Difference between revisions of "Locale Settings"

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While Gnucash was written in american english, there are many translations available. This page shows, how to select them.
+
While Gnucash was written in american english, there are many localizations (translations, number formats, ...) available. This page shows, how to select them. An additional source is [https://www.gnu.org/software/gettext/manual/gettext.html#Users The User’s View in the Gettext manual].
  
 
== System settings ==
 
== System settings ==
In general GnuCash uses the system settings of your computer. So the '''control center for system settings''' of your desktop environment or operating system should be your ''first choice'' to adjust them:
+
In general GnuCash uses the system settings of your computer. So the '''control center for system settings''' of your operating system, distribution or desktop environment should be your ''first choice'' to adjust them:
 
* '''Linux'''
 
* '''Linux'''
:* ''distro dependend'': the configuration tool of your distribution could do the work for you.
+
:* ''distro dependend'': if one exists, the '''configuration tool''' of your distribution like Yast in Opensuse might be your first choice, because it might apply the settings to ''all environments and for all users''. Additionally it will install the respective language packages, if they are missing.
 
:* '''Gnome''': Computer->[System->]Controlcenter->[System->]Language
 
:* '''Gnome''': Computer->[System->]Controlcenter->[System->]Language
 
:* '''KDE''': Start->System settings->Regional
 
:* '''KDE''': Start->System settings->Regional
 +
:*  At the '''shell''' prompt, merely execute
 +
::* '''csh''': ‘setenv LANG de_DE’,
 +
::* '''sh''': ‘export LANG; LANG=de_DE’ or
 +
::* '''bash''', '''ksh''': ‘export LANG=de_DE’.
 +
:: This can be done from your ''.login'', ''.profile'' or ''.bashrc'' file, once and for all.
 +
::; Note: By default bash uses .login for remote logins and .bashrc for interactive shell, but some distibutions like Opensuse source .bashrc in .login. Then it has only to be done in .bashrc.
 
* '''MacOS''':
 
* '''MacOS''':
:* ''Version?'': System Settings>International
+
:* '''Mavericks (10.9)''': System Settings>Languages and Region
:* ''Version?'': System Settings>Languages and Text
+
:* '''Snow Leopard (10.6)''' through '''Mountain Lion (10.8)''': System Settings>Languages and Text
 +
:* '''Leopard (10.5)''': System Settings>International
 
* '''Windows'''
 
* '''Windows'''
:* '''7''': Start->Control Panel->[Clock, Language and Region->]Change display language. Check also the other tabs, esp. location.
+
:* '''7''': To change the UI language, use <tt>Start->Control Panel->[Clock, Language and Region->]Change display language</tt>. To change number and date formats, use <tt>Start -> Control Panel -> [Clock, Language and Region] Change format locale</tt>.
 
:* '''Vista''':
 
:* '''Vista''':
 
(Feel free to complete and correct this list)
 
(Feel free to complete and correct this list)
 +
:* Since '''DOS''' incl. '''OS/2''':
 +
:: At the '''shell''' prompts of <code>COMMAND.COM</code> and <code>cmd.exe</code>: SET LANG=de_DE
  
 
Usually you must then restart your session - re-login.
 
Usually you must then restart your session - re-login.
  
 +
But there are some cases, e.g. as a [[Translation|translator]] or [[FAQ#Q:_What_should_I_obey_as_a_beginner_in_bug_reporting.2C_enhacement_requesting_....3F|bug hunter]], where you wish to tweak them. Usually this is done by setting the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Locale_(computer_software)#POSIX_platforms locale] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environment_variable environment variables] with proper [[#IETF language tags]], but the ''How'' depends on your operating system.
  
But there are some cases, e.g. as a [[Translation|translator]] or [[FAQ#Q:_What_should_I_obey_as_a_beginner_in_bug_reporting.2C_enhacement_requesting_....3F|bug hunter]], where you wish to tweak them. Usually this is done by setting the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Locale locale][http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environment_variable environment variables] with proper [[#IETF language tags]], but the ''How'' depends on your operating system.
+
== Basics ==
 +
A few things, you should know ...  
  
== Language tags ==
+
=== Language tags ===
 
There are at least 2 slightly different definitions of language tasks:
 
There are at least 2 slightly different definitions of language tasks:
The [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_Engineering_Task_Force Internet Engineering Task Force] (IETF) defined the language tags in [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BCP_47 BCP 47], the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Institute_of_Electrical_and_Electronics_Engineers Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers] in [http://pubs.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/009695399/basedefs/xbd_chap08.html#tag_08_02 IEEE Std 1003.1] (aka POSIX). In short commonly they are of the form:
+
The [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_Engineering_Task_Force Internet Engineering Task Force] (IETF) defined the language tags in [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BCP_47 BCP 47], the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Institute_of_Electrical_and_Electronics_Engineers Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers] in [http://pubs.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/009695399/basedefs/xbd_chap08.html#tag_08_02 IEEE Std 1003.1] (aka POSIX). In short commonly they are of the form:
 
  <language>[_<region>][.<charset>]
 
  <language>[_<region>][.<charset>]
 
where usually
 
where usually
* <language> is a 2 letter abbreviation taken from the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ISO_639-1_codes List of ISO 639-1 codes] and
+
* <'''language'''> is a 2 letter ''lowercase'' abbreviation taken from the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ISO_639-1_codes List of ISO 639-1 codes]
* <region> from [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_3166-1_alpha-2 ISO 3166-1 alpha-2] to differentiate e.g. <tt>pt_PT</tt> vs. <tt>pt_BR</tt>.
+
*: or a 3 letter code for [https://www.gnu.org/software/gettext/manual/html_node/Rare-Language-Codes.html#Rare-Language-Codes Rare Language Codes] and
 +
* <'''region'''> in ''uppercase'' from [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_3166-1_alpha-2 ISO 3166-1 alpha-2] to differentiate e.g. <tt>pt_PT</tt> vs. <tt>pt_BR</tt>.
  
 
The POSIX standard knows an additional modifier:
 
The POSIX standard knows an additional modifier:
 
  [language[_territory][.codeset][@modifier]]
 
  [language[_territory][.codeset][@modifier]]
That will be used if e.g. different scripts are available like <tt>cyrillic</tt> vs. <tt>latin</tt>.
+
The '''@modifier''' will be used if e.g. different scripts are available like <tt>cyrillic</tt> vs. <tt>latin</tt>.
 +
 
 +
The prefered '''charset''' is ''UTF-8'', which has enough space for all on the earth known scripts, but Windows might wish another codepage. In some Linux distributions like Fedora 21, at least as long as the language is not installed system wide, the default is ''@euro'', a shortcut for ''ISO-8859-15'', which is different from UFT-8. If the program crashes as described in [{{BugURL}}/show_bug.cgi?id=628710 Bug 628710 - Crash when calling "New File" with a charset <> utf8 in LANG] or showing a line like <tt>Invalid UTF-8 string passed to pango_layout_set_text()</tt> on the command line or in the [[Tracefile|log file]], you should explicitly set the charset to utf-8.
  
 
At least under Linux
 
At least under Linux
 
  locale
 
  locale
shows your current settings,
+
shows your ''current settings'',
 
  locale -a
 
  locale -a
 
gives you a list of the on your system ''installed locales'' and  
 
gives you a list of the on your system ''installed locales'' and  
 
  locale -m
 
  locale -m
of the charmaps.
+
of the ''charmaps''.
 +
 
 +
If the list is too long you can filter it, e.g.
 +
locale -a|grep de_
 +
to see available combinations for german (de).
  
 
See
 
See
Line 48: Line 66:
 
  Man: What manual page do you want?
 
  Man: What manual page do you want?
 
  Man: 1p
 
  Man: 1p
for details.
+
for further details.
  
 
If your desired language or charset is missing you should install them using the tools of your operating system.
 
If your desired language or charset is missing you should install them using the tools of your operating system.
  
The prefered '''charset''' is ''UTF-8'', but Windows might wish another codepage. If the program crashes as described in [https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=628710 Bug 628710 - Crash when calling "New File" with a charset <> utf8 in LANG] you should explicitly set the charset to utf-8.
+
=== LANG vs LANGUAGE ===
 +
'''LANG''' sets a whole bunch of other ''LC_'' variables, which you can always check, at least under Linux, by running <tt>locale</tt>. This setting affects things like
 +
* the default currency
 +
* formats of date and numbers
 +
* available account templates
  
== LANG vs LANGUAGE ==
+
'''LANGUAGE''' can contain a ''priority list of languages'' to be used by the program surface. You can set it to a colon separated ''list of language codes'', which you prefer over U.S. english - the fallback if your languages are not found. E.g. set your system to
It may be that both variables are not always required. It depends on the system. It does no harm to set both of them and this ensures that the language is really set.
+
LANG=fy_NL
 +
LANGUAGE=fy:nl
 +
if you are a westfrisian who prefers frisian and understands nederlands better than english. Or if you understand spanish better than english, but wish to create an US tax report, you can run
 +
LANGUAGE=es LANG=en_US gnucash
  
'''LANGUAGE''' sets the language of the program surface.
+
[https://www.gnu.org/software/gettext/manual/html_node/The-LANGUAGE-variable.html#The-LANGUAGE-variable gettext manual: The LANGUAGE variable]
  
'''LANG''' sets a whole bunch of other ''LC_'' variables, which you can always check, at least under Linux, by running <tt>locale</tt>. This setting affects also beneath others
+
At least under Linux, you can simply unset LANGUAGE and only use LANG. Please report here, which are required for other OSes.
* the default currency,
 
* available account templates.
 
  
So if you understand spanish better than english, but wish to create an US tax report, you can run
+
== OS dependend tweaking ==
LANGUAGE=es LANG=en_US gnucash
+
=== Changing the Language on Linux ===
 
 
== Changing the Language on Linux ==
 
 
In general you should set the LANGUAGE and LANG environment variables before starting GnuCash. For example:
 
In general you should set the LANGUAGE and LANG environment variables before starting GnuCash. For example:
  
Line 86: Line 107:
  
 
On some systems the encoding could be part of the locales name, like "no_NO.UTF-8". You can use these names as well.
 
On some systems the encoding could be part of the locales name, like "no_NO.UTF-8". You can use these names as well.
 +
;Note: ''no'' is a '''macrolanguage''' containing
 +
:* '''nb''' - ''Bokmål'' which is supported by GnuCash and
 +
:* '''nn''' - ''Nynorsk'' which is unsupported.
 +
: If "no_NO" fails, try "nb_NO".
  
===Note for Debian users===
+
You should first test your setting by calling it on the ''command line''. Then you might see
 +
The locale defined in the environment isn't supported. Falling back to the 'C' (US English) locale
 +
if something still is wrong.
 +
 
 +
====Note for Debian users====
 
Make sure your locales of the language in which you want ''GnuCash'' to appear are properly installed. You can check by <tt>locale -a | grep de_DE</tt> (in case of German). If nothing is in output, run <tt>dpkg-reconfigure locales</tt> and install needed one. Eventually you will have run <tt>locale-gen</tt> afterwards to make the new installed locales available.
 
Make sure your locales of the language in which you want ''GnuCash'' to appear are properly installed. You can check by <tt>locale -a | grep de_DE</tt> (in case of German). If nothing is in output, run <tt>dpkg-reconfigure locales</tt> and install needed one. Eventually you will have run <tt>locale-gen</tt> afterwards to make the new installed locales available.
  
 
Note that the default desktop manager for Debian is GDM which does '''NOT''' read the .xsession files. To get the right language using GDM, use the Options button on the GDM login screen and set the default language. (The list includes all those languages supported by locales). When you login, confirm that the new language is to be the default for future sessions.
 
Note that the default desktop manager for Debian is GDM which does '''NOT''' read the .xsession files. To get the right language using GDM, use the Options button on the GDM login screen and set the default language. (The list includes all those languages supported by locales). When you login, confirm that the new language is to be the default for future sessions.
  
===Notes for Ubuntu users===
+
====Notes for Ubuntu users====
  
 
If the previous instructions don't works, please check the following items:
 
If the previous instructions don't works, please check the following items:
Line 103: Line 132:
 
  LANG=it_IT.UTF-8 LANGUAGE=it_IT.UTF8 LC_ALL=it_IT.UTF-8 gnucash
 
  LANG=it_IT.UTF-8 LANGUAGE=it_IT.UTF8 LC_ALL=it_IT.UTF-8 gnucash
  
== Changing the Language on OSX ==
+
=== Changing the Language on OSX ===
  
=== GnuCash 2.4.0 or newer ===
+
==== GnuCash 2.4.0 or newer ====
 
By default, Gnucash will select the first available translation from the list in your language list (''System Settings>International'' or ''System Settings>Languages and Text'', depending on what version of OSX you're using). Other localization settings (numeric format, date format, and default currency) are determined from the "Formats" tab of the same System Settings panel. Environment variables have '''no effect''', and there is no environment.sh file.
 
By default, Gnucash will select the first available translation from the list in your language list (''System Settings>International'' or ''System Settings>Languages and Text'', depending on what version of OSX you're using). Other localization settings (numeric format, date format, and default currency) are determined from the "Formats" tab of the same System Settings panel. Environment variables have '''no effect''', and there is no environment.sh file.
  
If you want to use a different translation from the one that is automatically selected, you can run the following in ''Terminal.app'':
+
If you want to use ''a different translation from the one that is automatically selected'', you can run the following in ''Terminal.app'':
 
   defaults write -app Gnucash AppleLanguages '(de, en)'
 
   defaults write -app Gnucash AppleLanguages '(de, en)'
  
 
(Use whatever language codes you want, replacing Deutsch and English. It won't work if there isn't a translation file for the language you want.)
 
(Use whatever language codes you want, replacing Deutsch and English. It won't work if there isn't a translation file for the language you want.)
 +
Some versions of OS X don't accept <tt>-app Gnucash</tt> and emit <tt>Can't determine domain name for application Gnucash</tt>. In that case use <tt>org.gnucash.Gnucash</tt> in place of <tt>-app Gnucash</tt>.
  
 
If you want to unset it (that is, return to using the system settings), run this:
 
If you want to unset it (that is, return to using the system settings), run this:
 
  defaults delete -app Gnucash AppleLanguages
 
  defaults delete -app Gnucash AppleLanguages
  
You can adjust the other locale settings similarly: Use <tt>AppleLocale  'xx_XX'</tt>, providing a language and country code; you can specialize it for currency with <tt>AppleLocale  'xx_XX@currency=YYY'</tt>, where <tt>YYY</tt> is a valid [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_4217 ISO-4217 currency code].
+
You can adjust the ''other locale settings'' similarly: Use
 +
AppleLocale  'xx_XX'
 +
providing a language and country code; you can specialize it for currency with <tt>AppleLocale  'xx_XX@currency=YYY'</tt>, where <tt>YYY</tt> is a valid [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_4217 ISO-4217 currency code].
  
 
'''NB:''' The quotes around the value must be ''single'' quotes. If you use double quotes you'll get the following error:
 
'''NB:''' The quotes around the value must be ''single'' quotes. If you use double quotes you'll get the following error:
Line 122: Line 154:
 
   Defaults have not been changed.
 
   Defaults have not been changed.
  
=== GnuCash 2.2.9 ===
+
==== GnuCash 2.2.9 ====
 
With Gnucash 2.2.9 (the first version with a project-provided MacOSX build), the language and locale settings are extracted from the system defaults in the launcher script, <tt>Gnucash.app/Contents/MacOS/Gnucash</tt> (You can see this file in Finder by control-clicking on Gnucash.app and selecting "Show Package Contents" from the context menu; the Contents subfolder will open in a new Finder window. From there you can navigate to the launcher script and open it with your favorite editor. If  you don't have a favorite editor, TextEdit works fine.)
 
With Gnucash 2.2.9 (the first version with a project-provided MacOSX build), the language and locale settings are extracted from the system defaults in the launcher script, <tt>Gnucash.app/Contents/MacOS/Gnucash</tt> (You can see this file in Finder by control-clicking on Gnucash.app and selecting "Show Package Contents" from the context menu; the Contents subfolder will open in a new Finder window. From there you can navigate to the launcher script and open it with your favorite editor. If  you don't have a favorite editor, TextEdit works fine.)
  
Line 134: Line 166:
 
If you need to adjust something else (currency, perhaps), look at the locale-setting block in the launcher script to see what variables to override.
 
If you need to adjust something else (currency, perhaps), look at the locale-setting block in the launcher script to see what variables to override.
  
== Changing the Language on Windows ==
+
=== Changing the Language on Windows ===
  
=== GnuCash 2.4.0 or newer ===
+
==== GnuCash 3.0 or newer ====
 +
 
 +
If you are running GnuCash 3.0 (or newer) on Windows, you can set the interface language by editing the file ''environment.local''. This file does not exist by default, but you can create one ''as administrator'' in '''c:\\Program Files\gnucash\etc\gnucash''' next to the file called '''environment''':
 +
 
 +
[Variables]
 +
LANG=fr_CA
 +
LANGUAGE={LANG}
 +
Note the second line can usually remain as-is, unless you explicitly want to configure LANG and LANGUAGE differently as explained under [[#LANG vs LANGUAGE]].  The braces are a variable expansion of the LANG variable.
 +
You can find more information in the environment file in the same directory.
 +
 
 +
==== GnuCash 2.4.0 or newer ====
  
 
If you are running GnuCash 2.4.0 (or newer) on Windows, you can set the interface language by editing the file ''environment''. By default this file is installed in '''c:\\Program Files\gnucash\etc\gnucash'''. Change this file ''as administrator'' such that the last few lines are:
 
If you are running GnuCash 2.4.0 (or newer) on Windows, you can set the interface language by editing the file ''environment''. By default this file is installed in '''c:\\Program Files\gnucash\etc\gnucash'''. Change this file ''as administrator'' such that the last few lines are:
Line 144: Line 186:
 
  LANG=nl_BE
 
  LANG=nl_BE
 
  LANGUAGE={LANG}
 
  LANGUAGE={LANG}
Note that the second line should remain as-is, unless you explicitly want to set LANG and LANGUAGE to different locales as explained under [[#LANG vs LANGUAGE]]. The braces are a variable expansion of the LANG variable.
+
Note the second line can usually remain as-is, unless you explicitly want to configure LANG and LANGUAGE differently as explained under [[#LANG vs LANGUAGE]]. The braces are a variable expansion of the LANG variable.
  
 
Don't forget to remove the comment signs: '''#'''.
 
Don't forget to remove the comment signs: '''#'''.
Line 153: Line 195:
 
  LANGUAGE={LANG}
 
  LANGUAGE={LANG}
  
=== GnuCash 2.2.9 and older ===
+
==== Swedish and probably other Languages ====
 +
 
 +
According [{{BugURL}}/show_bug.cgi?id=725296 Bug 725296 Unable to change language from english using the environment file] there seems to be something wrong in the table translating ''ISO-639 language codes'' - specialized with ISO-3166-1 country codes where appropriate - in ''Microsoft locale names''.
 +
;Workaround: In the environment file set
 +
LANG=Swedish_Sweden
 +
LANGUAGE=sv
 +
 
 +
==== GnuCash 2.2.9 and older ====
  
 
A good place to set your language preference is in ''gnucash.cmd''. By default this file is installed in '''c:\\Program Files\gnucash\bin'''. Change this file ''as administrator'' such that the last few lines are:
 
A good place to set your language preference is in ''gnucash.cmd''. By default this file is installed in '''c:\\Program Files\gnucash\bin'''. Change this file ''as administrator'' such that the last few lines are:
Line 160: Line 209:
 
  set LANGUAGE=nl_BE
 
  set LANGUAGE=nl_BE
 
  start gnucash-bin %*
 
  start gnucash-bin %*
 +
 +
== Support State ==
 +
This section explains, how to get the current state of translated languages and adapted account templats for specific regions. 
 +
 +
=== Supported Languages ===
 +
While we have many translations for the program, there are less of documentation.
 +
 +
==== Program ====
 +
You can easily see an probably outdated overview at the [https://translationproject.org/domain/gnucash.html Translation Project].
 +
 +
The ''next GnuCash release'' will have (at least partial) support of your language, if you see <language>.po in the stable branch of our [https://github.com/Gnucash/gnucash/tree/maint/po Github po directory]
 +
 +
Feel free to click on <tt>Branch->Tags</tt> there to select your ''current version'' or some historical data.
 +
 +
To see the completeness of any .po file download it and run
 +
msgfmt --statistics <language>.po
 +
or in your preferred ''po file editor''. You can find an overview of them in [[Translation#Tools]].
 +
 +
msgfmt -c <language>.po
 +
can be used to check the file for syntactical errors. The program ''msgfmt'' is part of the package [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gettext Gettext]
 +
 +
==== Documentation ====
 +
Similar as for the [[#Program]] you can search the documentation for a <language> directory:
 +
*[https://github.com/Gnucash/gnucash-docs/tree/maint/guide Guide]
 +
*[https://github.com/Gnucash/gnucash-docs/tree/maint/help Help]
 +
 +
=== Supported Regions ===
 +
Finally for the [https://github.com/Gnucash/gnucash/tree/maint/data/accounts account templates] search your <language>[_<region>] directory.
 +
 +
=== Improve them ===
 +
If you think, they could be improved continue on our [[Translation]] page.
 +
 +
== Font Issues ==
 +
(main section should be moved from [[FAQ#Q:_How_get_I_rid_of_strange_unreadable_characters_or_adjust_the_font_size]]
 +
=== Rare Fonts ===
 +
We have translations in scripts which are rare in most common fonts. See [[Published_tools#Fonts]] for places to download them.
 +
 +
== Adjusting Currency Symbols ==
 +
In order to support the use of appropriate currency symbols when using foreign or multi-currency accounts, In GNUCash 2.6.x is ongoing work on [{{BugURL}}/show_bug.cgi?id=723145 Bug 723145 - Currency display does not respect locale]. Some versions of Gnucash do not ask the currency symbol in the right order from the different settings. If for example your locale was set to en_US and you had a Euro account, "EUR" would prefix monetary amounts rather than the preferable "&#x20ac;" (Euro sign). Currency symbols are now taken from a pre-populated list based on [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_4217 ISO-4217].
 +
 +
The default symbols are not always appropriate for every region setting however. For example, the default display symbol for the Canadian dollar is "C$", which is not optimal if you are in Canada using only CAD accounts. In this context, simply "$" is preferable. Therefore, it is possible to customize the display symbol for any currency in the security editor '''Tools->Securities->Currency'''.

Revision as of 03:51, 14 July 2018

While Gnucash was written in american english, there are many localizations (translations, number formats, ...) available. This page shows, how to select them. An additional source is The User’s View in the Gettext manual.

System settings

In general GnuCash uses the system settings of your computer. So the control center for system settings of your operating system, distribution or desktop environment should be your first choice to adjust them:

  • Linux
  • distro dependend: if one exists, the configuration tool of your distribution like Yast in Opensuse might be your first choice, because it might apply the settings to all environments and for all users. Additionally it will install the respective language packages, if they are missing.
  • Gnome: Computer->[System->]Controlcenter->[System->]Language
  • KDE: Start->System settings->Regional
  • At the shell prompt, merely execute
  • csh: ‘setenv LANG de_DE’,
  • sh: ‘export LANG; LANG=de_DE’ or
  • bash, ksh: ‘export LANG=de_DE’.
This can be done from your .login, .profile or .bashrc file, once and for all.
Note
By default bash uses .login for remote logins and .bashrc for interactive shell, but some distibutions like Opensuse source .bashrc in .login. Then it has only to be done in .bashrc.
  • MacOS:
  • Mavericks (10.9): System Settings>Languages and Region
  • Snow Leopard (10.6) through Mountain Lion (10.8): System Settings>Languages and Text
  • Leopard (10.5): System Settings>International
  • Windows
  • 7: To change the UI language, use Start->Control Panel->[Clock, Language and Region->]Change display language. To change number and date formats, use Start -> Control Panel -> [Clock, Language and Region] Change format locale.
  • Vista:

(Feel free to complete and correct this list)

  • Since DOS incl. OS/2:
At the shell prompts of COMMAND.COM and cmd.exe: SET LANG=de_DE

Usually you must then restart your session - re-login.

But there are some cases, e.g. as a translator or bug hunter, where you wish to tweak them. Usually this is done by setting the locale environment variables with proper #IETF language tags, but the How depends on your operating system.

Basics

A few things, you should know ...

Language tags

There are at least 2 slightly different definitions of language tasks: The Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) defined the language tags in BCP 47, the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers in IEEE Std 1003.1 (aka POSIX). In short commonly they are of the form:

<language>[_<region>][.<charset>]

where usually

The POSIX standard knows an additional modifier:

[language[_territory][.codeset][@modifier]]

The @modifier will be used if e.g. different scripts are available like cyrillic vs. latin.

The prefered charset is UTF-8, which has enough space for all on the earth known scripts, but Windows might wish another codepage. In some Linux distributions like Fedora 21, at least as long as the language is not installed system wide, the default is @euro, a shortcut for ISO-8859-15, which is different from UFT-8. If the program crashes as described in Bug 628710 - Crash when calling "New File" with a charset <> utf8 in LANG or showing a line like Invalid UTF-8 string passed to pango_layout_set_text() on the command line or in the log file, you should explicitly set the charset to utf-8.

At least under Linux

locale

shows your current settings,

locale -a

gives you a list of the on your system installed locales and

locale -m

of the charmaps.

If the list is too long you can filter it, e.g.

locale -a|grep de_

to see available combinations for german (de).

See

man locale
Man: find all matching manual pages (set MAN_POSIXLY_CORRECT to avoid this)
* locale (5)
  locale (7)
  locale (1p)                                                                              
Man: What manual page do you want?
Man: 1p

for further details.

If your desired language or charset is missing you should install them using the tools of your operating system.

LANG vs LANGUAGE

LANG sets a whole bunch of other LC_ variables, which you can always check, at least under Linux, by running locale. This setting affects things like

  • the default currency
  • formats of date and numbers
  • available account templates

LANGUAGE can contain a priority list of languages to be used by the program surface. You can set it to a colon separated list of language codes, which you prefer over U.S. english - the fallback if your languages are not found. E.g. set your system to

LANG=fy_NL 
LANGUAGE=fy:nl

if you are a westfrisian who prefers frisian and understands nederlands better than english. Or if you understand spanish better than english, but wish to create an US tax report, you can run

LANGUAGE=es LANG=en_US gnucash

gettext manual: The LANGUAGE variable

At least under Linux, you can simply unset LANGUAGE and only use LANG. Please report here, which are required for other OSes.

OS dependend tweaking

Changing the Language on Linux

In general you should set the LANGUAGE and LANG environment variables before starting GnuCash. For example:

$ env LANGUAGE=fr_FR
$ env LANG=fr_FR
$ gnucash
This example sets the variables to use GnuCash in French (français) and then launches GnuCash.
You could also do this in one line:
 $ LANGUAGE=de_DE LANG=de_DE gnucash
This example sets the language to German (Deutsch).
This one-line method can also be used if you like to change the default language for the GnuCash menu item (or in the gnucash.desktop file). For these cases, the path to GnuCash is usually a full path and the command is followed with '%f', which represents the file to be opened:
$ LANGUAGE=de_DE LANG=de_DE /usr/bin/gnucash %f

On some systems the encoding could be part of the locales name, like "no_NO.UTF-8". You can use these names as well.

Note
no is a macrolanguage containing
  • nb - Bokmål which is supported by GnuCash and
  • nn - Nynorsk which is unsupported.
If "no_NO" fails, try "nb_NO".

You should first test your setting by calling it on the command line. Then you might see

The locale defined in the environment isn't supported. Falling back to the 'C' (US English) locale

if something still is wrong.

Note for Debian users

Make sure your locales of the language in which you want GnuCash to appear are properly installed. You can check by locale -a | grep de_DE (in case of German). If nothing is in output, run dpkg-reconfigure locales and install needed one. Eventually you will have run locale-gen afterwards to make the new installed locales available.

Note that the default desktop manager for Debian is GDM which does NOT read the .xsession files. To get the right language using GDM, use the Options button on the GDM login screen and set the default language. (The list includes all those languages supported by locales). When you login, confirm that the new language is to be the default for future sessions.

Notes for Ubuntu users

If the previous instructions don't works, please check the following items:

  • if you have installed localepurge package, be sure that the locale you are using is not deleted after the installation of gnucash. To check this, reconfigure localepurge, and be sure to not include your locale in the list of the ones to be deleted
sudo dpkg-reconfigure localepurge
Then reinstall all gnucash packages:
sudo apt-get install --reinstall gnucash gnucash-common gnucash-doc
  • If you can get the graphical interface in the correct language , but you can't get the accounts in the desired locale, you have to add the LC_ALL variable, like in the following example:
LANG=it_IT.UTF-8 LANGUAGE=it_IT.UTF8 LC_ALL=it_IT.UTF-8 gnucash

Changing the Language on OSX

GnuCash 2.4.0 or newer

By default, Gnucash will select the first available translation from the list in your language list (System Settings>International or System Settings>Languages and Text, depending on what version of OSX you're using). Other localization settings (numeric format, date format, and default currency) are determined from the "Formats" tab of the same System Settings panel. Environment variables have no effect, and there is no environment.sh file.

If you want to use a different translation from the one that is automatically selected, you can run the following in Terminal.app:

  defaults write -app Gnucash AppleLanguages '(de, en)'

(Use whatever language codes you want, replacing Deutsch and English. It won't work if there isn't a translation file for the language you want.) Some versions of OS X don't accept -app Gnucash and emit Can't determine domain name for application Gnucash. In that case use org.gnucash.Gnucash in place of -app Gnucash.

If you want to unset it (that is, return to using the system settings), run this:

defaults delete -app Gnucash AppleLanguages

You can adjust the other locale settings similarly: Use

AppleLocale  'xx_XX'

providing a language and country code; you can specialize it for currency with AppleLocale 'xx_XX@currency=YYY', where YYY is a valid ISO-4217 currency code.

NB: The quotes around the value must be single quotes. If you use double quotes you'll get the following error:

 Rep argument is not a dictionary
 Defaults have not been changed.

GnuCash 2.2.9

With Gnucash 2.2.9 (the first version with a project-provided MacOSX build), the language and locale settings are extracted from the system defaults in the launcher script, Gnucash.app/Contents/MacOS/Gnucash (You can see this file in Finder by control-clicking on Gnucash.app and selecting "Show Package Contents" from the context menu; the Contents subfolder will open in a new Finder window. From there you can navigate to the launcher script and open it with your favorite editor. If you don't have a favorite editor, TextEdit works fine.)

The shell script method of obtaining the locale information proved to be a bit brittle, producing surprising results for a few users. If you find that you want to override it, you can change the variables in the script or just add the following at the bottom

export LANG=xx_XX 
export LANGUAGE=xx_XX

just before the

$EXEC "$bundle_contents/MacOS/$name-bin" $* $EXTRA_ARGS

line. It's important to export both LANG and LANGUAGE because while the POSIX spec says that LANGUAGE should override LANG and Gnucash follows the spec, Gtk+ doesn't and uses only LANG. Some button and menu item translations are provided by Gtk+, so you can get mixed languages on controls in Gnucash.

If you need to adjust something else (currency, perhaps), look at the locale-setting block in the launcher script to see what variables to override.

Changing the Language on Windows

GnuCash 3.0 or newer

If you are running GnuCash 3.0 (or newer) on Windows, you can set the interface language by editing the file environment.local. This file does not exist by default, but you can create one as administrator in c:\\Program Files\gnucash\etc\gnucash next to the file called environment:

[Variables]
LANG=fr_CA
LANGUAGE={LANG}

Note the second line can usually remain as-is, unless you explicitly want to configure LANG and LANGUAGE differently as explained under #LANG vs LANGUAGE. The braces are a variable expansion of the LANG variable. You can find more information in the environment file in the same directory.

GnuCash 2.4.0 or newer

If you are running GnuCash 2.4.0 (or newer) on Windows, you can set the interface language by editing the file environment. By default this file is installed in c:\\Program Files\gnucash\etc\gnucash. Change this file as administrator such that the last few lines are:

# If you wish GnuCash to use a different language, uncomment the two parameters
# below and set LANG to your preferred locale
LANG=nl_BE
LANGUAGE={LANG}

Note the second line can usually remain as-is, unless you explicitly want to configure LANG and LANGUAGE differently as explained under #LANG vs LANGUAGE. The braces are a variable expansion of the LANG variable.

Don't forget to remove the comment signs: #.

The Language lines in your Environment file should look like this (change language variables based on desired language):

LANG=fr_CA
LANGUAGE={LANG}

Swedish and probably other Languages

According Bug 725296 Unable to change language from english using the environment file there seems to be something wrong in the table translating ISO-639 language codes - specialized with ISO-3166-1 country codes where appropriate - in Microsoft locale names.

Workaround
In the environment file set
LANG=Swedish_Sweden
LANGUAGE=sv

GnuCash 2.2.9 and older

A good place to set your language preference is in gnucash.cmd. By default this file is installed in c:\\Program Files\gnucash\bin. Change this file as administrator such that the last few lines are:

set LANG=nl_BE
set LANGUAGE=nl_BE
start gnucash-bin %*

Support State

This section explains, how to get the current state of translated languages and adapted account templats for specific regions.

Supported Languages

While we have many translations for the program, there are less of documentation.

Program

You can easily see an probably outdated overview at the Translation Project.

The next GnuCash release will have (at least partial) support of your language, if you see <language>.po in the stable branch of our Github po directory

Feel free to click on Branch->Tags there to select your current version or some historical data.

To see the completeness of any .po file download it and run

msgfmt --statistics <language>.po

or in your preferred po file editor. You can find an overview of them in Translation#Tools.

msgfmt -c <language>.po

can be used to check the file for syntactical errors. The program msgfmt is part of the package Gettext

Documentation

Similar as for the #Program you can search the documentation for a <language> directory:

Supported Regions

Finally for the account templates search your <language>[_<region>] directory.

Improve them

If you think, they could be improved continue on our Translation page.

Font Issues

(main section should be moved from FAQ#Q:_How_get_I_rid_of_strange_unreadable_characters_or_adjust_the_font_size

Rare Fonts

We have translations in scripts which are rare in most common fonts. See Published_tools#Fonts for places to download them.

Adjusting Currency Symbols

In order to support the use of appropriate currency symbols when using foreign or multi-currency accounts, In GNUCash 2.6.x is ongoing work on Bug 723145 - Currency display does not respect locale. Some versions of Gnucash do not ask the currency symbol in the right order from the different settings. If for example your locale was set to en_US and you had a Euro account, "EUR" would prefix monetary amounts rather than the preferable "€" (Euro sign). Currency symbols are now taken from a pre-populated list based on ISO-4217.

The default symbols are not always appropriate for every region setting however. For example, the default display symbol for the Canadian dollar is "C$", which is not optimal if you are in Canada using only CAD accounts. In this context, simply "$" is preferable. Therefore, it is possible to customize the display symbol for any currency in the security editor Tools->Securities->Currency.