Since ever we (the Right To Left users) had problems with Gnome Terminal, IMHO translations to the terminal shouldn’t have ever done, but this is another story. the main problem that we discuss lately is the the support of RTL languages in the terminal. this is an issue that we always had, and I never felt any improvement in the last 4 years I use linux.

Try to think how would it be if anything in your language was opposite in the terminal…
just to illustrate the situation, here is the way RTL user sees apt-get help output: (please do try reading it, it’s not only flipped, it’s an exact simulation of RTL text in Gnome Terminal!)

dor@dor-laptop:~$ apt-get help
15 2009 19:23:21 tcO no delipmoc i386 rof apt 0.7.23.1ubuntu2
dnammoc [snoitpo] apt-get :egasU
[… 2gkp] 1gkp evomer|llatsni [snoitpo] apt-get
[… 2gkp] 1gkp ecruos [snoitpo] teg-tpa

dna gnidaolnwod rof ecafretni enil dnammoc elpmis a si apt-get
etadpu era sdnammoc desu yltneuqerf tsom ehT .segakcap gnillatsni
.llatsni dna

:sdnammoC
segakcap fo stsil wen eveirteR – update
edargpu na mrofreP – upgrade
(bed.6cbil ton 6cbil si gkp) segakcap wen llatsnI – install
segakcap evomeR – remove
segakcap desunu lla yllacitamotua evomeR – autoremove
selif gifnoc dna segakcap evomeR – purge
sevihcra ecruos daolnwoD – source
segakcap ecruos rof seicnedneped-dliub erugifnoC – build-dep
(8)teg-tpa ees ,edargpu noitubirtsiD – dist-upgrade
snoitceles tcelesd wolloF – dselect-upgrade
selif evihcra dedaolnwod esarE – clean
selif evihcra dedaolnwod dlo esarE – autoclean
seicnedneped nekorb on era ereht taht yfireV – check

:snoitpO
.txet pleh sihT h-
rotacidni ssergorp on – tuptuo elbaggoL q-
srorre rof tpecxe tuptuo oN qq-
sevihcra kcapnu ro llatsni TON od – ylno daolnwoD d-
noitalumis gniredro mrofreP .tca-oN s-
tpmorp ton od dna seireuq lla ot seY emussA y-
ecalp ni seicnedneped nekorb htiw metsys a tcerroc ot tpmettA f-
elbatacolnu era sevihcra fi eunitnoc ot tpmettA m-
llew sa segakcap dedargpu fo tsil a wohS u-
ti gnihctef retfa egakcap ecruos eht dliuB b-
srebmun noisrev esobrev wohS V-
elif noitarugifnoc siht daeR ?=c-
o dir::cache=/tmp- ge ,noitpo noitarugifnoc yrartibra na teS ?=o-
launam (5)apt.conf dna (5)sources.list ,(8)apt-get eht eeS
.snoitpo dna noitamrofni erom rof segap
.srewoP woC repuS sah APT sihT

THAT IS ANNOYING! yes – it does!
following a bug report opened about it in gnome says one thing: NO. nothing is going to happen, this bug won’t EVER be fixed.

I believe that if there will be any better patch, it will be added to the next version. our problem is that we just don’t know from where to attack that bug.

any suggestions? any ideas? any good hackers around?

Thanks in advance,
Dor (and all affected users).