Re: Euro support in GNUstep

[Nicola Pero]

> 
> quick idea: 
> 1. rename the old Language files to e.g. 'German.old', and have the file 
> 'German' include the new values.
> 2. introduce defaults setting like GSLoadOldLanguageFiles yes/no. 
> 3. a) If setting is 'yes' try to load e.g. 'German.old' and fall back to 
> 'German' if it does not exist. OR load 'German' first and then load 
> 'German.old' (if it exists) so that German.old has to contain only the old 
> currency related strings which will replace the ones loaded before from file 
> 'German'. (the second approach seems better to me)
>     b) if setting is 'no' just proceed as normal and load e.g. 'German'.
> 
> Don't know whether this is of any use or whether its too much overkill to 
> implement. From March 1st the Euro is the only used currency in those 
> countries
> anyway. 

I quite agree with Martin - I suggest that - 

 - all standard Language files involved switch to use the euro
   immediately, before the new release of gnustep-base is done.

 - the old Language files (with the old currencies) are never loaded or
   used unless specifically requested.

That makes gnustep-base useful to write new software making use of money,
and also to compile and use existing software using money in current real
life.

Old software having to deal with old accounts in national currency - thus
having to deal with both old and new currencies is in trouble anyway :-)
it needs to have a way to know, for each amount, in which currency it is
expressed ... probably the Languages file are little help there, such kind
of software will need to contain its own currency code anyway.

If I had such software, I would probably convert all old amounts into euro
(if possible) and then switch the whole system into using euro both for
historical and new data, it looks much simpler than having to keep a
multi-currency system forever.  It also means you can more meaningfully
compare old data with new ones since they are expressed in the same
currency.

So I think we probably need not bother with old currencies, and just drop
them all and switch to the euro.  But yes - we could keep the old
Languages files around and perhaps even provide a way to load them ... as
a temporary measure I would say, if we do it let's pick up a date, say 31
December 2002, and let's drop all old currency code by that date.

This is just a suggestion under my feeling that there are not many users
who need the double currencies ... if anybody has accounting software
based on gnustep-base which needs support for the double currency please
let us know.