Front page issue - Language prefix not added

thank you for your response. A fresh night sleep and your return message has me thinking that it is something to do with the variables and the way I've set up my menus.
Here are my variables in my settings file:
$conf['i18n_variables'] = array(
// Site name, slogan, mission, etc..
'site_name',
'site_slogan',
'site_mission',
'site_footer',
'anonymous',
// Node help
'blog_help',
'story_help',
// User configuration
'user_registration_help',
'user_mail_welcome_subject',
'user_mail_welcome_body',
'user_mail_approval_subject',
'user_mail_approval_body',
'user_mail_pass_subject',
'user_mail_pass_body',
// Different front page for eah language
'site_frontpage',
// Primary and secondary links
'menu_primary_links_source',
'menu_secondary_links_source',
// Contact form information
'contact_form_information',
// For theme variables, read more below
'theme_settings',
'theme_garland_settings',
'theme_zen_settings',
);

However, I've created two menus:
en-mainmenu
fr-mainmenu

And in Blocks the settings are:
en-mainmenu - multilanguage setting: English pages - source menu settings: en-mainmenu
fr-mainmenu - multilanguage setting: French pages - source menu settings: fr-mainmenu

In the admin - site building - menus
en-mainmenu
fr-mainmenu
Navigation
Primary links
Secondary links

And in the settings tab on the menu page I have:
Default menu for content set to primary links
Source for the primary links: en-mainmenu (for the English site) fr-mainmenu (for the french site)
Source for the secondary links: No secondary links.

When I play around with those settings nothing changes even after I clear the cache and run cron. Same when I change the variable in the settings file from 'menu_primary_links_source', to 'menu_en_mainmenu_source',

I've set the home page in admin - settings - site information:
home
accueil_fr
it clearly shows on this page that it's a language variable and the address before shows the en and fr prefix respectively.

I think it has something to do with the way I've set up my menus but need some guidance.

Thank you for your help

Thank you for your reply I hadn't thought of that and just tested. Sure enough same trouble but....
Through CSS I disabled the display of the translation switch at the bottom of the page ( a.translation-link {display:none;}) in my Zen subtheme CSS. However in Garland the translation link showed up as text on the bottom of the page and sure enough that link works just fine.
I've enabled it on the Zen theme as well for you to look at. How come that link works perfectly but the language switcher block doesn't?
Surely this means that the issue is not in the menu or with the paths but with the Language Switcher Block.

By the way as I though the issue is the same on both sites
http://www.cims-scic.ca
http://www.octevaw-cocvff.ca/new
I've enabled the text translation link on both sites and those works good just not the Language Switcher Block. The language switcher block has to work for both sites so any help would be greatly appreciated.

Any ideas anyone? I would really appreciate help as I am totally stumped on this one and it

I've used only the variables mentioned above uploaded the settings files, cleared cache and run cron but still no luck.

Hello,

First of all thank you for your help and staying with me to fix this problem.

I've added the block and whne you now view those pages as suggested:
http://www.cims-scic.ca/en/concept
http://www.cims-scic.ca/fr/Concept
the english page says home in the block
the french accueil_fr

I've left the block in place (on the right hand side) for you to see.

Let me know when you've seen it so I can remove it again.

thanks again

Thank you for your help I am going to create a test site and see where I went wrong and if I can create a site without this problem. I'll keep it simple no theme no other modules and slowly keep adding....

In the meantime is there anyone else who has any ideas?

So I've created a test site to see what is happening.
I've installed a clean copy of drupal:

Enabled modules:
Content Translation
Locale
Path
Block Translation
Content Type Translation
Internationalization
String Translation
Syncronize Translation
Taxonomy Translation

Enabled the language block and added it to the header.

Created two pages - home and accueil both of which have a path called home

In site information set homepage to home

At this stage already the language block is not recognizing the home page.

http://www.annelies.ca/cims/
Great sees the home page. Now click on the language switch to see in French and get a 403 Forbidden page. Do a back button in the browser and get a 403 Forbidden page on the /en as well. It just won't go to the fr/home or en/home

I have now add the setting.php file variables but that makes absolutely no difference.

Any help would be really appreciated.

In the meantime I have removed the language switch block on www.cims-scic.ca site and added a hard link redirecting to the respective home page of each language. Not ideal at all. So basically in order to now see the problem have a look at

http://www.annelies.ca/cims/

Thank you anyone for your help.

yes that is the issue on all three sites. Thank you so much for pointing that out.

Ok I've tested the problem and even when not set up as a multisite but just as default the issue still remains.
Basically the front page isn't recognized when clean URL's are enabled.
I noticed there are some other front page issues http://drupal.org/node/614548.
I tried that fix but didn't seem to make any difference.

Is this an i18n problem or clean URL and where should I get help with this?

thanks

Thank you Dominic for your help. You inspired me to restart on the test server. (annelies.ca/cims)
I deleted the database and created a new one. Downloaded Drupal, French translation and i18n module. Installed and did the steps as you mentioned in post above. So the only difference is that the English site now doesn't have a path prefix (previously I had set that to en). And you are right no issue! All works like a charm! I will go step by step to recreate the site. I've started with the module Nice Menus and will test and clear cache with every step to see where the problem starts. Could it be that it's in setting a path prefix on the default (English) site? I'll post here again if and when then problem starts up again.
thanks again for all who helped me figure this out, it's truly appreciated.

Dominic thank you for you response and I am sorry to take so long to respond. It's been a busy week.

This indeed worked for CIMS website and that site works great now. All modules installed and no more issues.
However, the second site mentioned in the post octevaw-cocvff.ca still has the same issue.
I've set up a test site for this
www.octevaw-cocvff.ca/new
I follow your instructions from post #15.
I still however get the 403 error page. As it can't seem to find the french accueil.
So just to follow:
I set up the site according to #15:
I create the english page promoted to the front called home. I translated the page into french called accueil.
I edited the settings.php added the variables and changed the base URL to http://www.octevaw-cocvff.ca/new

Any help on this would be greatly appreciated.

Hello Dominic,

This is copied straigth from my settings file:

$base_url = 'http://www.octevaw-cocvff.ca/new';
$conf['i18n_variables'] = array(
// Site name, slogan, mission, etc..
'site_frontpage'
);

In site admin - site configuration - site information - I have the home page in English set to path home and in french to accueil.
See image attached. I noticed that in the English part is has a slash after new/ but in french it has no slash after fr.
When I try to enter /accueil it gives an error though.

When I turn off the clean URL feature switching works great and I don't have the 403 error at all. Site is defined in default not a multi site.

thanks for your help