Publisher: local translation

[Pyanepsion]

The translation of Publisher into French, and probably into other languages, is a horror.

How, where, can we translate the local into our own language, as is the case in the vast majority of modern software?

That is extremely important. I had asked this question in the bug part of the forum, but the designers obviously did not realize that their language is no longer the center of the world [as in the 1950s] and that it is migrating to 4th place.

In short! We find the mistakes of the translator’s beginner in the way of Google translate which confuses un espace (masculine, an expanse) with une espace (feminine, Initially, a metal rod used to create spaces between words, and, from there, the electronic character), or even laughable: Capitales en petites capitales.

There are also huge contradictions coming from:

– the different typographical rules in American and French typography, for example the notion of prices totally out of phase, between the two cultures;

– and on the other hand the poverty of the English vocabulary with, for example, for the word size there is 18 different words in French for the context in DTP where there is only one in English (size only translated taille), or even (a font)  the confusion between une police and une fonte;

– and finally word lengths and therefore very lower menu in English, with for example OK in English which will translate Confirmer in French. This brings truncated words into the interface. Let us also not forget the incongruous abbreviations that are used here and there.

[Alfred]

24 minutes ago, Pyanepsion said:

the confusion between une police and une fonte

I was under the impression that a font is « une police » in French. What is « une fonte » ?

(The capitales/majuscules thing is rather silly.)

[Pyanepsion]

11 minutes ago, Alfred said:

What is « une fonte » ?

This is one of many examples.

– Une police is a set of glyphs, that is to say, visual representations of characters from the same family, which groups together all the bodies and fats of the same family, whose style is coordinated, in order to form an alphabet , or the representation of all the characters of a language, complete and coherent.

– Une fonte is the set of characters corresponding to the same body, fat, and italic characteristics within the same font. For example :

Garamond is a typeface (police de caractères);
the bold Roman Garamond 12 points is a set of characters (une fonte).

[Alfred]

2 hours ago, Pyanepsion said:

This is one of many examples.

– Une police is a set of glyphs, that is to say, visual representations of characters from the same family, which groups together all the bodies and fats of the same family, whose style is coordinated, in order to form an alphabet , or the representation of all the characters of a language, complete and coherent.

– Une fonte is the set of characters corresponding to the same body, fat, and italic characteristics within the same font. For example :

Garamond is a typeface (police de caractères);
the bold Roman Garamond 12 points is a set of characters (une fonte).

So, a font family is « une police » and a single font within that family is « une fonte » (but it sounds a little as though you’re saying that Garamond Bold 12pt is a different « fonte » from Garamond Bold 14pt).

[R C-R]

Just as a side note, Roget's Thesaurus lists over 30 synonyms for the English language word "size." Even for native English speakers, it is not always easy to choose the best word or phrase, particularly in technical contexts.

[Pyanepsion]

7 hours ago, Alfred said:

Garamond Bold 12pt is a different « fonte » from Garamond Bold 14pt. 

I never thought I’d get that far.

Yes, in the case of matrix fonts.

Where it gets complicated is that in the case of vector fonts, the file contains in the most common formats, the different sizes ( Obviously, since this is the function of these fonts). It cannot, however, combine the different fats, roman or italic versions, etc. in the same file.

So the police Garamon in 12 and Garamon in 14 will be part of the vector police, but Garamon 12 bold and Garamon 12 Italic will be part of two different sets.