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from refracta English to refracta German, possible?

Wed Nov 23, 2011 3:48 pm

I for one always use English, when it comes to computing.
Hence i don't know about the following subject at all.

I am allowed to put a Gnu/Linux machine in a public cafe.
So far, so good. I thought: "Using refracta is the most easy way to get a usual environment for most users out there"
Problem is: it needs to be all German (including menus and menu bars and help and what not.

Is it possible to change the system language (system language?) from English to German, after installation?
If yes, how?
If no, how can i use the build-in tool, get-selections, to install stock debian and then all refracta applications in a row. Step by step, i got the general idea.
(i did it, it was not hard, but i am a bit spare on time, would like to move the PC tomorrow or Friday to the cafe, hence a short step by step would be good).
https://github.com/fsmithred/refracta/b ... ections.sh


---------
side question: how do i put application icons, iceweasel, on the desktop?
Just drag and drop? Will try that, but advice is welcome.

joke: takes a lot of knowledge to make use of user-comfort. lol.

thanks in advance.

Re: from refracta English to refracta German, possible?

Wed Nov 23, 2011 9:55 pm

I don't know how to do the language change, and I'm not at home to try it with refracta or with squeeze. Right now I'm on a live lenny CD that I made about a year ago.

To use the get/set selections scripts, install a base debian system (squeeze), copy the package_list and auto_package (or whatever it's called) files from refracta's /home/user to your new system, and copy /usr/local/bin/set-selections.sh, too. Then, from the same directory as those list files, run ./set-selections.sh. You'll be asked to select the list files from a list, but the choice will be easy, since there's only those two. That will give you the same packages that are in refracta, but it won't give you the use configs. It also won't give you Taskfer or Deadbeef. Those were installed from .deb files.

Copy the user configs (/home/user/.config, /home/user/.local, and maybe /home/user/.mozilla if you want), copy /usr/local/bin for the custom scripts, and there's probably something else to do that I'm forgetting. I'll look at my notes when I get home tonight.

Oh yeah - add the github repo to /home/github/refracta, and if you want clamav in /home, I'll have to look at exactly what I did. Probably a symlink, but I don't remember if it's from /var or from /usr/lib.

To add a launcher to the desktop, I think you can put a .desktop file in /home/user/Desktop. Or maybe there's a way to do it by right-clicking on the desktop. Not sure, and I'm running an older version of xfce right now.

Re: from refracta English to refracta German, possible?

Thu Nov 24, 2011 1:18 am

Code:
/etc/init.d/gdm stop
dpkg-reconfigure locales
/etc/init.d/gdm start


(generate locale required and set as default) Thats it! no extra packages needed. Tested here for Deutch and Espanol on a proper install. Now I must learn to read German and Spanish better.

Don't forget the console keyboard:

Code:
apt-get install console-data


Check /etc/default/keyboard that what you want is there, see earlier discussion for the X keyboard

(Iceweasel has it's own extra language packs)

There is a file "~/.config/user-dirs.locale" containing "en_US" probably that should be edited.

Re: from refracta English to refracta German, possible?

Thu Nov 24, 2011 2:11 am

Ok, looks good. Thanks.
(need a bit to actually do it, but i am confident with all the help).

and yup: app-launcher on the desktop is via right-click (i first copied /usr/bin/name to ~/desktop, but then the icon was "ugly", with a link-sign. Not sure why i thought it would be more difficult).

Re: from refracta English to refracta German, possible?

Sun Nov 27, 2011 9:56 pm

tip for running ffrom a live-CD, by dzz, given in IRC:

live CD, before boot,
hit "tab" to enter boot options, then:
live-config=locales locales=de_DE.UTF-8
(which, obviously, is for German, de -> Deutschland -> Germany)

Re: from refracta English to refracta German, possible?

Mon Nov 28, 2011 2:21 am

dzz wrote:
Code:
/etc/init.d/gdm stop
dpkg-reconfigure locales
/etc/init.d/gdm start


Yup, that did it, exactly what i wanted. Nice and easy. Thanks

Re: from refracta English to refracta German, possible?

Mon Nov 28, 2011 1:40 pm

Also worth remembering, the gdm login screen has a language chooser, in the list are all locales generated on the system.

Refracta by default has only en_US.UTF-8 but you can generate more (remember to do this with gdm stopped)

This should stick for a snapshot, then you get as many languages as you want from gdm screen, ideal for a multi-user system

Re: from refracta English to refracta German, possible?

Sun Dec 04, 2011 5:38 pm

I've edited the release notes to include the following instructions on changing the locale and keyboard. Tell me if this is wrong or confusing. I still haven't tried dzz's script for setting the locale. That's probably my next experiment.

Code:
CHANGE LANGUAGE/LOCALE and KEYBOARD LAYOUT

To change only the keyboard layout on the desktop, click on the "us" next
to the date on the panel, and select the layout you want. Preconfigured
choices are U.S. English, U.K. (gb) English, and German (de). To add
another layout, left-click on the "us" and select Properties. Click on
Add, and select the one you want. The maximum number of layouts you can
have is four. You can also use the keyboard shortcut, Alt-Shift to toggle
through the choices.

To change the locale at the boot screen, press TAB and append the boot
options at the bottom of the screen with the appropriate locale. This
information is also available in the Help section at the boot screen.
Example:
   live-config=locales locales=de_DE.UTF-8
   
To change the locale after booting the system, and to add locales,
open a terminal and give the command:
   sudo /etc/init.d/gdm stop
You will be dropped to console, where you can log in as root (or log in
as user and prepend the next commands with 'sudo'.)
  To change the default locale or to add locales:
   dpkg-reconfigure locales
  To change the console keyboard layout and the language used in the
  system messages:
   dpkg-reconfigure console-data
  Be sure to make a sane choice, most likely one that begins with "pc".
  You'll need to log out of the console and log in again to see the change.
  To return to the desktop:
   /etc/init.d/gdm start

You can also select the language at the graphical login screen. Any
locales that have been added will show up as a choice. You'll still
need to change the keyboard layout from the panel applet once you're on
the desktop.
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