Score:2

Ubuntu

How to separate language from time format?

cprn

1/8/24, 7:16 PM

I want to set a custom time format or the time format specific to my localisation but I want to keep the names of days and months in English. How can I set it to something like YYYY-MM-DD, Monday, 20:05:47 CET?

There are multiple similar questions, e.g. How to change time and date language to English? and Combine English language and alternative locale

None of them are the solution - $LC_TIME bounds format to language and I want to know if there's a different way of handling formats in Linux, some kind of alternative to locale that'd allow to specify the time format and the language separately. Creating a custom locale is of course possible but it confuses most applications. Did anyone came out with anything better over all these years?

139

2 + 0

time

internationalization

language

locale

Score:2

Ubuntu

Hannu

1/8/24, 8:32 PM

Hmm... this is not a direct answer, but something that might give a clear hint what to try:

$ sudo -i
...
# cp sv_SE_nerdy /usr/share/i18n/locales/
# echo "sv_SE_nerdy UTF-8" >> /etc/locale.gen
# locale-gen
# exit # sudo
$ localectl set-locale LC_MONETARY=sv_SE_nerdy
$ localectl set-locale LC_NUMERIC=sv_SE_nerdy
$ echo >>.bash_aliases "export LC_MONETARY=sv_SE_nerdy"
$ echo >>.bash_aliases "export LC_NUMERIC=sv_SE_nerdy"
$ localectl status
   System Locale: LANG=status
                  LC_NUMERIC=sv_SE_nerdy
                  LC_TIME=sv_SE.UTF-8
                  LC_MONETARY=sv_SE_nerdy
                  LC_PAPER=sv_SE.UTF-8
                  LC_NAME=sv_SE.UTF-8
                  LC_ADDRESS=sv_SE.UTF-8
                  LC_TELEPHONE=sv_SE.UTF-8
                  LC_MEASUREMENT=sv_SE.UTF-8
                  LC_IDENTIFICATION=sv_SE.UTF-8
       VC Keymap: sv-latin1
      X11 Layout: se
       X11 Model: asus_laptop
     X11 Options: terminate:ctrl_alt_bksp

and what I changed in sv_SE to create the ..._nerdy version:

$ cat sv_SE_diff 
--- /usr/share/i18n/locales/sv_SE   2022-04-07 03:24:41.000000000 +0200
+++ sv_SE_nerdy 2022-10-31 09:51:36.262570560 +0100
@@ -34 +34 @@
-title      "Swedish locale for Sweden"
+title      "Swedish locale for Sweden, decimal point in numbers and monetary values, narrow space number grouping"
@@ -41 +41 @@
-language   "Swedish"
+language   "Swedish, w DP"
@@ -44 +44 @@
-date       "2000-06-29"
+date       "2022-10-31"
@@ -182,2 +182,2 @@
-mon_decimal_point       ","
-mon_thousands_sep       "<U202F>"
+mon_decimal_point       "."
+mon_thousands_sep       "<U200A>"
@@ -198,2 +198,2 @@
-decimal_point           ","
-thousands_sep           "<U202F>"
+decimal_point           "."
+thousands_sep           "<U200A>"
@@ -276 +276 @@
-lang_name    "svenska"
+lang_name    "svenska, decimalpunkt"

... U200A defines unicode character 200A,
click on a char in character map to see the code for the selected character.
Display the character encoded (by a code) by typing e.g.CTRL+u followed by 202F+Enter in e.g. gnome-shell / Terminal.

and one more thing: the sv_SE locale formats dates as:

$ date 
sön  8 jan 2023 21:34:58 CET

... which may give a good hint on what to change the date format to.

+ 7

cprn

1/8/24, 10:02 PM

So you've made a custom locale. How does e.g. `soffice` work with that for you? Calc especially.

Hannu

1/10/24, 9:11 AM

I'm using LibreOffice, which accepts this perfectly, no noted issues so far (this *is* fairly new though).

Hannu

1/10/24, 9:19 AM

+ if the software is locale-aware, I would expect it to work well - at least for moderate changes, or changes / usage that exist in one or more of existing locales.

cprn

1/11/24, 1:08 AM

I had issues with LibreOffice and currency settings in custom locale file in the past but it seems to be working okay now (i.e. LibreOffice seems to ignore `LC_MONETARY` as it should).

TFuto

3/25/24, 2:14 PM

I needed to run `sudo vi /etc/locale.gen` and add the altered locale, otherwise `sudo locale-gen` does not pick it up as new locale. (Ubuntu 22.04 LTS).

Hannu

3/26/24, 12:07 PM

The above revised to include that...

Hannu

3/26/24, 12:52 PM

Hmm.. `Ubuntu > Settings > Region & Language` still has `,` in numeric format.

Score:0

Ubuntu

Gunnar Hjalmarsson

1/8/24, 11:46 PM

Open your ~/.profile file for editing and add this line:

export LC_TIME=en_DK.UTF-8

While that is not exactly "specific to your localization" (unless you happen to be Danish), it gives you days and months in English and a sensible date/time format.

+ 9

cprn

1/9/24, 11:42 AM

This changes output of things like `ls -l` to `MM/DD/YY` which is out of order and therefore unacceptable.

Gunnar Hjalmarsson

1/9/24, 1:22 PM

@cprn: I assumed that `en_DK.UTF-8` had been generated on your system. Otherwise do: `sudo locale-gen en_DK.UTF-8`

cprn

1/9/24, 6:38 PM

The only locale that seem to be generated are `en_GB`, `en_US`, `es_ES` and `pl_PL` - probably because the rest was commented out in `/etc/locale.gen` - I selected these 4 about 8 years ago when installing Linux. I've uncommented `en_DK` in `locale.gen` but it complained it needs to generate `da_DK` as well. I've uncommented `da_DK` but now it complains about missing file in `/usr/share/i18n/locales` (indeed there's no `da_DK` there). It's a mess. That's why I'm looking for a different solution to handle time altogether.

cprn

1/9/24, 7:02 PM

I copied `pl_PL` and made a custom `en_PL` locale file for now but it's a silly solution. I'm going to Spain next week and will have to make another one, it seems.

Gunnar Hjalmarsson

1/9/24, 7:40 PM

@cprn: Why don't you just run the command I suggested? Are you on a non-Ubuntu system?

cprn

1/10/24, 7:29 PM

I'm on Debian and I did - `sudo locale-gen en_DK.UTF-8` igored the argument and generated locale only for languages I selected during installation few years back. Adding `en_DK` was problematic, as described in my previous comment, so I made a custom `en_PL` and it works for now.

Gunnar Hjalmarsson

1/10/24, 9:54 PM

@cprn: Then your problem is off topic at Ask Ubuntu. (`locale-gen` in Ubuntu differs from `locale-gen` in Debian.)

cprn

1/11/24, 1:17 AM

well it acts the same on my work laptop which runs Ubuntu so IDK what you mean. Also `man locale-gen` doesn't mention arguments and `man locale.gen` explicitly states the `locale-gen` command will generate all the locales from `/etc/locale.gen` file that that are correct, i.e. a template in `/usr/share/i18n/locales` for given locale exists and charset is correct - this is exactly what happened. Nevertheless, the question was about an alternative to `locale` - some more sensible standard of setting up formats that doesn't change the language - assuming it exists.

Gunnar Hjalmarsson

1/11/24, 9:04 AM

@cprn: It's correct that `man locale-gen` in Ubuntu does not reflect the Ubuntu changes to that script. That's a bug. I'm not aware of an alternative to `locale` which would achieve your goal. `en_DK.UTF-8` is the best workaround I know about. (And it ought to work on Debian too, but how to do it there is off topic here.)

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