400, Kyle Nitzsche wrote:
>> Just noting that our traditional deb based lang packs approach (for core stuff)
>> in the context of the monolithic system image enables:
>> * producing stock Ubuntu devices with as wide a set of languages as is wanted
>> * while also allowing custom phones/tablets to trim that down to the hand picked
>> languages they want and thereby freeing disk space
> While the debs do allow this, it is only convenience to us that they are
> debs we are doing it with. There are other ways we could enable this,
> without debs, but it requires work. The debs are convenient right now,
> but when requirements change and we need to provide translations updates
> without upgrading the whole image, they will not be so convenient.

So to be clear, I don't really care if it is debs or not. It's just that debs
already work (except for the requirement to add translations/languages at
runtime). And we have a fully functioning set of things that enable:
* customized images (only include the languages you want)
* customized packages (that add features and just those features' translations
to a pkg while falling back to the translations provided for the pkg by lang packs).

The only thing we do not have now (as previously mentioned in this thread) is
adding a language at runtime that it not baked into the system image. Can an
overlay file system solve this by allowing language deb installation (by a
language selector settings widget like in 'classic' now) into a read-write area
that is joined with the read-only area?

>
>> If we do not have the ability to add translations for core stuff (not including
>> click pkgs) beyond that baked into the image, then the pressure will be to add
>> as many languages into the stock image as possible. In my experience, OEMs are
>> often quite clear that their product does not need all those languages and they
>> choose to delete them for the disk space. Lang packs enable these options
>> without much fuss, it seems to me.
> The main issue with the current debs system is that we are shipping a
> lot of translations we don't actually need to be on the system, because
> our language pack debs are built from the requirements of the full
> Ubuntu ISO, and not the phone image. So we are already hitting a
> conflict of interest between the two.

Yes: Perhaps the lang packs for Ubuntu Desktop would not be the same as for
Ubuntu for phones/tablets.
 
>> I look forward to hearing about how/whether we intend to support adding
>> translations for core stuff beyond that provided in the system image when it is
>> built. If we can do that, this part of the discussion is moot.
> I would hope we intend to support that. We've been supporting it for 10
> years in Ubuntu. I don't see why we'd stop supporting it just because
> some OEMs want to ship images with only a subset of translations. If we
> don't support it, it means some people will never be able to use an
> Ubuntu phone, without building their own custom images and reflashing a
> device. I sure hope that isn't how we intend to continue supporting it.
>
>