VAST on ubuntu and Umlauts

[jtu...@objektfabrik.de]

Hi again,

no, it's not my intention to spam the group with Umlaut related problems. I am not searching for them, they find me ;-)

I've happily moved my testing from an openSuse/KDE system to an ubuntu/unity VM and with the XKeySymDB and locale settings and switching off expanded prompters as suggested on this group VAST runs very stable there.

BUT: I just found a weird problem that bit me twice now. If I have a comment or String in a method that includes an Umlaut like ä, the browser cuts off all source text beginning with that special character. The byte code is of course okay, meaning the method runs correctly, but it is displayed incorrectly. 

Example:  A method like 

renderContentOn: html

  html anchor

     with: 'Löschen'.

will be displayed in a class or method editions Browser as

renderContentOn: html

  html anchor

    with: 'L

So far, this is just annoying, but not an actual problem for running and testing the code. The HTML-code will be correct and the method runs nicely.

 

The problem comes up when I need to change that method, because it is extremely likely it doesn't compile any more, because it is missing the rest of the method. Looking a Editions of such a method, you have the same problem: all editions are only displayed from the first letter to the last before the special character. So it is impossible to fix methods on the Linux VM if they include umlauts. I have to fix them on a Windows VM and load the fixed code into the Linux image. Not actually a very productive process...

My abt start script sets LANG=en_US.iso8859-15 before VAST is started.  And that locale is present on the system. 

Is this a known problem and is there a known solution to it?

[jtu...@objektfabrik.de]

Hi again,

I guess it is a problem with all editable text panes. I've attached a screenshot of an Inspector. Funny enough, on the left side you can see the whole string, but the text pane cuts off at the Umlaut...

Joachim

[jtu...@objektfabrik.de]

Hi again,

this turns into a serious problem because stuff needs to be tested on Linux. As soon as a method includes a comment or String with a special character (Umlaut), it cannot be fixed in Linux. The cycle is quite similar to fix-compile-link-test, only slower : switch to a Windows VM - fix the method - version it - go back to the Linux VM - load new edition - test.

So: are there any plans to fix this in one of the next releases?

Joachim

[Marten Feldtmann]

Hello Joachim,

yes I have seen this too - very often. But it seems for me, that this is due to a misconfiguration of Linux and its running VASmalltalk. VASmalltalk still thinks, that UTF8 is used as a code page ... I have managed it once to make a Linux system so sweet, that VASmalltalk showed its Windows source code without problems ... I am still wondering how all those Unix programs from other people work without problems and VASmalltalk has so many problems ....

After all I think, that the only correct way of programming would be a complete UTF8 aware IDE (which is not available in the near future) or a complete string management done in external files - NLS enabled applications. But for the last feature I would really lik to see more comfort ...

[jtu...@objektfabrik.de]

Hmm...

I am setting the Locale to en_US before startup.
And as you can see in the screenshot I posted earlier, Inspectors can show Umlauts on the left list pane, but not in the edit panes.... So I'd guess this is either a bug in the Motif Library or in VAST... If it was just a misconfiguration, wouldn't the panes show wrong characters instead if simply cutting off?

On the other hand: you never know...

Joachim