gettext dropping locale.alias support and file except under glibc

[brian.inglis@systematicsw.ab.ca]

On 2025-07-31 13:59, Corinna Vinschen wrote:
> On Jul 31 12:55, Brian Inglis wrote:
>> Heads up that next release of gettext will drop support for locale.alias
>> except under glibc, which also provides the file
>> /usr/share/locale/locale.alias (content not updated since 2015).
>>
>> https://gitweb.git.savannah.gnu.org/gitweb/?p=gettext.git;a=commit;h=e0caff
>>
>> I have requested more information from maintainer Bruno Haible about the
>> exact limitations of gettext without glibc, as well as support of
>> /etc/locale.alias.
>>
>> It appears it may be up to our newlib/Cygwin libc to provide or source any
>> locale.alias to map to our supported locales, and our Cygwin locale
>> interface already does its best to match then convert the info.
> 
> The NLS in the Cygwin DLL already supports /usr/share/locale/locale.alias
> and I don't think it makes sense to change that.  For backward compatibility,
> we should continue to ship it, for instance, in a gettext-locale.alias
> package or something like that.
> 
> There's also no good reason to add to this file.  Its only reason for
> existence is maintaining backward compatibility with pre-existing locale
> aliases like "french", "japanese.euc" or "no_NO" (albeit support for
> the latter is builtin to the DLL).

Hi Corinna,

Same for libX11 which is a *maintained* superset, compatible with more legacy 
locales and systems, and could make support and results more compatible between 
console and X, as well as other systems!

I just wondered if it would make sense to filter out those libX11 locales not in 
our supported MS Windows locales:

ar_AA ar_IN ee_EE en_DL eo_XX gv_GB lt_LN pa_PK pd_DE pd_US ph_PH pp_AN tl_PH wa_BE

I can source either from their respective repos and install with the updated 
package in the standard location:

MIT:
https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/xorg/lib/libx11/-/raw/master/nls/locale.alias.pre

GPL-2.0-or-later:
https://sourceware.org/git?p=glibc.git;a=blob_plain;f=intl/locale.alias

$ cygcheck -f /usr/share/locale/locale.alias
gettext-0.22.5-1

move it over to libintl8:

$ cygcheck -l libintl8
/usr/bin/cygintl-8.dll

or by itself in a gexttext-locale-alias package category Base?

-- 
Take care. Thanks, Brian Inglis              Calgary, Alberta, Canada

La perfection est atteinte                   Perfection is achieved
non pas lorsqu'il n'y a plus rien à ajouter  not when there is no more to add
mais lorsqu'il n'y a plus rien à retrancher  but when there is no more to cut
                                 -- Antoine de Saint-Exupéry