Fedora 4 Frustrations

Just spent a day "having fun" with fedora core 4, which for my non-computer-geek readers is linux, an operating system (competitor to Windows) that is useful to me and my computer-geek readers. My work computer is fedora. This is not a computer blog, but I got frustrated before figuring out some useful information. There aren't many English speakers trying to use linux in Japan, but just in case someone else out there needs to use multiple languages on their fedora box, I present the following information for Google to find.

For the rest of you, fear not. Regularly scheduled programming will resume after this brief special service announcement.

Multiple languages on Fedora 4 gnome

All my instructions here are for adding Japanese ja_JP as a secondary language to a English en_US session. Should/might work for other cases, exchanging local codes as needed.

1. At installation, add any languages you could possibly find useful in the near future. For me it was Japanese, Chinese, Korean, Spanish, and German.
   • The only information at fedora forums about installing languages post-install is "Gee that's hard--we should work on that. And stuff." If you know a link to (well written) instructions on how to do this post install, please post a comment.
   • Your machine now has the language packages installed, but they are intended to support different locales, in other words the entire menu system of your gnome session.


2. Tell fedora "Yes, I really want to be able to input more than one language" by making a link. Then add the menu button. This information is from fedora's iiimf faq page:
   
   
   • open a terminal, then

     $ mkdir ~/.xinput.d
     $ ln -s /etc/X11/xinit/xinput.d/iiimf ~/.xinput.d/en_US

   • On the FAQ they say restart X. Don't yet, it's step 3.
   • Add the menu button to switch input languages:
     
     • Right click on your panel
     • Press "add to panel"
     • Select "InputMethod Switcher"
     • Press "Add"
   Even IF you restart X at this point, (for me) no additional languages show up. Clicking Add Language shows a box with no installed languages!! They're installed, just not showing up. Seems like a memory problem.
3. How to make it appear: log in using the desired language. Tips*
   • Before leaving your English session: Memorize how to log out! Remember the exit door icon at Desktop > Log Out
   • Log Out: "Save this Session" to remember your menu edit (maybe not required)
   • Log in: in the lower left corner you can select your language. All languages are listed, even ones you do not have support for.
   • Click "For this session only"
   Japanese GNOME is pretty slick, good katakana practice, and impresses the ladies. ..umm, maybe not. But you should notice [Ja] in the language selector, and English is in there too.
   • Log Out (L) clicking OK (O)
   • Log in: English is your default language, no need to select it
4. Done! Test it with gedit
   • Applications > Accessories > Text Editor
   • In the menu's input box, select Nihongo A, aka 日本語(A)
   • a hiragana [a] should appear below the lower left corner of the gedit window
   • Ctrl+Space to toggle between Nihongo and English modes, as normal
   
   
   • NOTE OpenOffice has a preferences setting for Japanese which should be set before you use it.

-GRUMBLE- Firefox crashed midway through drafting this entry.. Fedora is stable but Firefox seems to have issues on this box. Well, on the plus side, maybe my the instructions above became more streamlined as a result.
-GRUMBLE #2- To any Fedora developers reading (har har), I wish Anaconda was smart enough to realize FTP install settings. I hosed my language settings, and didn't have Disc 4 to fix it. (Full Reinstall) And because my disks required no repartitioning and user files were still there, the first boot settings interface did not initiate. (Full Reinstall) Eventually, it worked. The unofficial fedora FAQ helps make fedora much more useful. Sound card works now--yipee! I just hope Firefox stops crashing--will try an update.

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UPDATE
(Going to post one more Fedora thing and then I'll get it out of my system.) The packages below should be recommended on fedora FAQ, but they aren't. Assuming you have yum configured as the FAQ recommends,

% su -
% yum install gnome-yum
% rpm -e totem
% yum install totem-xine

"gnome-yum" is a graphical interface for yum, ala synaptic, but is certain to access fedora extras. The totem-xine gives you a movie player that can play MOV files from your digital camera. Also, for those scientists out there using FORTRAN, g77 is no longer included by default, with the appearance of gcc 4. Try "gfortran." If concerned about any possible issues "yum install compat-gcc-32-g77" gives good old g77 under gcc 3.2.