LocalizedImagesRollout

Revision 31 as of 2011-10-05 15:42:06

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The idea of this page is to act as a place for brainstorming on aspects related to how we do the testing and rollout of the new localized ISO images, as drafted on the desktop-o-cd-localization spec.

Contact persons for initial tests

We would like to test the initial prototypes for a set of languages, and thus we would like to have a contact person or owner for each of these languages, with the idea of adding them to the dedicated page for localized ISO testing.

Please add yourself to the list if you'd like to contribute to your language's ISO. Thanks a lot for your help!

Language

Contact person

Catalan

David Planella

Chinese (Traditional)

Cheng-Chia Tseng

Danish

Anders Jenbo

Estonian

Guido Tabbernuk

Finnish

Timo Jyrinki

French

Didier Roche

Italian

Milo Casagrande

Japanese

Jun Kobayashi

Slovenian

Andrej Znidarsic

Dutch

Redmar

Romanian

Stas Suscov

Uyghur

Gheyret Kenji

German

Hendrik Knackstedt

Swedish

Daniel Nylander

FAQ

(Note: This Q/A is still incomplete, feel free to add your questions here and we'll answer them as well as we can)

Ubuntu Which aspects of the images can be localized?

(i) As of the current state of the spec, the following areas can be localized at the technical level:

  • Keyboard layout
  • Default applications file association
  • Rhythmbox/Banshee radio stations
  • Installation of additional packages
  • Internationalization support (languages and keyboard layout)
  • Default desktop session in login managers (LightDM and GDM)
  • Additional icons

With additional restrictions applying to these items:

  • Web browser bookmarks (Firefox): TBD
  • Web browser default search engine: TBD
  • Web browser start page: please use only the provided start pages, we use an affiliate code in our start page to generate revenue. Learn more about the provided web browser start pages.

  • Desktop background image: please do not change the background image, as this is part of Ubuntu's trade dress.
  • Additional Unity launchers: please feel free to add new launchers can be, but do not remove the launchers shipped by default.

Ubuntu What is the workflow for creating a localized image?

(i) Right now we've just started to write documentation how to build localized images, which will be shortly available in a wiki page.

In the meantime, documentation can be found in the build scripts' man pages, but roughly, here is a high-level overview of the workflow to create a localized image:

  1. Create a defaults package with all the customizations for your language and upload it to a PPA. Use the ubuntu-defaults-template scripts for that.

  2. Run the build script (ubuntu-defaults-image in the ubuntu-defaults-builder package) to create the image.

  3. Upload the image on a public location for everyone to download and test

Ubuntu Will these images be considered as official Ubuntu images, or rather as a remix?

(i) TBD

This is going to be in part dependent on the level of QA and signoff on the images, as well as what has changed. Once we are able to define the testing, and scope of changes, we'll know better how these images should be labeled.

Ubuntu Where will these images be published?

(i) At least for the first iteration, we're relying on LoCo and translation teams to use the standard toolset we're providing to create and host their own images. That does not mean that in the future, and given enough testing, we could not publish the images on e.g. cdimages.ubuntu.com

Ubuntu Are there going to be any changes in the main ISO?

(i) The only change will be that we no longer will be shipping language packs in the main ISO, as we're now providing standard tools to create localized images. This change will only affect the few languages that were previously included in the main ISO, which will now have to create their own localized versions. For the majority of languages, there will be no change, other than now having a much easier way to roll out localized versions.

There will be no changes with regards to translations in the installer. The installer will remain localized in the main ISO and when an Internet connection is present, install the language packs for the chosen locale as usual.

Ubuntu Will the images need to be tested on each milestone during the development cycle?

(i) Testing during the development cycle will be at the discretion of the image contact and test contact. Testing can happen on milestone images, which is useful for finding and getting bugs fixed before the final release. Widespread distribution of a localized image should only be based on the official final release images.

Ubuntu How will the testing of the localized images be done?

(i) This is still being brainstormed.

Ideally once a base release image is available, the translation team contact for that language, should signoff that the right langpacks have been pulled into the build of localized candidate image.

Then the image should go through a series of standard tests, to check that the basic functionality and translations are appropriate. The set of test (manual and automated) is still TBD (help welcome).

We're investigating being able to make the iso tracker available, and have a set of defined manditory tests to be run to verify the expected languages and customizations are in place, so that community participation in the testing can occur, and folks using the images know there has been some QA checking.

Ubuntu How can I translate the browser start page?

(i) Please use only the provided browser start pages, which Canonical uses with an affiliate code to generate revenue for the Ubuntu project. You can: