Arch Linux

black_dragon

Member

Registered: 2025-04-18

Posts: 27

[SOLVED] Can't set locale

Hi,
I'm trying to set en_US-UTF-8 locale but every time after reboot, I still have C.UTF-8,
Steps:
1) Uncomment en_US-UTF-8 in /etc/locale.gen
2) Call locale-gen
3) Set /etc/locale.conf to

LANG=en_US.UTF-8

But after reboot, here's the result of locale command:

LANG=C.UTF-8
LC_CTYPE="C.UTF-8"
LC_NUMERIC="C.UTF-8"
LC_TIME="C.UTF-8"
LC_COLLATE="C.UTF-8"
LC_MONETARY="C.UTF-8"
LC_MESSAGES="C.UTF-8"
LC_PAPER="C.UTF-8"
LC_NAME="C.UTF-8"
LC_ADDRESS="C.UTF-8"
LC_TELEPHONE="C.UTF-8"
LC_MEASUREMENT="C.UTF-8"
LC_IDENTIFICATION="C.UTF-8"
LC_ALL=

In the same time, output of localectl:

System Locale: LANG=en_US.UTF-8
    VC Keymap: us
   X11 Layout: us
    X11 Model: pc105+inet
  X11 Options: terminate:ctrl_alt_bksp

If I, instead of reboot, call source /etc/profile.d/locale.sh, I will get the desired result:

LANG=en_US.UTF-8
LC_CTYPE="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_NUMERIC="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_TIME="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_COLLATE="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_MONETARY="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_MESSAGES="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_PAPER="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_NAME="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_ADDRESS="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_TELEPHONE="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_MEASUREMENT="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_IDENTIFICATION="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_ALL=

Though after reboot I have C.UTF-8 everywhere.

Why is this happenning? Did I miss something? Is it something wrong with my init scripts?

Last edited by black_dragon (2025-04-26 00:31:30)

seth

Member

From: Won't reply 2 private help req

Registered: 2012-09-03

Posts: 75,317

Re: [SOLVED] Can't set locale

Your session script, desktop session or shell rc will likely steamroll C.UTF-8 after /etc/profile.d/locale.sh has initially been sourced.
https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/KDE#Pl … e_settings is otr for that kind of stuff, but it could happen in any context.

Try to boot the multi-user.target (2nd link below) and login on the console.
Then check locale.
You can eg "bash -x -l" to trace a login shell.

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black_dragon

Member

Registered: 2025-04-18

Posts: 27

Re: [SOLVED] Can't set locale

Thanks!
The problem was indeed in ~/.config/plasma-localerc, it was setting C.UTF-8 for some reason. After I deleted it and logged again, the new and proper file was generated.

mackin_cheese

Member

Registered: 2025-01-07

Posts: 477

Re: [SOLVED] Can't set locale

This is also documented in the troubleshooting section for the locale page in the arch wiki, please remember to do research first before asking questions.