This page explains how to set up an environment in a different language (say French) for a particular user on a machine where Debian was installed in, say, English.
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Generate the locale · Configuring the environment · Installing some localization packages · Selecting the language in the session managerThe first thing to do is to generate the locale for the new language. It can be done using the following command (as root):
root# dpkg-reconfigure locales
Make sure you select the UTF-8 variant of the locale, as in the screenshots below. (Note that those screenshots are from Debian 4.0, but very similar to what you see under Debian 8.0.)
To configure the environment for the new language, some files in the home directory of the user must be modified. The language-env package provides a tool to make the task easier. You can install the package using the following command (as root):
root# aptitude install language-env
Then log in as the user and run set-language-env. It will ask whether you're using ISO-8859-15 (euro sign). I answered no to this question. Then it will propose to modify some files. Let it modify at least the files in the list below (follow the links to see what the files should look like after the modification). Make sure the LANG variable has been set to the UTF-8 variant of the language.
$ set-language-env
The next step is to install some localization packages for documentation, Iceweasel and OpenOffice.org.
root# aptitude install manpages-fr manpages-fr-extra doc-linux-fr-html doc-debian-fr iceweasel-l10n-fr openoffice.org-l10n-fr
If Icedove or Adobe Acrobat Reader are installed on the system, you can also install the localization packages for them.
root# aptitude install icedove-locale-fr acroread-l10n-fr
The user can now log out, select his language in the session manager and log and back in again. His environment should be in French now.