Bug#799602: the pages are sent according to what your browser requested

On 2015-09-21 18:12:04 +0200, Rhonda D'Vine wrote:
> * Vincent Lefevre <[email protected]> [2015-09-21 17:51:42 CEST]:
> > On 2015-09-21 14:47:54 +0200, Rhonda D'Vine wrote:
> > > * Vincent Lefevre <[email protected]> [2015-09-21 02:14:12 CEST]:
> > > > As the text can change, this is not a good solution.
> > > 
> > >  Sure, the text can change in all languages, I don't see that as a
> > > reason either or other way?
> > 
> > To make sure that the readers know what I'm talking about, I need
> > to quote the text. Otherwise if the text changes and says something
> > else, this would lead to confusion.
> 
>  If you quote something, it can change within the next rebuild.  The
> confusion is there inherently.

No, because the reader can check whether what is quoted is different
from the current version. This is impossible if one doesn't quote.

> > > > Moreover I wonder whether the web pages are up-to-date for all
> > > > languages.
> > > 
> > >  They might, or might not.  But that also can change over the time, see
> > > above.  I'm unsure what you really try to solve here?
> > 
> > The page in language A may say something, while the page in language B
> > may say something else.
> 
>  Then that's a clear bug and needs to get fixed.

The problem is that the user doesn't know whether language A and
language B say the same thing.

> > >  If you are speaking about quoting parts of the page, then follow the
> > > language-specific link at the bottom and quote it.
> > 
> > The problem is that I need to do that for *every* page I visit. This
> > is not acceptable. This is even more annoying due to the fact that
> > the anchor is not preserved.
> 
>  I don't see why you need to do it for *every* page you visit.  I can't
> follow.  If you need to do it for *every* page you visit you seemingly
> want to change your browser preferences, if *every* page you visit is
> displayed in the wrong language to you.

I mean every page in the group of pages (manual, etc.).

> > > There's no need to "keep" the "current language" for that, or are
> > > you usually quoting more than one page?
> > 
> > Yes.
> 
>  Can you be a bit more verbose on that usecase so I/we can follow?

I don't remember for things I did in the past (there was the same
problem on other pages). This time I started on

  https://www.debian.org/Bugs/

which I could switch to English immediately because I was not sure
yet what to quote. Then I ended up to

  https://www.debian.org/Bugs/server-control

then to:

  https://www.debian.org/Bugs/Developer#severities

but I wished I could have immediately the English version to make sure
I got what I wanted.

BTW, there's a major difference between the French and the English
version. Just reported.

> > I expect that for a same group of pages (on the same topic, e.g. a
> > same manual), every page should be available in the chosen language.
> 
>  That expectation is flawed, unfortunately, because it's simply untrue.

Then this should be fixed.

> > > With content negotiation you can define a
> > > preferred order of translations.  What should a page do when a link you
> > > want to follow isn't translated in your preferred language?  Display a
> > > "not found" to you?
> > 
> > Use the generic URL.
> 
>  And how would the page know about that?

Because this is part of the same source.

> The pages gets rebuilt only when something changes. They are static.
> There is no cookies or javascript involved, and it is not planned to
> go that road.

I do not see any problem. The generic URL is used initially, and
once a translation is added, the pages are rebuilt with the URL's
updated.

-- 
Vincent Lefèvre <[email protected]> - Web: <https://www.vinc17.net/>
100% accessible validated (X)HTML - Blog: <https://www.vinc17.net/blog/>
Work: CR INRIA - computer arithmetic / AriC project (LIP, ENS-Lyon)