Bug 36094

PPC G4 1.5 GHz OS X 10.4.11
LibO with Welsh (cy) language pack

First, I should say that I *very* much appreciate the efforts to localise for Welsh. Nothing I say should be interpreted in a way inconsistent with that. (I figure I probably sound frustrated but I do not fail to appreciate the efforts put into providing localisation for so many languages.)

The localisation for Welsh alters the keyboard combinations in ways which are inconsistent with the OS X norm and also internally inconsistent. That is, I have Welsh as the default for my OS X interface (insofar as this is possible - Apple hasn't gone out of its way or anything). I also have it set for the interface in LibreOffice.

This is very awkward however because system wide, command + a, for example, means "select all" but in LibreOffice it *sometimes* means "select all" and it *sometimes* means "open file". This means that I am continually getting the open file dialogue when I don't want it. This happens in the help browser, for example, which alters the combinations. It also happens  for the main LibreOffice interface (choosing a new document type to start, say) In the main application interface for Writer (when editing a document, say), the localisation doesn't change the combinations even when the menu items have been translated.

To make things even more confusing, the language pack doesn't change all of the keyboard shortcuts but only some of them. So command + q still quits even though this does not work for Welsh at all. (For one thing, there's no 'q' in Welsh.)

So in order to figure out what keys to use, the user has to somehow be conscious of the fact that she is (a) using LibreOffice; and (b) using sub-part so-and-so of LibreOffice (am I in Writer? have I opened help from Writer? am I in the main startup interface?); and (c) she has to remember which parts of the latter interfaces have been localised and which have not. So hiding, quitting etc. are not localised and use English keys, whereas starting a new text or calc document etc. are and use Welsh, while select, open etc. are localised in some bits of LibreOffice but not others.

It is quite difficult to think of a way this could be made more confusing.

For the OS I'm using, I would prefer the menus etc. to be translated but no keyboard shortcuts to be localised whatsoever. So quitting should be "Gadael" rather than "Quit" but it should still use command + q. This also avoids the problem that the OS won't allow certain key combinations to be used for certain things. (Firefox uses command + g for quit but it just fails to have any effect whatsoever.)

But obviously this might not be best for all OS setups.

But the localisation should at least be consistent within the LibreOffice interface even if it is not possible to make it consistent with the OS.