South African localization. I have a point where I need a comma.

Am I right? If you press the point button, you'll get a comma?
Peter

Hi Peter.

No, it means we use a comma as a decimal delimiter not a point. For example our currency - R10,50 - not like the American $10.50. An example of a practical nature - in spreadsheets at present if I use the comma the number is seen as text. In short, I need to tell the system that we use the comma as a decimal delimiter.

I hope I've put that across correctly! :-)

OO should know this Do you use the correct language?
Peter

Hi again. Yes, the system handles other issues such as currency correctly. It just has a problem with the decimal delimiter.

Sorry, I can't help. Hope you will get a wise answer.
Peter

Ok, just to clarify

System - Administration - Language Support

is set to "English (South African)" and also in OpenOffice

Tools - Options - Language Settings - Languages

is also set to "English (South African)"? With both these set right it really should be behaving itself. I think this is really weird. I have tried it myself and even tried formatting individual cells using a right-click which allowed me to set a different language inside individual cells. When i edited the currency's "." to a "," it messed things up. There is an option for a special character which i forgot to try :( I think this is something to ask the translators about and see if they can get it fixed although that route is likely to take a while but at least it would be a permanent fix and helps other people too. The weirdest thing about this is that Mark Shuttleworth is/was South African so i'm amazed this hasn't been noticed before! Lol

Apols and regards from
Tom :)

Thanks, Tom. The thing drives me crazy! (Not far to drive, fortunately!)
  :-)

Hi, i don't even need to get in a car for this! I couldn't even access the special character bit this time, grrr. I tried unticking the "thousands separator" thing but that made no difference - the comma still messed up the value displayed.
Definitely worth posting somewhere as a bug-report or perhaps join the SA translations team to help get this fixed!

Err i just had a look and there doesn't seem to be a SA translation team!
https://translations.launchpad.net/+groups/ubuntu-translators

Good luck with this!
Regards from
Tom :)

Hi Tom. You've certainly done some homework on this. Thanks, I
appreciate the effort!

Is this actually a translation issue or is it a locales issue? (Not that
I really know the difference, of course!) I also use Afrikaans and I
face the same issue there so I don't think it language related at all.
Am I making sense or am I making sense only to me? :-)

Ummm, i don't know if there is a difference. i assumed there wasnt but i don't know now. Shocker eh? If you're posting directly into the thread then you'll notice up at the top right-hand corner is a link to "Create bug-report". If you could click on that you'll find it's quite easy, especially as the problem is so easy to reproduce on someone else's machine.

Good luck with this!
Regards from
Tom :)

Ah yes. That could be an option. Thanks again for your kind efforts, Tom.

Best wishes from Cape Town!

Ken.

You're welcome.
Regards from
Tom :)

Hi Tom and Ken,

Its a locale issue not a translation issue. Trust me, since I'm the one who did it :)

There is a slight problem. I did do it correctly which is:

group = nbsp
decimal = ,

But got a number of bug reports about that, since most South African's have been 'educated' to use the American system of 'comma' and 'point'.

There was some discussion about creating two locales: American numbers and SA numbers. That hasn't moved forward much, locales take a long time to create, test and disseminate. There was some discussion at SABS about the whole wisdom of the current system, not formal just informal.

Also space can be problematic as many systems are not very good at selecting the space.

So how could you work around this? My recommendation is to keep using the ZA locale, but to use custom formats to try to do the formating in OOo (I unfortunately have never got it to work).

Also please be aware that ZA locales and OOo localisation doesn't happen in Ubuntu. It happens through Translate.org.za.

Wow, thanks for that Dwayne :)
Many regards from
Tom :)

Thanks for the response, Dwayne.

I don't know what to say about this but I find it a bit strange that those who want to do things correctly are denied the opportunity. I feel that they should at least be given the choice.

Lol, quite. Normally in linux the main problem for most people is too much choice!! I think you've just been shockingly lucky there as there normally i choice about almost everything. I guess we just have to accept that people in South Africa are very pro-american.

No, no Tom! That is just not so! To me, America is just another country across the water and I know LOTS of SA people who would agree with me. (The reverse is, sadly, also true however!) ;-)

If Linux wants to be all things to all people, then the option of doing things correctly should be there for one to use. Take for example OpenOffice.org. If you go to their Options > Language Settings > Languages you are offered the option of choosing the decimal separator key. It doesn't work so why leave it there? It serves only to add an irritation factor and it plays right into the hands of those who maintain that Linux is rubbish. If they want to compete with other systems (There! I didn't once mention Microsoft!) then annoyances must be minimized.

Go well! :-)

Hi Ken, (I think, I can't seem to work out who stated this thread)

Correctly, also means dates are YYYY-MM-DD and time is HH:MM - which most South African's don't do, ask the banks and the accountants who do you   and comma.

So I'm not saying don't do anything, I'm just saying that you will need to become a bit more aware of the broader issues and be willing to role up your sleeves. I'm honestly willing to help someone make the fixes needed. But that does mean going beyond a bug report :)

If I have a willing helper I'm willing to track up all the old bug reports that point to how the decision was arrived at and that show how we could move forward on this.

The glibc locale needs the same treatment as the OOo locale. The CLDR where other data is drawn from is correct.

What I'd be curious in seeing is understanding why I can't set a custom format with space and comma. That might be the solution that we need first before making the locale more correct.

Yes, a simple answer would be great. It's odd that the comma get treated so differently from other characters. Personally i would let this one go - it's a relatively tiny difference but there's a huge amount of work involved in getting it right so i would leave it as it is. Sorry Ken. Dwayne, thanks for stepping in from the translators group about this.

Wow, no typos this psot!

Good luck and regards to all from
Tom :)

(Our friend, Tom, is having a bad day with typos!) :-)

I started this thread, Dwayne - guilty as charged and I wish I could help you with this and other problems but the truth is I'm just not qualified for the task. I can proof read a book but but there is no way that I'd be able to write one! Not in this life nor in the hereafter! The fact is I love my computer and I want it to do things the way I want them done but I'm afraid I'll have to leave achieving that up to clever guys like you.

Your point about the date and time is certainly valid but I have no problem with that issue. I can format the programs that I use to give those to me any way I wish. Unfortunately, those same programs offer me the opportunity to change the decimal separator but can't deliver on the promise. Now, given that, I would argue that the locale should be straight down the line and by the book leaving personal preferences and deviations from the rules to the the programmers of applications as is the case where the date is concerned. (OK, I'm not REALLY arguing. I just seems that way sometimes!) :-)

Like Tom said, "thanks for stepping in". I really do appreciate your input on this. Perhaps I'll go to OOo and bend their collective ears a bit!

Heheheh. In the linux world you seldom need qualifications or experience to start something off because other people might well (hopefully anyway) bring those things to the project later. The one thing you need is fearlessness and a little time now and then. Ok, the two things one needs. Err, and ability to let people take the project off your hands ;)

Good luck and regards from
Tom :)