Bug Tracker

ID	316🔗
Submitted by:	Denis Bitouzé
Date:	2026-05-16 13:19:11
Last update:	2026-05-16 14:14:08
Status	Open Sign in if you want to bump this report.
Category	glossaries-extra
Version	2.1
Summary	French instead of English rules applied in case both languages are loaded in this order at \documentclass' level
Cross Ref	315

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Description

When the babel's languages french and english are loaded in this order at \documentclass' level, the rules applied regarding the plural of the short forms of abbreviations are the French ones instead of the English ones. Note that this issue:

doesn't arise if only the english language is loaded,
doesn't arise if the french and english languages are loaded (only) at the \usepackage{babel}' level,
arises with the glossaries package as well.

MWE

Download (739B)

\listfiles
\documentclass[a4paper,french,english]{article}
\usepackage{babel}
\usepackage{glossaries-extra}
\makeglossaries
\newabbreviation{dvd}{DVD}{Digital Video Disc}
\newabbreviation{lug}{LUG}{Linux Users Group}
\begin{document}
\begin{itemize}
\item The current language is English: \today{}.
\item But \texttt{glsxtrabbrvpluralsuffix=\glsxtrabbrvpluralsuffix}.
\item \renewcommand{\glsxtrabbrvpluralsuffix}{s}%
  Despite \verb|\renewcommand{\glsxtrabbrvpluralsuffix}{s}|
  (now \texttt{glsxtrabbrvpluralsuffix=\glsxtrabbrvpluralsuffix}), the
  shortplural forms are not followed by an `s':
  \begin{itemize}
  \item \gls{dvd}, \glspl{dvd}.
  \item \glspl{lug}, \gls{lug}.
  \end{itemize}
\end{itemize}
\printglossary
\end{document}

Evaluation

The plural suffix expands by default when the abbreviation is defined. This allows the suffix to be changed before a block of abbreviations are defined that require a particular suffix.

You can test this with \showgloshortplural{dvd} (after the dvd abbreviation is defined) which shows DVD because the French setting has redefined \glsacrpluralsuffix to expand to nothing. With the language passed through the document class as in your example, French is the language currently in effect when the abbreviations are defined.

If the language settings are passed to babel using

\usepackage[french,main=english]{babel}

Then the language in effect when the abbreviations are defined is English, so \glsacrpluralsuffix expands to \glspluralsuffix which expands to “s”. In this case, \showgloshortplural{dvd} shows DVDs.

If you want to retain the language-sensitive command within the shortplural field you will need to prevent it from expanding:

\renewcommand\glsxtrabbrvpluralsuffix{\noexpand\glsacrpluralsuffix}
\newabbreviation{dvd}{DVD}{Digital Video Disc}
\newabbreviation{lug}{LUG}{Linux Users Group}

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