A couple of multilingual questions

[David Webber]

Me again :) Continuing to stress-test your lovely software.

I'm getting to grips with the multilingual support and have a couple of questions:

1. I understand that the installer-language selector which comes up at the
start, comes up in the default language of the Windows installation on the
machine. I haven't tested that yet, but I don't doubt it. It certainly
comes up in English for me - even though I am not using "English-US".

However my available languages are currently Dutch, English, French, Spanish, Swedish, and the dialogue comes up leaving Dutch as the default selection in the drop-down box! It would be nice if it were English (for an English computer)! :)

[It occurred to me that either it shows the first alphabetically for
everyone, or that it is trying to set the machine's language to be the
default in the drop-down, and failing because it isn't recognising non-US
dialects of English at that point. I notice that there's a %CURLNG% variable which must be the machine's language code. I am used to them in hexadecimal, but yes mine is 2057 (=0x809=UK English) whereas I select English-US and get %SELLNG%=1033. (=0x409=US English). ]

2. I notice that Swedish translations for the default text entries are not provided. That's fair enough - but I am resolved to provide language versions in any language where I have volunteers to translate in exchange for a free upgrade, and one of them happens to be Swedish. Question: does the default language selector at the start come up in all the languages on your list? In particular Swedish?

3. A very minor comment indeed: "Spanish (traditional sort)" looks a little bit odd as a language label. As far as I can see, most sources, including Microsoft, call it "Spanish (Castilian)" to distinguish it from other Iberian and Latin American dialects. Just a thought.

Dave

[linder]

Hi Dave,

I think it always selects the first language (we have to check this).

BTW, there is a nice "Radio Button Demo 2.sb6" example available that demonstrates how to display your own language selection dialog. This gives you more control and flexibility. What do you think?

Unfortunately, we do not have a translation for the Swedish language available (at the moment). We have quite a few Swedish customers but they all distribute to English speaking customers :(

BTW, this is from MSDN (for language ID 1034):

Spanish (Traditional Sort) 1034

And this is an interesting link:

http://www.microsoft.com/globaldev/DrIntl/columns/017/default.mspx

So I think "traditional sort" is correct <g>

Friedrich

[David Webber]

Hi again,

> I think it always selects the first language (we have to check this).<

It *would* be nice if it could find the machine's language on the list as the initial default. Just a minor thing really.

> BTW, there is a nice "Radio Button Demo 2.sb6" example available that demonstrates how to display your own language selection dialog. This gives you more control and flexibility. What do you think?"

I saw in the help that this was a possibility, but the provided system seemed so close to what I would have done anyway. I'll have a look - even if only to reward my Swedish friend for his efforts :)

> Unfortunately, we do not have a translation for the Swedish language available (at the moment). We have quite a few Swedish customers but they all distribute to English speaking customers<

In my experience many Swedes speak excellent English. As I say, my language module policy is based more on the availability of volunteers to translate than on commercial considerations. But if I don't find a German friend soon I am going to have to start twisting arms as my German is only "nearly good enough" :( and German speakers form a major European population.

> BTW, this is from MSDN (for language ID 1034):
> Spanish (Traditional Sort) 1034
> http://www.microsoft.com/globaldev/DrIntl/columns/017/default.mspx

Ok. It was only a minor point, but it still looks a bit odd - maybe it's just me. I have met these numbers as part of a VERSIONINFO structure in the past and am used to documentation like

http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms933150.aspx :)

"Traditional Spanish" or "Standard Spanish" may also be clearer to those whose geography doesn't run as far as Castile ;)

Thanks for your comments,

Dave

[linder]

Hi Dave,

> It *would* be nice if it could find the machine's language on the list as
> the initial default. Just a minor thing really.

I agree! We are working on this now :)

> In my experience many Swedes speak excellent English. As I say, my
> language module policy is based more on the availability of volunteers to
> translate than on commercial considerations. But if I don't find a German
> friend soon I am going to have to start twisting arms as my German is only
> "nearly good enough" and German speakers form a major European
> population.

:)

> Ok. It was only a minor point, but it still looks a bit odd - maybe it's
> just me. I have met these numbers as part of a VERSIONINFO structure in the
> past and am used to documentation like
>
> http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms933150.aspx
>
> "Traditional Spanish" or "Standard Spanish" may also be clearer to those
> whose geography doesn't run as far as Castile

Just found some information about this in our old development documentation.
Some years ago we decided to follow the List of Locale ID (LCID) Values as
Assigned by Microsoft:

http://www.microsoft.com/globaldev/reference/lcid-all.mspx

Thanks again for all your valuable feedback!

Friedrich

[David Webber]

>> It *would* be nice if it could find the machine's language on the list as
>> the initial default. Just a minor thing really.

> I agree! We are working on this now :)

Great. :)

> Just found some information about this in our old development documentation.
Some years ago we decided to follow the List of Locale ID (LCID) Values as
Assigned by Microsoft:

http://www.microsoft.com/globaldev/reference/lcid-all.mspx<

Fair enough then. :)

Dave