Firefox OS language packs

[Gervase Markham]

[CC people: discussion is in mozilla.dev.l10n]

It was suggested in mozilla.governance that Mozilla should make "ship a
certain number (or all) language packs" a condition of the Firefox OS
logo license program, which is our main way of influencing what happens
with Firefox OS.

I raised this with the business people, who said:

"An OEM's reaction to this ask will boil down what does it cost to
support/ship all the language packs:

* memory
* disk space
* QA of the languages to the OEM's satisfaction
* further localization of OEM/operator customizations, etc.
* What happens if a langpack is missing a string

Is anyone able to provide information on these matters, and anything
else which would influence their decision?

We aren't the only mobile OS in town; the requirements we set on the
logo program do, in part, affect an OEM's decision as to whether to go
with us or with someone else. So we have to be sure it's worth making
this a requirement.

(Or it may be that we are soon going to have user-installable langpacks
with seamless fallback, in which case this question becomes very different.)

Gerv

[Michael Bauer]

My tuppence...

20/02/2013 19:51, sgrìobh Gervase Markham:

> "An OEM's reaction to this ask will boil down what does it cost to
> support/ship all the language packs:
>
> * memory
> * disk space

Well, if we have the user-installable packs you mention below, this
won't be an issue. In terms of my own locale, I honestly don't care
whether it comes bundled or via a pack, as long as it's not up to the
OEM to include or exclude them. For the simple reason that on the whole,
they just don't think about and/or care about languages which aren't
economically relevant to them - which means most languages under ~5
million speakers.

> * QA of the languages to the OEM's satisfaction

I don't think the OEM's are actually that smart about the languages they
DO handle... a lot of them are arcane but I know that's not what you
meant ;)

Proofreading doesn't cost the world. How about a process where for every
language that gets admitted Mozilla sends a dozen random screenshots to
an independent proofreader for feedback?

> * further localization of OEM/operator customizations, etc.
> * What happens if a langpack is missing a string

Use a fallback language for each locale?

> We aren't the only mobile OS in town; the requirements we set on the
> logo program do, in part, affect an OEM's decision as to whether to go
> with us or with someone else. So we have to be sure it's worth making
> this a requirement.

Isn't it more a question about Mozilla's philosophy?

> (Or it may be that we are soon going to have user-installable langpacks
> with seamless fallback, in which case this question becomes very different.)

Which, as I said, would be fine with me too.

Michael

[Axel Hecht]

Hi,

I'll answer the questions in details below, but I'd like to re-iterate
the current technical constraints:

- we can't change the localizations of an app at runtime
- we can't dynamically load additional data

... without breaking our startup performance, that is.

Fixing either is an to-be-scoped engineering task, with unknown outcome.

I'll answer below based on the status-quo of what we consider necessary
to perform.

On 20.02.13 20:51, Gervase Markham wrote:
> [CC people: discussion is in mozilla.dev.l10n]
>
> It was suggested in mozilla.governance that Mozilla should make "ship a
> certain number (or all) language packs" a condition of the Firefox OS
> logo license program, which is our main way of influencing what happens
> with Firefox OS.
>
> I raised this with the business people, who said:
>
> "An OEM's reaction to this ask will boil down what does it cost to
> support/ship all the language packs:
>
> * memory

Linear in terms of locales, as all of them are loaded into memory.

> * disk space

Linear in terms of locales. We're trying to get the factor down by not
needing all of toolkit, see the thread on .platform.

> * QA of the languages to the OEM's satisfaction

I doubt we'll actually see this among the OEMs. If they don't care about
a locale, they can just as well rely on our QA.

QA on our side is a hefty problem, though. Devices, follow-up, etc.

> * further localization of OEM/operator customizations, etc.

Right now, we're not falling back great. Say, we're falling back from
fy-NL to en-US instead of nl. This is pretty ugly.

> * What happens if a langpack is missing a string

Fallback to en-US.

> Is anyone able to provide information on these matters, and anything
> else which would influence their decision?
>
> We aren't the only mobile OS in town; the requirements we set on the
> logo program do, in part, affect an OEM's decision as to whether to go
> with us or with someone else. So we have to be sure it's worth making
> this a requirement.
>
> (Or it may be that we are soon going to have user-installable langpacks
> with seamless fallback, in which case this question becomes very different.)
>
> Gerv

One other issue, the language lists of OEMs are not based on hard
opinions. They're usually picked up data that some other company did
based on absolutely nothing.

We can also provide real data that shows why we think particular
languages are important to large populations in the target markets.

Axel

[Michael Bauer]

20/02/2013 22:32, sgrìobh Axel Hecht:

>
> ... without breaking our startup performance, that is.

Would that be a hit on startup perfomance once or every time?

>
> We can also provide real data that shows why we think particular
> languages are important to large populations in the target markets.

Well that's our locale doomed, along with Welsh, Asturian, Basque,
Breton, Frisian, Icelandic, Kashubian, Rumantsch etc etc...

Michael

[Axel Hecht]

On 20.02.13 23:49, Michael Bauer wrote:
>
> 20/02/2013 22:32, sgrìobh Axel Hecht:
>>
>> ... without breaking our startup performance, that is.
> Would that be a hit on startup perfomance once or every time?

Every time.

>>
>> We can also provide real data that shows why we think particular
>> languages are important to large populations in the target markets.
>
> Well that's our locale doomed, along with Welsh, Asturian, Basque,
> Breton, Frisian, Icelandic, Kashubian, Rumantsch etc etc...

That's not doomed, that's just different aspects of the discussion.

Axel

[Kai Hendry]

On 21 February 2013 07:16, Axel Hecht <l1...@mozilla.com> wrote:
>> Would that be a hit on startup perfomance once or every time?

At Webconverger we solved the "all the langpacks killing performance"
problem, by linking in the langpack based on locale which is a system
wide setting:
https://github.com/Webconverger/webc/blob/master/etc/webc/live-config.sh#L81

Tbh I find FF langpacks a PITA. I wish it was integrated somehow. The
changelog between updates is bonkers:
https://github.com/Webconverger/webc/commit/7924f13ff275af10ac8f480ef80c979212a7769d

Good luck! :)

[flod]

2013/2/21 Kai Hendry <hen...@webconverger.com>

> At Webconverger we solved the "all the langpacks killing performance"
> problem, by linking in the langpack based on locale which is a system
> wide setting:
>
> https://github.com/Webconverger/webc/blob/master/etc/webc/live-config.sh#L81
>

I believe you're talking about Firefox (desktop), while this discussion is
about Firefox OS, a completely different beast..

Francesco

[Gervase Markham]

Hi Axel,

This is really helpful - thanks.

On 20/02/13 22:32, Axel Hecht wrote:
>> * memory
>
> Linear in terms of locales, as all of them are loaded into memory.

So if I have a 10-locale phone, more memory is used, even if I'm only
ever using 1 of those locales?

Even if we decide to have a system which means I have to reboot the
phone to change locale?

What's the memory footprint per locale, roughly?

>> * further localization of OEM/operator customizations, etc.
>
> Right now, we're not falling back great. Say, we're falling back from
> fy-NL to en-US instead of nl. This is pretty ugly.

Are there plans to fix that, or is it another Hard Problem?

> We can also provide real data that shows why we think particular
> languages are important to large populations in the target markets.

Now that _is_ a good idea. We can, at least, provide a "list of
suggested languages" for each locale our partners are shipping in.

Gerv

[Axel Hecht]

On 21.02.13 12:45, Gervase Markham wrote:
> Hi Axel,
>
> This is really helpful - thanks.
>
> On 20/02/13 22:32, Axel Hecht wrote:
>>> * memory
>>
>> Linear in terms of locales, as all of them are loaded into memory.
>
> So if I have a 10-locale phone, more memory is used, even if I'm only
> ever using 1 of those locales?

Yes.

> Even if we decide to have a system which means I have to reboot the
> phone to change locale?

With the system we have, reboot or not doesn't matter. I'd rather keep
wishlists for other systems to other threads.

> What's the memory footprint per locale, roughly?

I don't know, but some data point to start from: 10k is the strings for
the system app as source, localizations are 14-17k. Settings app has 22k
for en-US. For the current build, the index.html of the systems app
grows from <40k to >450K.

All those are parsed in js data structures right now, no idea how that
maps out.

>>> * further localization of OEM/operator customizations, etc.
>>
>> Right now, we're not falling back great. Say, we're falling back from
>> fy-NL to en-US instead of nl. This is pretty ugly.
>
> Are there plans to fix that, or is it another Hard Problem?

The problem is that l10n.js is hooked on navigator.language, which is
only a single value. The best upcoming multi-locale API is the JS i18n
API that Norbert is working on. He wants to redo his ETA of April next
week. That's with ICU and all that. When we'd be willing to update
Firefox OS to a gecko that comes with that, no idea.

Axel

[Toni Hermoso Pulido]

Hi,

I cannot add any further value to the discussion, but I just want to
comment that I think can confirm the issue of more memory consumption
in Firefox OS when more locales are added. I tried including all
possible ones and there was an important degradation of performance in
an unagi device :/
I thought at that moment that it was a buid puntual thing but now I
see it was very likely because of having added all locales at that
time.


2013/2/21 Axel Hecht <l1...@mozilla.com>:

--
Toni Hermoso Pulido
http://www.cau.cat

[Michael Bauer]

20/02/2013 23:16, sgrìobh Axel Hecht:

> That's not doomed, that's just different aspects of the discussion.
>
> Axel

Given how well l10n and Mozilla Mobile are doing, you'll have to pardon
me for not sharing your confidence though of course I'd love to be wrong
on this one.

21/02/2013 11:45, sgrìobh Gervase Markham:
> Now that_is_ a good idea. We can, at least, provide a "list of

> suggested languages" for each locale our partners are shipping in.
>

> Gerv
I'd just like to remind people of the reality of what commercial
companies' attitude to non-economically relevant languages is. Anyone
remember the trouble Icelandic had with Microsoft
(http://chronicle.augusta.com/stories/1998/06/30/tec_232220.shtml) or
that the Basque Government initially *paid* Microsoft to do a Basque
version
(http://paperekoa.berria.info/plaza/2011-02-02/037/002/ordenagailua_euskaratzen.htm)?

Having a bit of a windmill feeling right now.

Michael

[Guillermo López]

2013/2/21 Toni Hermoso Pulido <ton...@softcatala.cat>

> I tried including all
> possible ones and there was an important degradation of performance in
> an unagi device :/
>

IIRC, now if you flash gaia and add a lot of locales, each localization is
put on the bottom of the index.html, as a script with the type text/l10n.
Before, it was a XHR to a json resource outside the index.html. I don't
know how the parse works, but maybe it need to load everything on memory,
including those localizations.


--
Guillermo López [willyaranda]
http://mozilla-hispano.org
http://twitter.com/mozilla_hispano
http://facebook.com/mozillahispano
Certified Mozillian: https://mozillians.org/willyaranda

[Gervase Markham]

On 21/02/13 12:59, Axel Hecht wrote:
>> So if I have a 10-locale phone, more memory is used, even if I'm only
>> ever using 1 of those locales?
>
> Yes.

Given that we are searching for max performance on memory-constrained
devices, that seems like a showstopper, right there.

> I don't know, but some data point to start from: 10k is the strings for
> the system app as source, localizations are 14-17k. Settings app has 22k
> for en-US. For the current build, the index.html of the systems app
> grows from <40k to >450K.

That's going to have a significant effect on page (app) load time.

Gerv

[Robert Kaiser]

Axel Hecht schrieb:

> The problem is that l10n.js is hooked on navigator.language, which is
> only a single value. The best upcoming multi-locale API is the JS i18n
> API that Norbert is working on. He wants to redo his ETA of April next
> week. That's with ICU and all that. When we'd be willing to update
> Firefox OS to a gecko that comes with that, no idea.

I doubt we'd want that any time soon, esp. with the current line of
devices, as ICU is huge and would surely take away a ton more memory
than a few localizations.

Robert Kaiser

[Gervase Markham]

On 25/02/13 01:15, Robert Kaiser wrote:
> I doubt we'd want that any time soon, esp. with the current line of
> devices, as ICU is huge and would surely take away a ton more memory
> than a few localizations.

As I recall, that discussion ended with Norbert going away to have
another think and return with an alternative proposal. So we'll see what
he comes up with.

Gerv

[Fjoerfoks]

Sounds like a good reason to let users uninstall unnecessary languages to
speed up performance,
and install only the languages they want. Indeed, the fallback system is an
issue to be investigated.
Please don't put it into the hands of providers, but let the user control
it.
I know, I know, I'm only preaching for my own church................

Wim

2013/2/22 Gervase Markham <ge...@mozilla.org>

[Michael Bauer]

There are quite a few in your church Wim :)

Michael

25/02/2013 12:54, sgrìobh Fjoerfoks:

> I know, I know, I'm only preaching for my own church................
>
> Wim

--
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<http://www.iGaidhlig.net/>

[Julen Ruiz Aizpuru]

Hi,

Sorry if I chime in a little bit late.

og., 2013.eko otsren 21a 12:45(e)an, Gervase Markham(e)k idatzi zuen:

>
>> We can also provide real data that shows why we think particular
>> languages are important to large populations in the target markets.
>
> Now that _is_ a good idea. We can, at least, provide a "list of
> suggested languages" for each locale our partners are shipping in.
>

I understand there are technical problems that make it impossible to
ship/offer all the locales in Firefox OS at the moment, but it'll be
unfortunate if some locales are prioritized based on population � our
users won't understand that kind of reasoning coming from Mozilla.
(Any bug numbers for this issue, by the way? or any hints to offer help
fixing the related issues?)

Now, after reading last Sunday the announcement that Firefox OS-enabled
devices will be available in Spain starting in June, I'm really worried
that this would practically mean �at least in a beginning, if large
population measures are mainly taken into account and unless the
blockers to offer any localization to users are fixed� the extinction
from Firefox OS devices for us the small languages spoken in Spain.

So I don't know what the final outcome will be, but sooner or later I'm
sure our users will start asking us if they'll be able to buy and use a
Firefox OS device in their mother tongue. Do we have any answers for that?

It's 2013 and we still have no smartphones officially available in our
own language, so Firefox OS is probably the only choice in the short/mid
term � which, by the way, can be another selling point.

Julen.

[Rhoslyn Prys]

Welsh is the third most popular language in the UK after English and
Polish. My Tesco HTC Wildfire includes a choice of German, English,
Spanish, French, Italian and Polish but no Welsh. Also all of the
languages have a different language pack for the UK and Ireland so
that's 12 packs in all. Orange introduced a Samsung GT-S5600 with a
Welsh interface a few years ago that was quite popular with Welsh
speakers even though as a phone it's not great. I think there was also
an Irish version as well.

It all comes down to Mozilla's wish/ability to provide users with an
interface in their language of choice. If there is a translation of the
interface available why not recommend it to carriers and users? Mozilla
has a long history of doing this. I don't see any reason for a change in
policy.

Rhos.

[Anton Meixome]

+1


2013/2/27 Julen Ruiz Aizpuru <jul...@gmail.com>

> Hi,
>
> Sorry if I chime in a little bit late.
>
> og., 2013.eko otsren 21a 12:45(e)an, Gervase Markham(e)k idatzi zuen:
>
>

>> We can also provide real data that shows why we think particular
>>> languages are important to large populations in the target markets.
>>>
>>
>> Now that _is_ a good idea. We can, at least, provide a "list of
>> suggested languages" for each locale our partners are shipping in.
>>
>>

> I understand there are technical problems that make it impossible to
> ship/offer all the locales in Firefox OS at the moment, but it'll be

> unfortunate if some locales are prioritized based on population — our users

> won't understand that kind of reasoning coming from Mozilla.
> (Any bug numbers for this issue, by the way? or any hints to offer help
> fixing the related issues?)
>
> Now, after reading last Sunday the announcement that Firefox OS-enabled
> devices will be available in Spain starting in June, I'm really worried

> that this would practically mean —at least in a beginning, if large

> population measures are mainly taken into account and unless the blockers

> to offer any localization to users are fixed— the extinction from Firefox

> OS devices for us the small languages spoken in Spain.
>
> So I don't know what the final outcome will be, but sooner or later I'm
> sure our users will start asking us if they'll be able to buy and use a
> Firefox OS device in their mother tongue. Do we have any answers for that?
>
> It's 2013 and we still have no smartphones officially available in our own

> language, so Firefox OS is probably the only choice in the short/mid term —

> which, by the way, can be another selling point.
>
> Julen.
>

> ______________________________**_________________
> dev-l10n mailing list
> dev-...@lists.mozilla.org
> https://lists.mozilla.org/**listinfo/dev-l10n<https://lists.mozilla.org/listinfo/dev-l10n>
>



--
Antón Méixome - Galician Native Lang Coordination
Galician community LibO & AOO

[Robert Kaiser]

Julen Ruiz Aizpuru schrieb:

> Now, after reading last Sunday the announcement that Firefox OS-enabled
> devices will be available in Spain starting in June

I don't think they really said that. From what I heard and saw,
Telefonica will ship them in Brazil in June, and then will step by step
roll it out to other countries, ultimately in all their markets
including Spain. I didn't heard them say that they will ship in all
those markets already in June. They'll start with Brazil only, from what
I heard.

Robert Kaiser

[Julen Ruiz Aizpuru]

og., 2013.eko otsren 28a 19:56(e)an, Robert Kaiser(e)k idatzi zuen:

This is what you can read in Telefónica's press room[1]:

"The first commercial handsets featuring Firefox OS will go on sale in
Brazil, Colombia, Spain and Venezuela in mid-2013. Further launches are
planned in both Europe and Latin America in late 2013 and 2014."

Whether this is June, August or September, the concerns are still there.
Do we have any answers for our users?

Julen.

[1]
http://saladeprensa.telefonica.com/jsp/base.jsp?contenido=/jsp/notasdeprensa/notadetalle.jsp&id=0&origen=portada&idm=eng&pais=1&elem=19449

[Gervase Markham]

On 27/02/13 11:06, Rhoslyn Prys wrote:
> It all comes down to Mozilla's wish/ability to provide users with an
> interface in their language of choice.

Actually, if you read this thread, you will see that it doesn't.

> If there is a translation of the
> interface available why not recommend it to carriers and users?

We can recommend it but, particularly given the performance impact,
there's no way we can require it.

Hopefully, it will be possible for people to provide builds in other
languages. And soon, I believe we hope to have downloadable language packs.

Gerv

[Axel Hecht]

I don't want to get the hopes too high here. Different folks have
different opinions (see
https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/mozilla.dev.webapi/ZMl7MBe4x1Y),
and it's an unscoped problem in the context of Firefox OS apps. Hoping
for soon sounds far-fetched in this context.

Axel

[Robert Kaiser]

Julen Ruiz Aizpuru schrieb:

> This is what you can read in Telefónica's press room[1]:
>
> "The first commercial handsets featuring Firefox OS will go on sale in
> Brazil, Colombia, Spain and Venezuela in mid-2013. Further launches are
> planned in both Europe and Latin America in late 2013 and 2014."
>
> Whether this is June, August or September, the concerns are still there.
> Do we have any answers for our users?

I also don't have other info than what's official. But note that
"Europe" doesn't necessarily mean Spain, even if Telefónica's home is there.

Also, we cannot influence what languages they are shipping, esp. because
the first devices are pretty tight on memory as you might have noticed,
and every installed language is currently being loaded into RAM from
what I understand, even if not used, so the available memory shrinks
significantly with every additional language.
Yes, Firefox OS v1 is far from perfect. There's more work to be done to
improve it. Please try to help with that instead of throwing darts and
injuring the efforts.

Robert Kaiser

[Reuben Morais]

Hi Axel, Gerv,

On Feb 21, 2013, at 3:45 AM, Gervase Markham <ge...@mozilla.org> wrote:
>> We can also provide real data that shows why we think particular
>> languages are important to large populations in the target markets.
>
> Now that _is_ a good idea. We can, at least, provide a "list of
> suggested languages" for each locale our partners are shipping in.

Given the technical problems explained by Axel, and my understanding of the current development process, I think that is our only feasible option if we want to fix this before the initial Telefónica launch. Do we have that data? Have we provided the list to carriers already? How can localizers help?

-- reuben

[Axel Hecht]

I don't think anyone engaged in that discussion so far, nor if we have
the gathered current and relevant data.

I'm not sure if there's a timewindow to change the scope of our 1.0.1
release, too. We're already fighting scope-creep on a few fronts.

Understanding what data we can get access to, and how relevant it would
be, is a interesting question for community members to drive.

Axel

[Julen Ruiz Aizpuru]

or., 2013.eko marren 01a 23:37(e)an, Robert Kaiser(e)k idatzi zuen:

> Julen Ruiz Aizpuru schrieb:
>> This is what you can read in Telefónica's press room[1]:
>>
>> "The first commercial handsets featuring Firefox OS will go on sale in
>> Brazil, Colombia, Spain and Venezuela in mid-2013. Further launches are
>> planned in both Europe and Latin America in late 2013 and 2014."
>>
>> Whether this is June, August or September, the concerns are still there.
>> Do we have any answers for our users?
>
> I also don't have other info than what's official. But note that
> "Europe" doesn't necessarily mean Spain, even if Telefónica's home is
> there.

Seeing that Spain is explicitly mentioned in the quote from Telefónica's
press release, I don't understand what's the point of your second sentence.

> Also, we cannot influence what languages they are shipping, esp. because
> the first devices are pretty tight on memory as you might have noticed,
> and every installed language is currently being loaded into RAM from
> what I understand, even if not used, so the available memory shrinks
> significantly with every additional language.
> Yes, Firefox OS v1 is far from perfect. There's more work to be done to
> improve it. Please try to help with that instead of throwing darts and
> injuring the efforts.

Yes, I perfectly understand the technical limitations and is the first
thing I've stated on my initial message in this thread. And I also asked
about bug numbers and about ways to help getting the technical issues
fixed — which, by the way, didn't get any answers. Seeing that, the last
part of your last sentence sounds excessive.

Julen.

[Gervase Markham]

On 02/03/13 18:38, Axel Hecht wrote:
> Understanding what data we can get access to, and how relevant it would
> be, is a interesting question for community members to drive.

+1. If someone in this group cares about this issue, here's what you can do:

- Find out where the good, accurate, well-researched sources of data are
for language use in particular countries.

- Make a small report, focussing on the publicly-named Firefox OS launch
markets, which details the 1st language breakdown.

We can then pass that info on to carriers, who have to make decisions
about which languages to support on their phones.

(However, not every phone is targetted at every consumer; it may be that
some languages are over or under-represented in a target market segment,
so they won't necessarily just pick the top N on the list.)

Gerv

[Toni Hermoso Pulido]

2013/3/4 Gervase Markham <ge...@mozilla.org>:

Hi Gerv, Julen,

I can help on this,

regarding language, there is public information about this:
http://ec.europa.eu/public_opinion/archives/ebs/ebs_243_sum_en.pdf
IMHO, being an uncomfortable situation (since we are not including
other languages and variants), taking into account our current
technical limitations and legal situation, in this fist shipment I
think we should strive to convince them to include at least:
es, ca, gl, eu (and en-US)

Best,

P.D.: Offtopic, how feasible is going to be for consumers to get
branches updates. Let's say, from 1.0 to 1.1. These branches updates
may imply including/accepting new locales when technical issues get
solved.

[Gervase Markham]

On 04/03/13 14:06, Toni Hermoso Pulido wrote:
> regarding language, there is public information about this:
> http://ec.europa.eu/public_opinion/archives/ebs/ebs_243_sum_en.pdf

Hi Toni,

That's a good start, but I don't think it has the statistics we'd need -
does it? Is that just the summary of some data which is available elsewhere?

Also, it would be good to have something newer than 2005/6...

Gerv

[Julen Ruiz Aizpuru]

al., 2013.eko marren 04a 17:58(e)an, Gervase Markham(e)k idatzi zuen:

FWIW, a newer Eurobarometer with data gathered in 2012 can be found at:
http://ec.europa.eu/public_opinion/archives/ebs/ebs_386_en.pdf

[Axel Hecht]

There's a nice little number in this, "10% of people in Germany speak
German to the extent that they could have a conversation".

Which is probably people who's mother tongue isn't German, and it shows
some of the deficits of that document.

It maps EU countries to EU languages. Which, for Germany, is kinda
futile until Turkey joins the EU ;-)

Getting the coverage of actual languages spoken would be beneficial.
Say,
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/gm.html
shows that 91% of the population in Germany is German, 2.4% is Turkish.
It doesn't really dive into the languages spoken, though. Ethnologue
doesn't seem to give those numbers, either.

Axel

Axel

[Michael Bauer]

Especially for European countries, every Wikipedia page lists the
numbers of speakers, either in the infobox or the demographics section.
In the case of Spain it tells us "As a percentage of the general
population, Basque is spoken by 2%, Catalan (or Valencian) by 17%, and
Galician by 7% of all Spaniards" (referenced by the very same CIA factbook).

I'm sure those 2% Basque speakers or the fact that 0.09% of the
population of Germany speak Sorbian and 0.09% of the UK speak Gaelic is
going to make a real difference when dealing with a hard-nosed handset
manufacturer.

Michael

04/03/2013 20:06, sgrìobh Axel Hecht:

[Toni Hermoso Pulido]

Al 04/03/13 21:06, En/na Axel Hecht ha escrit:

Hi,

just for reference, a visualization of this:
http://languageknowledge.eu

Gerv, would you mind to start an etherpad or a wiki page for dealing
with this? I'm not fully sure which statistical data you have in mind
�which might make the most sense (for the Spanish case and others).
It might be the case that such data does not exist.
We should also take into account that we are not starting from a
landspace of linguistic free choice for users. Precisely, initiatives
such as Firefox for desktop had helped this to become something that
could be more possible.

[Axel Hecht]

> —which might make the most sense (for the Spanish case and others).

> It might be the case that such data does not exist.
> We should also take into account that we are not starting from a
> landspace of linguistic free choice for users. Precisely, initiatives
> such as Firefox for desktop had helped this to become something that
> could be more possible.
>

That site is actually great, AFAICT.

Also, speaking half for gerv here, I don't think we have expectations. I
at least rely on you folks coming up with insight, and I'll continue
giving feedback on that. 80% of the task at hand is matching what
information is publicly accessible, and evaluating if it's applicable to
answer the questions at hand. The primary concern here is about what
information is out there. How relevant and strong it is is something we
can discuss afterwards. Starting out with which information we would
want would only be constructive if we could actually create the
datasources we hope for.

Axel

[Michael Wolf]

Toni Hermoso Pulido schrieb:

> Hi,
>
> just for reference, a visualization of this:
> http://languageknowledge.eu
>

Hi,

Interesting that neither the Sorbian languages nor Frisian are mentioned
there.


Michael Wolf

[Gervase Markham]

On 04/03/13 20:57, Toni Hermoso Pulido wrote:
> just for reference, a visualization of this:
> http://languageknowledge.eu

This website seems to have the right data. Head to:

http://languageknowledge.eu/
and select a country from the dark blue dropdown to the left. That will
take you to e.g.:
http://languageknowledge.eu/countries/germany
Then click on "Younger" and "Native" and "Reorder" at the top.

That tells us, for example, 9% of German residents between 15 and 34
speak Russian as their native language. I did not know that.

I think that perhaps we should recommend that European carriers, at
least, view this site to make their language pack choice decisions.

> We should also take into account that we are not starting from a
> landspace of linguistic free choice for users. Precisely, initiatives
> such as Firefox for desktop had helped this to become something that
> could be more possible.

I understand that; it's persuading a carrier to accept a
worse-performing phone that's the trick :-)

Gerv

[Gervase Markham]

On 04/03/13 22:06, Michael Wolf wrote:
> Interesting that neither the Sorbian languages nor Frisian are mentioned
> there.

"You may be surprised to see that certain languages you expected to see
aren't present. The reason is that the set of options offered to
respondents in the survey only included the 30 or so languages included
on this website."
http://languageknowledge.eu/about/

Gerv

[Gervase Markham]

On 05/03/13 17:17, Gervase Markham wrote:
> This website seems to have the right data. Head to:

<snip>

I've emailed our business development team suggesting that they put a
recommendation for this website and an encouragement to ship multiple
language packs somewhere in our communications with OEMS/carriers.

Gerv

[Axel Hecht]

Did you suggest to ship localizations or language packs?

Axel

[Gervase Markham]

On 18/03/13 19:52, Axel Hecht wrote:
> Did you suggest to ship localizations or language packs?

I didn't realise there was a distinction.

This is the text I suggested for our product managers to communicate to
their product managers, although it's only a draft. Tweaks welcome.

"As an organization committed to allowing people to access the web in
the language of their choice, Mozilla produces language packs for
Firefox OS in XX languages. (A list can be found at <URL>.) Mozilla
encourages Firefox OS partners to include as many language packs which
are relevant to their market as possible, while meeting their
performance and other product goals.

When deciding on which packs to choose, we recommend
http://languageknowledge.eu/ as a good source of contemporary language
usage data (broken down by demographic) for EU geographies."

Gerv

[flod]

> I didn't realise there was a distinction.
>

Language pack = locale is available as an external package that users can
install on their phone if a language is not available (like it happens on
Firefox en-US).
Language pack is a technology/system not available at the moment on B2G.

> "As an organization committed to allowing people to access the web in
> the language of their choice, Mozilla produces language packs for
> Firefox OS in XX languages. (A list can be found at <URL>.) Mozilla
> encourages Firefox OS partners to include as many language packs which
> are relevant to their market as possible, while meeting their
> performance and other product goals.
>

This could work if you replace "language pack" with "locale" or
"localization".

Francesco

[Fjoerfoks]

Hi Michael and all,

Very interesting indeed, and stupid too, Fisian is even not mentioned in
the Netherlands while there should be a few %.
Why are we making this ourself so difficult? It seems to me this gathering
of numbers, figures, etc. is only a way to postpone the decision.
If we go by the numbers, let's not fool ourself and stop putting energy
into the smaller languages.
If there is no intention to even try to let people control their preferred
language we're doomed.

This discussion is starting to get om my nerves more and more. Indeed as
mentioned before,
there's nowhere any ask for help to bring this forward by people,
governmental influence, local help, etc.
Gerv, despite your efforts please stop giving numbers, let's put people in
control, not businesses. Hé, if they want it in Klingon, please let them do
so!

Wim

[Michael Bauer]

+1 but I suspect at this stage some folk are considering putting you and
me on their email filter :/

Michael

19/03/2013 17:43, sgrìobh Fjoerfoks:

[chris hofmann]

On 3/19/13 10:43 AM, Fjoerfoks wrote:

<snip>

> If there is no intention to even try to let people control their preferred
> language we're doomed.

This is exactly the main point.

In the past we have built applications for desktop OSes that have lots of
support and flexibility for integrating an application with any kind of
language, and offer people lots of control.

On mobile we are now dealing with OSes and Platforms that don't have
that same support.

We are going to need to invent new ways to get around the missing
elements and roadblocks put up by Android, The Various App Stores,
and Gonk in Firefox OS.

In my mind this is one of the ways that we are opening up mobile OSes
and one of the reasons we are doing Mobile versions of Firefox.

But it will take time. Please be patient, and please help on the
development work that will solve this basic problem.

We may never convince mobile partners to ship the wide variety
of language support that we have historically offered, but we can
provide a way for users to modify the device once they get it, and
that is what we must do.

-chofmann

> This discussion is starting to get om my nerves more and more. Indeed as
> mentioned before,
> there's nowhere any ask for help to bring this forward by people,
> governmental influence, local help, etc.
> Gerv, despite your efforts please stop giving numbers, let's put people in

> control, not businesses. H�, if they want it in Klingon, please let them do
> so!
>
> Wim

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