home
***
CD-ROM
|
disk
|
FTP
|
other
***
search
/
OS/2 Shareware BBS: 6 File
/
06-File.zip
/
eracer2.zip
/
LANGUAGE.TXT
< prev
next >
Wrap
Text File
|
1998-03-26
|
6KB
|
143 lines
E-Racer/2 is easy to translate into most languages. Lets start with
ENGLISH.MSG.
ENGLISH.MSG is a list of most of the English phrases used by
E-Racer/2 on screens, error messages and menus. Each phrase has an index
number like so:
000021 'Problem adding file to master list: '
000022 'Scanning '
000023 ' Registration Information '
000024 'Sorting'
000025 'Pruning'
Translation of each phrase is as easy as overwriting the English
phrase with the same message in your native language:
000021 'foo bar blabba stuff: '
000022 'blabba foo '
000023 ' BlabbaBlabba FoooooBlaba '
000024 'BlabbaStuff'
000025 'FooStuff'
Not that my translation into "pseudo-caveman" left in formatting
charaters - spaces at ends of lines and colon (:) characters. Many
of the phrases found in ENGLISH.MSG are concatenated with other
phrases, and spaces may be important. Experiment!
Use E.EXE or equivalent as the editor for this file. Word processors
will probably NOT work unless you really know what you are doing.
You can use "high ASCII" characters if need be. Don't delete the
single quotes at each end of the line. You don't need to "double up"
single quotes inside the two end quotes:
Correct: 000099 'This is Kevin's good example'
Incorrect: 000099 'This is Kevin''s bad example'
Each line should end with a standard DOS CR/LF sequence. Trailing
spaces after the end quote and before the CR/LF are ignored. Don't use TAB
characters. Don't use some UNIX or Mac editor that uses only CR or
LF or some other weird permutation of end-of-line characters.
Some of the Phrases that have an ampersand (&) in them are menu items
or entry screen fields with a "hotkey". The letter to the right of
the '&' is the hotkey for that item. You can move the & to a letter more
appropriate for your language, or remove it if you like. If you
remove it, there will be no hotkey for that field or menu item.
Example:
000125 '&First Path To Search:' -> 'F' is the hotkey for this field
000126 '&Second Path To Search:' -> 'S' is the hotkey for this field
Don't change phrases that start with a colon and are in all lower
case:
000308 ':gif'
000309 ':pcx'
000310 ':bmp'
The phrases above (and others like them) are used in the local INI file.
You can change them if you really want, but it may make E-Racer/2 forget the
last INI file settings you used with English phrases. It will also make it
difficult for me to troubleshoot any tech support problems you might have
with the INI file (ERACER2.INI, not OS2.INI).
Don't try to change the supported File Suffixes (Smart Viewer) here.
ENGLISH.MSG only has the default file suffixes used when the INI file
is missing. Change Smart Viewer settings by editing the INI file
itself. See DOCs for more info.
The best way to translate the screen messages is to make "screen
dumps" of each of the screens you want to translate. Find the
corresponding message in the ENGLISH.MSG file, and try to translate
it into a phrase in your language that will fit on the screen.
Note that some phrases are used in more than one place!
So, how do you compile the new phrases into the ENGLISH.MSX binary
format? Easy - just put the modified ENGLISH.MSG file into your
ERACER2.EXE subdirectory and run E-Racer/2. It will automatically
compile the phrases if the MSG is newer thant the MSX. You can
delete the MSG after compilation, but I don't recommend this.
Don't forget to send me a copy of translated MSG files so I can make
them available to other speakers of your language. No nasty words
please - I will verify your translation accuracy with other
independent sources prior to bundling them in future versions.
I will be happy to give you credit in the About Box, if you provide me
with a good translation.
------------------------------------------------------------------
Translating Help text
The text for online help is found in ERACER2.TXT. Since this file
contains cross referenced help topics, it is a little complex to deal
with. Additionally, you need a special compiler to change the TXT
file into a HLP file. If you are interested in translating this
file, please write us at eracer2@idk-inc.com. Feel free to begin
translation, and I will be happy to compile it for you and send you
the results. Again, use a standard text editor.
The following are examples of help topic numbers. You can change the
text part, but DO NOT change the topic numbers! Topic names must
match in all cross references.
!CONST
File = 1
Settings = 2
Run = 3
Quit = 4
Run1 = 5
Help = 6
General Help = 7
About Box = 8
Register = 9
Cross referenced topics are indicated by:
General HelpGeneral Help
The spade character () marks the text as a hypertext link (cross
reference). The club character () marks the actual index that will
be activated if you click on the link with the mouse.
"!LINE" inserts a line break;
"!Topic Help" marks the following block of text as belonging to the
topic "Help"
"!Index 7" marks the following block of text as belonging to index #7
- the seventh item in the index list.
"!NOINDEX" marks the block of text as being only available as a help
topic or cross reference. The block will not appear in the Help index
list.
"xxxxx" makes "xxxxx" appear in an alternate color.
";" at the beginning of a line marks the line as a comment. It does
not appear in the help.