[Libreoffice-bugs] [Bug 128860] New: Incorrect autocorrection of apostrophes in German text

[bugzilla-daemon at bugs.documentfoundation.org]

https://bugs.documentfoundation.org/show_bug.cgi?id=128860

            Bug ID: 128860
           Summary: Incorrect autocorrection of apostrophes in German text
           Product: LibreOffice
           Version: 6.3.3.1 rc
          Hardware: All
                OS: All
            Status: UNCONFIRMED
          Severity: normal
          Priority: medium
         Component: LibreOffice
          Assignee: libreoffice-bugs at lists.freedesktop.org
          Reporter: rs at rsems.dev

Description:
In German text, words or phrases containing apostrophes with no adjacent spaces
are incorrectly autocorrected.

Common examples are "ist's" (short for "ist es"), "Andrea's" (similar to
English use), "D'dorf" (short for "Düsseldorf"). 

The correct typographic symbol would be the English *right* single quotation
mark (U+2019).

When single quotes autocorrection is disabled, the typewriter-style
'apostrophe' (U+0027) is inserted (the ASCII character to which the apostrophe
key is traditionally mapped).

When single quotes autocorrection is enabled, the English *left* single
quotation mark (U+2018) is inserted, or whatever the user has configured for
the single 'end quote'.

Steps to Reproduce:
1. Open LibreOffice Writer, create a German-language document
2. Make sure 'autocorrect while typing' is enabled
3. Type words or phrases containing apostrophes like ist's, Andrea's, D'dorf


Actual Results:
If single quotes autocorrection is disabled, the character inserted into the
text is the typewriter-style, non-typographic apostrophe symbol (U+0027).

If single quotes autocorrection is enabled, the character inserted into the
text is the unicode character 'LEFT SINGLE QUOTATION MARK' (U+2018), or the
character defined by the user as the 'end quote' for single quotes
autocorrection, depending on whether there is a user-defined replacement or
not.

Only three specific phrases, and even these only if single quotes
autocorrection is disabled, finally will have the apostrophe (U+0027) replaced
with the correct symbol (U+2019) – "geht's", "gibt's" and "wird's" – because
these three replacements are explicitly included in DocumentList.xml file
within the acor_de.dat archive.



Expected Results:
The apostrophe being inserted is the unicode character 'RIGHT SINGLE QUOTATION
MARK' (U+2019).


Reproducible: Always


User Profile Reset: Yes


OpenGL enabled: Yes

Additional Info:
Three remarks:

1. Even when used as an apostrophe, it's surely sensible to not replace the
U+0027 apostrophe character with a typographic character if such an
autocorrection would not be wanted, but the enabled/disabled state of 'single
quotes' autocorrection is not the proper place, semantically, for deciding what
is to be done with a genuine apostrophe. For a user, changing something within
'single quotes' autocorrection settings should not have an effect on how
genuine apostrophes are handled. The only real solution to this problem might
be to include a third, separate settings option for 'apostrophes' beside
'single quotes' and 'double quotes'. 

2. Sometimes an apostrophe can be used at a word's end (for marking the
genitive of nouns ending in s, ß, z, x: "Delacroix' Gemälde", the painting by
Delacroix). If we get a correct typographic character there, it's only because
by pure chance the currently used 'end quote' for 'single quotes' is the same
symbol. Depending on the overall typography someone wants to use, this does not
need to be the case. 

3. To the best of my knowledge, even the implementation for English text (I
tried English-UK) solves the problem only partly. Autocorrection of the U+0027
character used as an apostrophe within a word is dependent on whether "single
quotes" autocorrection is enabled or not, too. Only if this is enabled, and
only if the user has not defined a custom "end quote" for "single quotes",
autocorrection correctly inserts U+2019 as the typographic apostrophe symbol.

To get the same behaviour for German text would already improve things, even if
it wouldn't solve the underlying problem, which is the behaviour of apostrophes
being dependent on the settings for single quotes.

----------

Version: 6.3.3.2
Build-ID: 1:6.3.3-0ubuntu0.18.04.1~lo1
CPU-Threads: 4; BS: Linux 5.3; UI-Render: Standard; VCL: gtk3; 
Gebietsschema: de-DE (de_DE.UTF-8); UI-Sprache: de-DE
Calc: threaded

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