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alfred_e.txt
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1993-05-02
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Using ALFRED_E.DIC
(What, me worry?)
SETUP:
This German-English translation dictionary is created for use with GER2EN19.PRG
or GER2EN21.PRG. For GER2EN19, rename the dictionary to 'GER2EN19.DIC'. For
GER2EN21, you may use any legal name, but the file extender must be '.G2E'.
If you use more than one dictionary with GER2EN21, be sure that this dictionary
is so named that it is loaded first.
CONVENTIONS:
German words in the dictionary must be in capital letters.
'Ä' is written as 'AE'
'Ö' is written as 'OE'
'Ü' is written as 'UE'
'ß' is written as 'SS'
This means that you can use a text editor to add dictionary words without
having to access special characters on your keyboard.
'«»' these brackets enclose the alternate meanings for a word. The first
bracket follows the primary meaning with no space.
'√' is used to separate alternate meanings if there is more than one.
'†' shows that other meanings exist - use your dictionary if none of the
meanings shown make sense.
'††' indicates that I was unsure of the meaning, but context-guessed.
'²' indicates that the word is a German proper name - a person's or firm's
name, a placename, etc.
'³' indicates that the word is a German computer program name, specific German
computer term. etc.
'∙' indicates that the word has meaning ONLY as part of a phrase - meaning
that it's search-the-dictionary time.
If you need to use any of these symbols while in GER2EN19, the following will
insert them:
<ALT>c = «
<ALT>v = »
<ALT>6 = √
<ALT>4 = ²
<ALT>5 = ³
PURPOSE:
This dictionary has a limited purpose: to make possible (I didn't say easy)
translation of German Atari related writings. This includes program
documentation, on-disk magazine articles, and German .RSC file text.
This dictionary is formatted for the GER2ENxx programs. A separate archive
contains the same dictionary formatted to work with MULTLANG.ACC, the
single-word translator. You may well find it useful to have MULTLANG.ACC on
hand while translating a doc with GER2ENxx.PRG. If you have an unrecognized
compound word, GER2ENG19.PRG likely will have the first part of that word
displayed (which is why I prefer it to version 2.1). You can search for the
second word without going to a paper dictionary by using MULTLANG.ACC.
STRENGTHS/WEAKNESSES:
First, this dictionary was developed by translating available German docs and
PD Journal articles. Not only do computer documents involve 'computerese', but
as all programs including games "do" something, translations must deal with the
"do" words. This dictionary should prove pretty strong in text editor and word
processor usage, and somewhat less so for graphics programs. The dictionary
includes a fair amount of spreadsheet, statistics, mathematics and hardware
terminology. No music or midi documentation was translated, so expect weakness
in this area. There are some PD Journal articles on games in the GERMANY RT on
GEnie, but I did not use them in building this dictionary.
LIMITATIONS:
On the English side of the commas, you'll notice that many words display
multiple meanings. As GER2ENxx is not context-sensitive and is capable only of
reading one line of 'meaning' for any given German word, this complication
cannot be avoided. Though the translated text may at first appear to be a
jumble, some patience and practice will enable you to efficiently scan
sentences for their meaning. I've found it easiest to take a doc one paragraph
at a time and 'rewrite' it in English rather than individually delete the
inapplicable meanings. More about that later.
NOT PAINLESS DEPARTMENT:
You will unavoidably need a good German-English dictionary to translate words
that are not in this dictionary file. I have used the 'Harper-Collins German
Dictionary' (paperback, collegiate level, very readable typeface, printed on
very white paper) and 'Cassell's German Dictionary', which is much more
comprehensive, but also much harder on the eyes, and harder to use by virtue of
its sheer size. Whatever dictionary you may use, be sure it is an up to date
edition - popular computer usage is a pretty new phenomenon.
You may find some misspellings in the German docs that you translate. You can
either translate the misspellings or use a desk accessory text editor such as
STeno to correct the spelling without leaving GER2ENG.
I have strived to conform meanings to those used by English computer usage
conventions. By translating quite a number of German Atari-related Docs, I've
developed the English word translations so that you should be able to get the
'sense' of almost all sentences. Inevitably a new program will contain some
program-specific words; the program's name and perhaps some specific file
extenders at the least. You will have to add these translations.
This dictionary does not pretend to be perfect, or comprehensive. At 24,000
'words', it cannot translate very word of every document.
DICTIONARY ADDITIONS:
I have placed 'ZZZZZZZ,END OF DICTIONARY!!!' as an end of file marker.
GER2ENxx will append your added words to the end of the text file. If you want
to upload supplements to this dictionary, place all the words you add with a
text editor below the marker. Then you can simply index or sort the addendum
and upload it.
If you are fluent in German, you may wish to make corrections in this dictionary
and reupload it, but keep in mind that Atari computer usage must be primary.
PREPARING THE DOCUMENT FOR TRANSLATION:
Many of the docs I've seen are hyphenated. You'll need to do some scutwork
here, using a text editor to recombine the hyphenated words. Don't worry about
ragged margins - your line lengths are going to be pretty wild when the doc
emerges translated from GER2EN.
Additionally, if you use GER2EN19, you must have a space at the end of each
line. Version 1.9 does not recognize a CR/LF as a word separator. You can add
the space manually (ouch!) or use a disk editor (I use Disk Mechanic from STart
magazine). Working in hex on a disk editor, you have the program search for all
occurrences of '0D' and replace with '200D'.
USING A TEXT EDITOR FOR FINAL TRANSLATION:
First, I strongly recommend that you use the English version of 7UP as your
text editor. With 7UP you can (memory permitting) load the English translation,
the original German doc and the dictionary file. 7UP's search/replace function
is amazingly fast.
IMPORTANT: set the text editor's line length for at least 140 columns. This
should be enough to avoid having your translation's lines split - much easier
to check a line against the German if the lines stay intact.
IMPORTANT: If you use GER2EN19, DO NOT save the German doc from 7UP. 7UP
eliminates spaces at the end of lines when saving, and you need those spaces.
Load the translated doc into your text editor. Looks intimidating, no?
⇩ ⇩ ⇩ ⇩ ⇩ ⇩ ⇩
_________________________________________________________________________
This is a sample of GER2EN 'raw' translation:
The«this√that»which†» Installation
WORDFLAIR is«are» a«an√one» complete in(to) GEM integrated
Program. This«these» goes«works» as far as, that you«it√MAN³» for«as√by» (the) Print out«express†» and for other«further» as«than√also»
the«this√that»which†» System character set the«this√that»which†» GDOSⁿExpansion needs. Two
GDOSⁿVersions as well«soon» as Character sets for some«several» Printer is«are» in the
Archive included contain. With«by» AMCGDOS worker WORDFLAIR indeed
(still«further√else√nor»?) not together.
__________________________________________________________________________
If you just 'clean up' this translation, it'll look like this:
Installation
WORDFLAIR is a completely into GEM integrated Program. This goes as far as,
that you for Print out and for other than the System character set the GDOSⁿ
Expansion needs. Two GDOSⁿVersions as well as Character sets for several
Printers are in the Archive included. With AMCGDOS worker WORDFLAIR indeed
(still?) not together.
__________________________________________________________________________
But (with familiarity) it's easier to learn to read the translation for meaning
and then do a 'paraphrasal' like this:
Installation
WORDFLAIR is completely GEM-compatible. This means that you must use GDOS for
printing and for everything except the system character set for scrren display.
Two GDOS versions as well as character sets for a number of printers are
included in the WORDFLAIR package. WORDFLAIR (still?) is not compatible with
AMCGDOS.
___________________________________________________________________________
SOME TIPS
In German, the nouns are capitalized. Good thing to remember as many translated
words will show both noun and verb meanings.
Prepositions ('of' in particular) can be implied rather than shown.
Syntax is 'backwards' for an English reader. Verb most often precedes the subject
of the sentence. If the sentence contains a conditional verb like 'can switch' as
shown here, the 'condition' may be early in the sentence and the main verb appear
at the end of the sentence:
With an Icon can you between the† Representation (of) the
Contents and (of) the By the name of a Field switch.
Your GER2EN translation percentage should be between 90% and 95% for most docs.
If it is much lower and you notice a lot of unrecognized compound words showing
at the left of GER2EN's screen, then you haven't added a space at the end of
each line - the last word of the line is being combined into a compound with the
first word of the following line.
I'M NOT AS COMPULSIVE AS I USED TO BE... HONEST - CAN I GO HOME NOW?
ALFRED_E.DIC is the product of almost four month's compulsive work which began
with my deciding to add to and make corrections in the 270k dictionary that
Carlos Varela furnished with GER2EN19. Though I probably will continue to make
additions and corrections as time goes by, it's time to go back to living like
a human being. ALFRED_E is far from perfect, but should prove useful.
Please - if you have corrections to make, post them in the new 'GER2ENG:' topic
in Category 13, Topic 3 of GEnie's ST Roundtable. I'll incorporate them in the
dictionary. If you develop a supplement (added words), please upload it.
Mike Valent (GEnie address: A.VALENT) May 1, 1993