# GNU Guile warning: failed to install locale **URL:** \ **Category:** Guix\ **Created:** [February 4, 2024, 7:51pm UTC](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/t/gnu-guile-warning-failed-to-install-locale/205 "2024-02-04T19:51:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![fyrfaras](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex029/user_avatar/forum.systemcrafters.net/fyrfaras/32/25_2.png) [@fyrfaras](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/u/fyrfaras)\ **Post date:** [February 4, 2024, 7:51pm UTC](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/t/gnu-guile-warning-failed-to-install-locale/205/1 "2024-02-04T19:51:57Z")
Hello everybunny šŸ‡ , Iā€™ve installed GNU Guile over Guix on my Debian VM recently. Iā€™m able to use guile(1) but I always get the message: ```auto guile: warning: failed to install locale warning: failed to install locale: Invalid argument ``` at the beginning. Installing `glibc-locales` and `glibc-utf8-locales-2.29` didnā€™t resolve the issue. My guile(1) version is `GNU Guile 3.0.9`. Is someone having the same issue? Bunny regards Fyrfaras šŸ‡ ---
**Author:** ![ashraz](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex029/user_avatar/forum.systemcrafters.net/ashraz/32/509_2.png) [@ashraz](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/u/ashraz)\ **Post date:** [February 4, 2024, 8:42pm UTC](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/t/gnu-guile-warning-failed-to-install-locale/205/2 "2024-02-04T20:42:07Z")
> [@fyrfaras](#): > > Is someone having the same issue? Iā€™m neither a Guix user, nor a Guile user, but letā€™s try. I guess that `guix shell guile -- guile` reproduces the behavior. So letā€™s use `strace` to see whether something interesting happens before the warning: ```shell guix shell guile glibc-locales strace -- strace guile --version |& grep -E "warning:.*install locale" -B6 ``` ```auto openat(AT_FDCWD, "/run/current-system/locale/2.33/en_US.UTF-8/LC_IDENTIFICATION", O_RDONLY|O_CLOEXEC) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory) openat(AT_FDCWD, "/run/current-system/locale/2.33/en_US.utf8/LC_IDENTIFICATION", O_RDONLY|O_CLOEXEC) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory) openat(AT_FDCWD, "/run/current-system/locale/2.33/en_US/LC_IDENTIFICATION", O_RDONLY|O_CLOEXEC) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory) openat(AT_FDCWD, "/run/current-system/locale/2.33/en.UTF-8/LC_IDENTIFICATION", O_RDONLY|O_CLOEXEC) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory) openat(AT_FDCWD, "/run/current-system/locale/2.33/en.utf8/LC_IDENTIFICATION", O_RDONLY|O_CLOEXEC) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory) openat(AT_FDCWD, "/run/current-system/locale/2.33/en/LC_IDENTIFICATION", O_RDONLY|O_CLOEXEC) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory) write(2, "guile: warning: failed to instal"..., 41guile: warning: failed to install locale ``` In case you donā€™t know `openat(...)`, itā€™s what actually opens files. Or at least tries to. In this case, the `openat` call returns `ENOENT`: the file does not exist. My `LANG` environment variable is `en_US.UTF-8`, which explains all those tries. Either way, this shows that the locale system looks for the locales within `/run/current-system`, a path that does not exist on Debian. I guess that `/run/current-system/` is a Guix thing about the, well, current system configuration, but thatā€™s not available on Debian. However, the important part here is that _my_ `LANG` was used within the `guix shell` environment. The issue vanishes as soon as we use a `--pure` (or `--container`) shell, as this wonā€™t transfer the `LANG` env: ```shell $ guix shell --pure guile glibc-locales strace -- strace guile --version |& grep -E "warning:.*install locale" -B6 ``` No output, therefore no warning. So all in all, I guess this is an issue of Guix@Debian not setting the `current-system` correctly. ---
**Author:** ![ryuslash](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex029/user_avatar/forum.systemcrafters.net/ryuslash/32/66_2.png) [@ryuslash](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/u/ryuslash)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2024, 12:12am UTC](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/t/gnu-guile-warning-failed-to-install-locale/205/3 "2024-02-05T00:12:45Z")
Iā€™ve seen that message pop up as well from time to time, but now I canā€™t reproduce it. I donā€™t know if this helps at all, but since you donā€™t mention it Iā€™ll ask: did you also set the `GUIX_LOCPATH` environment variable mentioned in the documentation? > **[Application Setup (GNU Guix Reference Manual)](https://guix.gnu.org/manual/en/html_node/Application-Setup.html)** > > Application Setup (GNU Guix Reference Manual) ---
**Author:** ![ennoausberlin](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex029/user_avatar/forum.systemcrafters.net/ennoausberlin/32/37_2.png) [@ennoausberlin](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/u/ennoausberlin)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2024, 2:38pm UTC](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/t/gnu-guile-warning-failed-to-install-locale/205/4 "2024-02-05T14:38:09Z")
Some distributions differ where to set environment variables for login shells or other shells. Putting to GUIX\_LOC\_PATH into .bashrc works here on ASAHI Ubuntu ---
**Author:** ![ashraz](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex029/user_avatar/forum.systemcrafters.net/ashraz/32/509_2.png) [@ashraz](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/u/ashraz)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2024, 5:02pm UTC](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/t/gnu-guile-warning-failed-to-install-locale/205/5 "2024-02-05T17:02:08Z")
Great find! Can confirm that this works. > **Without the environment variable** > > ```sh > $ guix shell guile glibc-locales strace -- strace -e trace=openat guile --version |& grep -E "warning|locale" > > ``` > > ```auto > openat(AT_FDCWD, "/run/current-system/locale/2.33/locale-archive", O_RDONLY|O_CLOEXEC) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory) > openat(AT_FDCWD, "/gnu/store/5h2w4qi9hk1qzzgi1w83220ydslinr4s-glibc-2.33/share/locale/locale.alias", O_RDONLY|O_CLOEXEC) = 3 > openat(AT_FDCWD, "/run/current-system/locale/2.33/en_US.UTF-8/LC_IDENTIFICATION", O_RDONLY|O_CLOEXEC) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory) > openat(AT_FDCWD, "/run/current-system/locale/2.33/en_US.utf8/LC_IDENTIFICATION", O_RDONLY|O_CLOEXEC) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory) > openat(AT_FDCWD, "/run/current-system/locale/2.33/en_US/LC_IDENTIFICATION", O_RDONLY|O_CLOEXEC) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory) > openat(AT_FDCWD, "/run/current-system/locale/2.33/en.UTF-8/LC_IDENTIFICATION", O_RDONLY|O_CLOEXEC) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory) > openat(AT_FDCWD, "/run/current-system/locale/2.33/en.utf8/LC_IDENTIFICATION", O_RDONLY|O_CLOEXEC) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory) > openat(AT_FDCWD, "/run/current-system/locale/2.33/en/LC_IDENTIFICATION", O_RDONLY|O_CLOEXEC) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory) > guile: warning: failed to install locale > > ``` > **With the environment variable** > > ```sh > $ GUIX_LOCPATH=$HOME/.guix-profile/lib/locale guix shell guile glibc-locales strace -- strace -e trace=openat guile --version |& grep -E "warning|locale" > > ``` > > ```auto > openat(AT_FDCWD, "/gnu/store/5h2w4qi9hk1qzzgi1w83220ydslinr4s-glibc-2.33/share/locale/locale.alias", O_RDONLY|O_CLOEXEC) = 3 > openat(AT_FDCWD, "/home/ashraz/.guix-profile/lib/locale/2.33/en_US.UTF-8/LC_IDENTIFICATION", O_RDONLY|O_CLOEXEC) = 3 > openat(AT_FDCWD, "/home/ashraz/.guix-profile/lib/locale/2.33/en_US.UTF-8/LC_MEASUREMENT", O_RDONLY|O_CLOEXEC) = 3 > openat(AT_FDCWD, "/home/ashraz/.guix-profile/lib/locale/2.33/en_US.UTF-8/LC_TELEPHONE", O_RDONLY|O_CLOEXEC) = 3 > openat(AT_FDCWD, "/home/ashraz/.guix-profile/lib/locale/2.33/en_US.UTF-8/LC_ADDRESS", O_RDONLY|O_CLOEXEC) = 3 > openat(AT_FDCWD, "/home/ashraz/.guix-profile/lib/locale/2.33/en_US.UTF-8/LC_NAME", O_RDONLY|O_CLOEXEC) = 3 > openat(AT_FDCWD, "/home/ashraz/.guix-profile/lib/locale/2.33/en_US.UTF-8/LC_PAPER", O_RDONLY|O_CLOEXEC) = 3 > openat(AT_FDCWD, "/home/ashraz/.guix-profile/lib/locale/2.33/en_US.UTF-8/LC_MESSAGES", O_RDONLY|O_CLOEXEC) = 3 > openat(AT_FDCWD, "/home/ashraz/.guix-profile/lib/locale/2.33/en_US.UTF-8/LC_MESSAGES/SYS_LC_MESSAGES", O_RDONLY|O_CLOEXEC) = 3 > openat(AT_FDCWD, "/home/ashraz/.guix-profile/lib/locale/2.33/en_US.UTF-8/LC_MONETARY", O_RDONLY|O_CLOEXEC) = 3 > openat(AT_FDCWD, "/home/ashraz/.guix-profile/lib/locale/2.33/en_US.UTF-8/LC_COLLATE", O_RDONLY|O_CLOEXEC) = 3 > openat(AT_FDCWD, "/home/ashraz/.guix-profile/lib/locale/2.33/en_US.UTF-8/LC_TIME", O_RDONLY|O_CLOEXEC) = 3 > openat(AT_FDCWD, "/home/ashraz/.guix-profile/lib/locale/2.33/en_US.UTF-8/LC_NUMERIC", O_RDONLY|O_CLOEXEC) = 3 > openat(AT_FDCWD, "/home/ashraz/.guix-profile/lib/locale/2.33/en_US.UTF-8/LC_CTYPE", O_RDONLY|O_CLOEXEC) = 3 > > # snip, rest not relevant. no warning though! > > ``` So @fyrfaras, you want to set the `GUIX_LOCPATH` as described within ` info "(guix) Application Setup"` (e.g. use `export GUIX_LOCPATH=$HOME/.guix-profile/lib/locale` in your `.profile` or your shellā€™s equivalent) šŸ™‚ ---
**Author:** ![daviwil](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex029/user_avatar/forum.systemcrafters.net/daviwil/32/1_2.png) [@daviwil](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/u/daviwil)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2024, 5:25pm UTC](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/t/gnu-guile-warning-failed-to-install-locale/205/6 "2024-02-05T17:25:57Z")
Yep, this is a common pitfall of using Guix as a package manager and these steps are required on ā€œforeignā€ distributions. ---
**Author:** ![ryuslash](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex029/user_avatar/forum.systemcrafters.net/ryuslash/32/66_2.png) [@ryuslash](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/u/ryuslash)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2024, 6:19pm UTC](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/t/gnu-guile-warning-failed-to-install-locale/205/7 "2024-02-05T18:19:57Z")
Yeah the first little while I used it I had these troubles, Iā€™m really thankful that this page was in the documentation šŸ˜ƒ There are still some issues I donā€™t know how to get around, thoughā€¦ sometimes trying to install things from the AUR (btw I use Arch) fails to compile because it mistakenly tries to build against the wrong libc or glib or something along those lines. Going full-in on Guix fixes that, but sometimes itā€™s easier to do `yay -S some-package` than `guix shell --pure coreutils bash gcc pkg-config dep1 dep2 dep3 ...` šŸ™‚ ---
**Author:** ![fyrfaras](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex029/user_avatar/forum.systemcrafters.net/fyrfaras/32/25_2.png) [@fyrfaras](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/u/fyrfaras)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2024, 9:07pm UTC](https://forum.systemcrafters.net/t/gnu-guile-warning-failed-to-install-locale/205/8 "2024-02-05T21:07:15Z")
Thank you so much everybunny šŸ‡ !! I inserted the `GUIX_LOCPATH` in my `.profile`. Now it works like a charm and there arenā€™t any warnings šŸŽ‡ Thanks again @ashraz, @ryuslash, @ennoausberlin and @daviwil ā¤ @ashraz Your indepth view with `strace` is really cool. For future debuggings I will keep this in mind for my toolbox šŸ§° Also I should rely more on `info` ā„¹