An effective way to Localize my Revolution Projects for Multiple Languages

[Scott Rossi]

Recently, Derek Bump wrote:

> Now before I start down my typical path of re-inventing the wheel, I
> felt I should ask this question of the list, just to see if anyone has
> found an effective way of working with Localized (multiple-language)
> projects.
> ...
> - Placing all text in a file, and then just translating the file to
> multiple languages when building the standalone would be preferred, but
> that would require some massive scripting to populate button and field
> labels, etc.
> ...
> Any ideas? ... Please!

I've used the above technique in the past.  I used a minimal numeric tag
system where each control label in the app referenced an ID in an external
text file: <1001>xyz text</1001> at startup.  You could use a named tag as
well: <welcome>Willkommen</welcome>.

I disagree that this requires massive scripting.  IMO, the flexibility
outweighs the required scripting efforts, especially if you need multiple
languages and have to share the translation docs with 3rd party translators.
A text file is way easier to manage than forcing someone to get into Rev's
IDE.

You'll probably want to use Unicode -- my understanding is the current
Unicode implementation is a bit limited in Rev but I believe searching the
mail archives may help address some of the issues you might run into.

BTW, if you decide to go this route, remember to have translators use a
simple text editor (ie WordPad, NotePad, etc).  Do not allow the use of Word
or any other heavyweight text editor since these apps may add formatting
garbage to the text which will make text parsing difficult.

Other folks may offer different suggestions.

Regards,

Scott Rossi
Creative Director
Tactile Media, Multimedia & Design
-----
E: scott at tactilemedia.com
W: http://www.tactilemedia.com