the role and location of locale.alias

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2 participants
  • Bruno Haible
  • Ludovic Courtès
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Bruno Haible
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B
B
Bruno Haible wrote on 13 Sep 2023 22:22
(address . bug-guix@gnu.org)
2444710.l5Z5W5aWdd@nimes
Hi,

In guix 1.4.0 there are 2 locale.alias files from glibc on the disk:

$ ls -liL --sort=size `find / -name locale.alias 2>/dev/null | grep -v X11` 940417 -r--r--r-- 1 root root 2998 Jan 1 1970 /gnu/store/0dbscs8zq4bdg8vbn9jkdgynjcn3s01p-gcc-toolchain-12.2.0/share/locale/locale.alias
940417 -r--r--r-- 1 root root 2998 Jan 1 1970 /gnu/store/5h2w4qi9hk1qzzgi1w83220ydslinr4s-glibc-2.33/share/locale/locale.alias
15716 -r--r--r-- 1 root root 2998 Jan 1 1970 /gnu/store/ayc9r7162rphy4zjw8ch01pmyh214h82-glibc-2.33/share/locale/locale.alias
15716 -r--r--r-- 1 root root 2998 Jan 1 1970 /gnu/store/c326489r6jvnl69l2nbmdvxmgzqln2hy-profile/share/locale/locale.alias
15716 -r--r--r-- 1 root root 2998 Jan 1 1970 /gnu/store/isn13ca7419sj7myb3xr3i3zbxspky8c-profile/share/locale/locale.alias
15716 -r--r--r-- 1 root root 2998 Jan 1 1970 /gnu/store/yh51nb5dq9n6pw8mrdp3nxcfmxzmrp1x-profile/share/locale/locale.alias
1058938 -r--r--r-- 1 root root 261 Jan 1 1970 /gnu/store/wf46adk80fdc1qij8472n8r2xr4cln0a-gdm-42.0/share/gdm/locale.alias

I explained the purpose of this file in
In summary, it's a configuration file whose initial contents is provided
for glibc, but which needs to be edited by the system administrator in
some situations.

For this reason, in Debian 12, the file has been moved to
/etc/locale.alias, and /usr/share/locale/locale.alias is merely
a symbolic link to /etc/locale.alias. IMO, this is the correct
way to handle this configuration file.

The way Guix handles this file provokes two problems:

1) When the system administrator wants to add a new alias, they have
to search for all occurrences of the file in the (two) glibc
installations. And if/when they install newer versions of glibc,
they will have to reapply their change again and again.

2) GNU gettext needs to access this file, in order to recognize the
same aliases that glibc recognizes. But glibc does not export the
_nl_expand_alias function. Therefore GNU gettext needs to know
where the file is. But how could GNU gettext retrieve any of the
file names
/gnu/store/5h2w4qi9hk1qzzgi1w83220ydslinr4s-glibc-2.33/share/locale/locale.alias
/gnu/store/ayc9r7162rphy4zjw8ch01pmyh214h82-glibc-2.33/share/locale/locale.alias
?
If Guix had this configuration file moved to /etc, like Debian did, GNU gettext
could be compiled with '-DLOCALE_ALIAS_PATH=\"/etc\"' and would then be able
to access it.

Bruno
L
L
Ludovic Courtès wrote on 21 Oct 2023 16:23
(name . Bruno Haible)(address . bruno@clisp.org)(address . 65927@debbugs.gnu.org)
87a5scqck9.fsf@gnu.org
Hi Bruno,

Bruno Haible <bruno@clisp.org> skribis:

Toggle quote (2 lines)
> In guix 1.4.0 there are 2 locale.alias files from glibc on the disk:

[...]

Toggle quote (11 lines)
> I explained the purpose of this file in
> https://sourceware.org/pipermail/libc-alpha/2023-September/151524.html .
> In summary, it's a configuration file whose initial contents is provided
> for glibc, but which needs to be edited by the system administrator in
> some situations.
>
> For this reason, in Debian 12, the file has been moved to
> /etc/locale.alias, and /usr/share/locale/locale.alias is merely
> a symbolic link to /etc/locale.alias. IMO, this is the correct
> way to handle this configuration file.

Does glibc look for ‘locale.alias’ in $sysconfdir, or does it look for
it in $localstatedir?

To follow the “correct way” as you described it, glibc should look for
it in $sysconfdir by default.

Toggle quote (7 lines)
> The way Guix handles this file provokes two problems:
>
> 1) When the system administrator wants to add a new alias, they have
> to search for all occurrences of the file in the (two) glibc
> installations. And if/when they install newer versions of glibc,
> they will have to reapply their change again and again.

That’d be impractical of course, and that’s not how Guix works
(/gnu/store is immutable).

Toggle quote (12 lines)
> 2) GNU gettext needs to access this file, in order to recognize the
> same aliases that glibc recognizes. But glibc does not export the
> _nl_expand_alias function. Therefore GNU gettext needs to know
> where the file is. But how could GNU gettext retrieve any of the
> file names
> /gnu/store/5h2w4qi9hk1qzzgi1w83220ydslinr4s-glibc-2.33/share/locale/locale.alias
> /gnu/store/ayc9r7162rphy4zjw8ch01pmyh214h82-glibc-2.33/share/locale/locale.alias
> ?
> If Guix had this configuration file moved to /etc, like Debian did, GNU gettext
> could be compiled with '-DLOCALE_ALIAS_PATH=\"/etc\"' and would then be able
> to access it.

Right now gettext in Guix ends up being compiled with:

-DLOCALE_ALIAS_PATH=\"\"

(Example build log at

What you propose is doable. However, how many distros provide
/etc/locale.alias? What happens when it’s missing?

We have to keep in mind that Guix can be used on top of any distro.

Thanks,
Ludo’.
B
B
Bruno Haible wrote on 21 Oct 2023 22:47
(name . Ludovic Courtès)(address . ludo@gnu.org)(address . 65927@debbugs.gnu.org)
4309618.iZASKD2KPV@nimes
Hi Ludo',

Toggle quote (14 lines)
> > I explained the purpose of this file in
> > https://sourceware.org/pipermail/libc-alpha/2023-September/151524.html .
> > In summary, it's a configuration file whose initial contents is provided
> > for glibc, but which needs to be edited by the system administrator in
> > some situations.
> >
> > For this reason, in Debian 12, the file has been moved to
> > /etc/locale.alias, and /usr/share/locale/locale.alias is merely
> > a symbolic link to /etc/locale.alias. IMO, this is the correct
> > way to handle this configuration file.
>
> Does glibc look for ‘locale.alias’ in $sysconfdir, or does it look for
> it in $localstatedir?

Toggle quote (3 lines)
> To follow the “correct way” as you described it, glibc should look for
> it in $sysconfdir by default.

But it does not do so currently; therefore the distros fix up the
upstream behaviour.

Toggle quote (19 lines)
> > 2) GNU gettext needs to access this file, in order to recognize the
> > same aliases that glibc recognizes. But glibc does not export the
> > _nl_expand_alias function. Therefore GNU gettext needs to know
> > where the file is. But how could GNU gettext retrieve any of the
> > file names
> > /gnu/store/5h2w4qi9hk1qzzgi1w83220ydslinr4s-glibc-2.33/share/locale/locale.alias
> > /gnu/store/ayc9r7162rphy4zjw8ch01pmyh214h82-glibc-2.33/share/locale/locale.alias
> > ?
> > If Guix had this configuration file moved to /etc, like Debian did, GNU gettext
> > could be compiled with '-DLOCALE_ALIAS_PATH=\"/etc\"' and would then be able
> > to access it.
>
> Right now gettext in Guix ends up being compiled with:
>
> -DLOCALE_ALIAS_PATH=\"\"
>
> (Example build log at
> <https://ci.guix.gnu.org/log/0yy8zmgvc6hy1pfc41gm1bi7nhj4aqf7-gettext-0.21>.)

In this case, localealias.c does not attempt to open a locale.alias file at all.

Toggle quote (5 lines)
> What you propose is doable. However, how many distros provide
> /etc/locale.alias? What happens when it’s missing?
>
> We have to keep in mind that Guix can be used on top of any distro.

When it's missing, localealias.c does not open a locale.alias file.
Negative effects can be seen after the ISO 639 language code of a language
changed or after the ISO 3166 country code of a territory changed. This is
currently not relevant, but may become relevant in the future again.

Which distros have it in /etc?
- Guix 1.4.0: no
- Debian 12, Ubuntu 23.10: yes, /usr/share/locale/locale.alias is a symlink.
- CentOS Stream 9: no
- Arch 19.11: no
- openSUSE 15.5: no
- Slackware 15: no

So, to solve the problem, Guix would need to customize glibc
1. to install locale.alias in /etc (= $(sysconfdir)),
2. compile with a LOCALE_ALIAS_PATH=$(sysconfdir):$(localedir)

Then GNU gettext could be compiled with LOCALE_ALIAS_PATH=$(sysconfdir):$(localedir)
as well. This would work in standalone Guix, as well as in
Guix-on-top-of-another-distro.

Bruno
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