Bug 168603 - Incorrect Autocorrection replacement table Swiss German (de-CH): ss vs ß
Summary: Incorrect Autocorrection replacement table Swiss German (de-CH): ss vs ß
Status: RESOLVED FIXED
Alias: None
Product: LibreOffice
Classification: Unclassified
Component: Writer (show other bugs)
Version:
(earliest affected)
unspecified
Hardware: x86-64 (AMD64) Windows (All)
: medium normal
Assignee: Mike Kaganski
URL: https://ask.libreoffice.org/t/ss-wird...
Whiteboard: target:26.2.0 target:25.8.2.2 target:...
Keywords:
Depends on:
Blocks:
 
Reported: 2025-09-29 09:20 UTC by grac
Modified: 2025-10-02 09:07 UTC (History)
5 users (show)

See Also:
Crash report or crash signature:


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Description grac 2025-09-29 09:20:22 UTC
LibreOffice Writer changes the word "Gruss" automatically to "Gruß", although all my settings are set to "Swiss German".
This is not correct, since "ß" does not exist in Swiss German.
Whatever I try, LibreOffice Writer replaces every word with "ss" to "ß".
My bug exchange thread with "WritingTool" says it's not a bug in "WritingTool", but in LibreOffice.
A very annoying bug, since the swiss german keyboard doesn't even have a key for "ß". And it's a german language imperialism to deny this Swiss language rule.
Comment 1 Mike Kaganski 2025-09-29 09:59:42 UTC
... or rather, there is no one in Swiss community to create an autocorrect rules file specific to the de-CH language, so generic 'de' is used?

Of course, you can edit autocorrect entries in autocorrect settings, or even disable them as a whole; but the fundamental problem of missing language-specific rules can't be fixed, until there is someone from the community doing the work - which helps much more, than accusations in "imperialism" ;)
Comment 2 grac 2025-09-29 10:03:43 UTC
Well then, tell me what to do to change this behaviour of LO Writer (I have a file "acor_de-CH.dat" in my profile, I changed/added substitute words - nothing helped).
Comment 3 Mike Kaganski 2025-09-29 10:09:23 UTC
Please ask "how do I use LibreOffice" questions on sites like Ask LibreOffice. Here is it off-topic. To answer, we would have to clarify a lot of things, like which system input language is configured on your Windows, if your LibreOffice honors that, if you set the language manually, etc., to make sure which autocorrect rules you have to change - and also what exactly "I changed/added substitute words" was. Performing all this here makes this Bugzilla issue - which *exclusive* goal is to make some improvements to the program, not to help users make their work done - unmanageable. Thanks.
Comment 4 grac 2025-09-29 10:12:19 UTC
This answer is the contrary of helpful.
I am a 77 year old LO user ...
Arrogance? Seems so ...
Comment 5 grac 2025-09-29 10:30:35 UTC
Furthermore, the developer of WritingTool looked exactly on this bug, and said:
"This is a bug of LibreOffice Writer!"

Why shouldn't I believe him that it's a bug and not a user problem?
Comment 6 Mike Kaganski 2025-09-29 10:43:49 UTC
(In reply to grac from comment #5)
> Why shouldn't I believe him that it's a bug and not a user problem?

Did you see I closed this as "not a bug"? I didn't. Because absent language-specific autocorrection is indeed a problem that needs to be fixed in LibreOffice.

But it will only ever be fixed, when someone from Swiss community decides to fix it. I wouldn't hold my breath. Until then, this should be here for tracking purposes; I wouldn't be too surprised to see it hanging here, say, for 15 years.

So, *if* you not only want to inform developers that there is a problem (you did here), but also want to know how to work now, in the absence of the language-specific autocorrection rules, you need to familiarize yourself with the program. I already suggested you to post to https://ask.libreoffice.org/ to ask questions related to use of the program. Posting more off-topic here, you are actively making *your own* report less and less manageable for developers, with the end result that this bug might less chances to find an interested developer.
Comment 8 V Stuart Foote 2025-09-29 15:19:39 UTC
@Mike, if I turn off the 'Use replacement table' the substitution does not occur.

But then even if I delete the Gruss -> Gruẞ and 
Grüsse -> Grüẞe and heiss -> heiẞ from both the de-DE and de-CH, creating new correction tables in the user profile, the substitution still occurs.

So where is the incorrect "correction" coming from? Is there an issue as suggested that the user profile correction table is not being honored?

Did find Eike's https://gerrit.libreoffice.org/c/core/+/124988
ss -> U+1E98 not sure that is applicable; but could this be happening globally via i18n transliteration?
Comment 9 Mike Kaganski 2025-09-29 19:18:49 UTC
(In reply to V Stuart Foote from comment #8)

The problem is in SvxAutoCorrect::SearchWordsInList [1], which looks for the entry in the language-specific list, but if not found, continues in the "primary language" (here: 'de' without country). Seems completely wrong to me. It should only try primary language, when there is no specialized list (here: created by user by removing some elements from the generic list).

[1] https://opengrok.libreoffice.org/xref/core/editeng/source/misc/svxacorr.cxx?r=7ff6d6017561c50b933b115452b210bdbce164bb#2041
Comment 10 Mike Kaganski 2025-09-29 19:54:19 UTC
Heh, it was fixed in bug 96787 (commit ae56dc05b27f05ffcee99845d661a237e70a7a51), but that caused bug 141773, so was reverted (commit 50be3fa1f0f3b8870af5bda88b65f835ef37d77e).
Comment 11 Mike Kaganski 2025-09-29 20:09:27 UTC
https://gerrit.libreoffice.org/c/core/+/191643
Comment 12 Commit Notification 2025-09-29 21:20:47 UTC
Mike Kaganski committed a patch related to this issue.
It has been pushed to "master":

https://git.libreoffice.org/core/commit/a25c152abb31db437eb306f358ae71ab73d2e6ba

tdf#96787 tdf#168603 Skip primary language list, when country-specific found

It will be available in 26.2.0.

The patch should be included in the daily builds available at
https://dev-builds.libreoffice.org/daily/ in the next 24-48 hours. More
information about daily builds can be found at:
https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Testing_Daily_Builds

Affected users are encouraged to test the fix and report feedback.
Comment 13 Commit Notification 2025-09-30 09:15:01 UTC
Mike Kaganski committed a patch related to this issue.
It has been pushed to "libreoffice-25-8":

https://git.libreoffice.org/core/commit/665379874b65e963b8ebc39623dc25ffe5510a3c

tdf#96787 tdf#168603 Skip primary language list, when country-specific found

It will be available in 25.8.3.

The patch should be included in the daily builds available at
https://dev-builds.libreoffice.org/daily/ in the next 24-48 hours. More
information about daily builds can be found at:
https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Testing_Daily_Builds

Affected users are encouraged to test the fix and report feedback.
Comment 14 Commit Notification 2025-09-30 11:14:23 UTC
Mike Kaganski committed a patch related to this issue.
It has been pushed to "libreoffice-25-2":

https://git.libreoffice.org/core/commit/5cae96ffc83b45e987a8215dc3a091e07fd3c962

tdf#96787 tdf#168603 Skip primary language list, when country-specific found

It will be available in 25.2.7.

The patch should be included in the daily builds available at
https://dev-builds.libreoffice.org/daily/ in the next 24-48 hours. More
information about daily builds can be found at:
https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Testing_Daily_Builds

Affected users are encouraged to test the fix and report feedback.
Comment 15 Commit Notification 2025-10-01 10:45:19 UTC
Mike Kaganski committed a patch related to this issue.
It has been pushed to "libreoffice-25-8-2":

https://git.libreoffice.org/core/commit/3285ae5b7cc943aabaa1ca02c2c425948959f2c7

tdf#96787 tdf#168603 Skip primary language list, when country-specific found

It will be available in 25.8.2.

The patch should be included in the daily builds available at
https://dev-builds.libreoffice.org/daily/ in the next 24-48 hours. More
information about daily builds can be found at:
https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Testing_Daily_Builds

Affected users are encouraged to test the fix and report feedback.
Comment 16 V Stuart Foote 2025-10-01 12:27:57 UTC
@Mike, @Eike -- Outstanding question/action needed. What is the source of the offending ss -> ß substitutions present in the de-CH auto correction file? Is the de-CH correction list separately maintained by l10n team, or is it being generated from the base de-DE?

With patch in now, looks like de-CH users would still need to edit the templated  autocorrection list to remove the gruss, grüsse, and heiss --> ẞ entries.
Comment 17 Mike Kaganski 2025-10-01 12:46:38 UTC
(In reply to V Stuart Foote from comment #16)

I already answered in comment 1. There is no list for de-CH; only generic 'de' exists:

https://opengrok.libreoffice.org/xref/core/extras/source/autocorr/lang/?r=7c1bad415ae48635dc67041c413bb7b76a530c22

https://opengrok.libreoffice.org/xref/core/extras/source/autocorr/lang/de/DocumentList.xml?r=7c1bad415ae48635dc67041c413bb7b76a530c22#122

Cf. to several en-* in extras/source/autocorr/lang.

The list for de-CH is therefore displayed from the generic one; and when user modifies it, it copies to the user profile.
Comment 18 V Stuart Foote 2025-10-01 13:31:17 UTC
(In reply to Mike Kaganski from comment #17)

> I already answered in comment 1. There is no list for de-CH; only generic
> 'de' exists:
> 
> https://opengrok.libreoffice.org/xref/core/extras/source/autocorr/lang/
> ?r=7c1bad415ae48635dc67041c413bb7b76a530c22
> 
> https://opengrok.libreoffice.org/xref/core/extras/source/autocorr/lang/de/
> DocumentList.xml?r=7c1bad415ae48635dc67041c413bb7b76a530c22#122
> 
> Cf. to several en-* in extras/source/autocorr/lang.
> 
> The list for de-CH is therefore displayed from the generic one; and when
> user modifies it, it copies to the user profile.

OK, sorry. That makes sense, and I had not looked at the autocorr/lang listing. 

Guess as you said it is up to someone interested in the de-CH (and de-LI) localization support to prepare a locale specific corrections set. 

While the current lang/de corrections would just stay put for the de-DE, de-AT, de-LU, de-BE, and de-NA locales. Though any of those could be split out similar to what would be needed for the Swiss Standard German.