1826119 - Properly localize Flatpak .desktop file

Status: RESOLVED FIXED

(Thunderbird :: L10n, defect)

Description

[Rob Lemley [:rjl]]

It's unclear where the translations that are currently in org.mozilla.Thunderbird.desktop originated. Probably from the existing Flatpak created by a third party.

There's enough inconsistency that the existing translations should be considered invalid. Releasing a Flatpak with the strings in their current state is not acceptable.

For example:

[Desktop Entry]
Name=Thunderbird

Name really should be "Mozilla Thunderbird" to be consistent with what we use in the Windows NSIS installer. (aka -brand-full-name).

Comment=Send and receive mail with Thunderbird
Comment[da]=Skriv/læs e-post/nyhedsgruppe med Mozilla Thunderbird
Comment[it]=Per leggere e scrivere email

Assuming that Comment is a source string, one would expect the (untranslatable) brand name to appear in the localized strings. For da, "Mozilla Thunderbird" appears, and for it, "Thunderbird" is not there at all. Clearly the social contract was not followed and all strings in that file are suspect.

The proposed fix:

• create a new Fluent file with strings for
  • Comment
  • Generic Name
  • "Compose Message" Name
  • "Open Address Book" Name
  • "Open ICS Calendar File" Name (new)

Then, during Flatpak repackaging, the desktop file can be assembled. This will fix up the inconsistent translations and inconsistent locales in the file. The assembling process should be generic enough that Firefox could use it if desired. (Their file looks a lot cleaner than the one currently in comm-central though.)

Comment 1

[Sean Burke [:leftmostcat]]

It looks like we're in kind of a weird position for this. As far as I can tell, we're not building the .desktop used for Linux packages. Firefox includes a .desktop in its repo, but I'm unclear where they are pulling their strings/translations from and a quick scan doesn't reveal how this file is constructed. It may be a good idea to talk to the Firefox folks and see if they have suggestions.

As far as consistency, I'll note that Firefox does use just "Firefox" in their .desktop and I'd expect more consistency between products on a single OS, but I also don't know if there's any policy behind using "Firefox" only.

Comment 2

[Rob Lemley [:rjl]]

(In reply to Sean Burke [:leftmostcat] from comment #1)

It looks like we're in kind of a weird position for this. As far as I can tell, we're not building the .desktop used for Linux packages.

Correct. The .desktop files used by Linux distributions are probably all based on the one from either Red Hat or Debian. Historically there's been no reason to have one ourselves because the tar-ball installation we provide doesn't have a way of using it.

Firefox includes a .desktop in its repo, but I'm unclear where they are pulling their strings/translations from and a quick scan doesn't reveal how this file is constructed. It may be a good idea to talk to the Firefox folks and see if they have suggestions.

One is part of gnome-search integration stuff.. it would be super cool if Gnome search could search Thunderbird emails and calendars and contacts.. OS parity since we have similar on Windows and macOS.

The Firefox Flatpak .desktop file came from the Snap .desktop file. Those, I do not know. There was talk of doing something similar to what I am planning on in this bug for Firefox back then. AFAIK it never materialized because it was probably not worth the effort. The strings in the Thunderbird file are messed up enough that they need retranslation. Pontoon is going to take time, but I'd prefer that to using DeepL or something since a human who speaks the language will have reviewed Pontoon translations.

As far as consistency, I'll note that Firefox does use just "Firefox" in their .desktop and I'd expect more consistency between products on a single OS, but I also don't know if there's any policy behind using "Firefox" only.

Yeah I noticed that... I'm going with be consistent for our own product across OS's, which means we call it "Mozilla Thunderbird" like the shortcuts on Windows do. I'm not going to try to understand Firefox product naming decisions.

Comment 3

[Rob Lemley [:rjl]]

Thunderbird will need to package a .desktop file when bug 1799516 is ported.

Comment 4

[Rob Lemley [:rjl]]

Attachment: Bug 1826119 - Add strings for Flatpak desktop file. r=#thunderbird-reviewers

There will be a script that runs during Flatpak repackaging to build the
desktop file that is part of the Flatpak.

Comment 5

[Pulsebot]

Pushed by [e-mail]:
https://hg.mozilla.org/comm-central/rev/7b03ccdd4eee
Add strings for Flatpak desktop file. r=leftmostcat

Comment 6

[Rob Lemley [:rjl]]

Attachment: Bug 1826119 - Generate Flatpak .desktop file during repackaging. r=#thunderbird-build-system-reviewers

Comment 7

[Pulsebot]

Pushed by [e-mail]:
https://hg.mozilla.org/comm-central/rev/e01f5e47da29
Generate Flatpak .desktop file during repackaging. r=dandarnell

Comment 8

[Rob Lemley [:rjl]]

Comment on attachment 9327216 [details]
Bug 1826119 - Add strings for Flatpak desktop file. r=#thunderbird-reviewers

[Approval Request Comment]
Incremental Flatpak improvements. There's no Daily, only Beta.

Comment 9

[Rob Lemley [:rjl]]

Comment on attachment 9328902 [details]
Bug 1826119 - Generate Flatpak .desktop file during repackaging. r=#thunderbird-build-system-reviewers

[Approval Request Comment]
Incremental Flatpak improvements. There's no Daily, only Beta.

Comment 10

[Wayne Mery (:wsmwk)]

Comment on attachment 9328902 [details]
Bug 1826119 - Generate Flatpak .desktop file during repackaging. r=#thunderbird-build-system-reviewers

[Triage Comment]
Approved for beta

Comment 11

[Wayne Mery (:wsmwk)]

Comment on attachment 9327216 [details]
Bug 1826119 - Add strings for Flatpak desktop file. r=#thunderbird-reviewers

[Triage Comment]
Approved for beta

Comment 12

[Daniel Darnell [:dandarnell]]

Thunderbird 113.0b6:
https://hg.mozilla.org/releases/comm-beta/rev/2b85c8469e40
https://hg.mozilla.org/releases/comm-beta/rev/c2d85893a679