HOWTO: Set up multi-language support

I had to go through this myself, and I know other people on here are struggling with the same issues, so I'm posting a howto for people who want to be able to switch between multiple languages. Here goes:

Installing a new keyboard layout:
1. Go to System->Preferences->Keyboard
2. Click the "Layouts" tab
3. Click "Add..."
4. Pick your new keyboard layout.

Adding the keyboard layout indicator:
1. Right-click on an empty spot on your Gnome panel.
2. Click "Add to panel..."
3. Select the Keyboard Indicator applet (in Utilities).
4. Click Add.
Whenever you click on this applet, it will toggle between the available keyboard layouts.

Setting up a hotkey combination to switch between keyboard layouts:
(Quick note: Doing this step is VERY IMPORTANT, because if your screen locks, it will only accept your password if you are using your default keyboard layout.)
1. Go to System->Preferences->Keyboard
2. Click the "Layout Options" tab.
3. Click "Group Shift/Lock behavior".
4. Select a hotkey combination.
Now whenever you hit that hotkey combination, Gnome will toggle between available keyboard layouts.

Setting up OpenOffice:
1. Open Synaptic
2. Click "Search"
3. In the search dialog that comes up, type "myspell-" (without the quotes) followed by the two letter language code for the language you want. Select the package that comes up.
4. To enable the user interface (along with word-completion) in the additional language, search for "openoffice.org" (without the quotes) and the two letter language code for the language you want.

To switch between languages in OpenOffice:
1. Click on the Tools menu and then Options.
2. Go to "Language Settings" and then "Languages"
3. To enable spellcheck, under "Default languages for documents", select the language you want to use. If you want to use that language only for the current document, check the "For current document only" box. You may also want to change the Locale setting (dates and whatnot) and Default currency settings to the appropriate language.
4. To change the user interface to the new language, set User interface to the new language.

Help! Non-Latin text looks funny in Nautilus!
(Don't know about all languages that use non-Latin characters, but I know this works for Cyrillic and Arabic fonts.)
1. Go to System->Preferences->Fonts
2. Change the application font and the desktop font to Bitstream Vera Sans Roman.
3. Change the window title font to Bitstream Vera Sans Bold.
4. Click close.

Preview of coming attractions: Setting up templates so you don't have to go through this nonsense with every new document you create.