Translating GZDoom's text content. Read if you want to help

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Kostov
 
 
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Re: Translating GZDoom's text content. Read if you want to h

Post by Kostov »

Now that we're having GZDoom translated into more and more languages, it's probably best the languages are moved to a list menu instead. As an extra touch that would help differentiate the various languages, I was wondering if flag icons could be added to that list.

Here's an example of what it could look like in 640x480:

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Post by Nash »

The flag idea is cool but the cropped long text won't fly.

Actually I have a generic solution for long labels: scroll them right then left repeatedly. Idea for m8f maybe? ;)
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Post by Gez »

With a list setup like this, I see no reason to have the language names be in both native and English form; especially if flags are added.

Alternatively, you could have the flags aligned, with the native name right-justified to the left, and the English name left-justified to the right.
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Post by Rachael »

With the menu security in effect for GZDoom, the list idea simply will not work, because the bug where the language selection will not save will just come back, unless someone volunteers to find a way to code around it... and one must be very careful how that is done, as well.

And to be honest, I do not consider the language feature anywhere near important enough to justify that amount of work coding that, nor the security risk in doing so, nor the extra work on top of that to make sure that the list menu functions in an intuitive way (ie automatically flipping back to the previous menu after selection).

So does anyone else want to do all that?

It's fine as a little multi-option that it already is, in my opinion. >_>
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Re: Translating GZDoom's text content. Read if you want to h

Post by Captain J »

Undead wrote:Here's an example of what it could look like in 640x480:
Ooooh. Looks promising! But the Espanol strings are unnecessarily long. You might shorten it a little if you can.

Also it's 한국어. Not 한국의(Basically means Korean's.)!
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Post by Graf Zahl »

More importantly, it'd have to be better aligned. About the Korean string, it surely can be changed. Things like this happen if you cannot read the language...
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Post by Negostrike »

Just made some slight corrections on the Brazilian Portuguese machine-translated part.
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Re: Translating GZDoom's text content. Read if you want to h

Post by Teddipetzi »

Just for curiosity's sake, is there any chance to set up the engine to localize some of the better known mods as well, like BTSX, Eviternity or even things like Daedalus or other script heavy projects?

How much work would it be to make the engine ready for it and what kinds of work is needed to actually localize the mods then?
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Re: Translating GZDoom's text content. Read if you want to h

Post by Graf Zahl »

A quick summary of what's needed engine side:

1. a feature to hash a loaded mod to give it some identifier for asset replacement.
2. a filter option for the resource manager to properly inject the localization resources into the directory.
3. an option to substitute strings in binary lumps containing text like ACS and dialogues. This already exists but would have to be extended.
4. (optionally) allow localized map name graphics to be defined in MAPINFO - that'd be useful for mods that alter them in a way that makes text replacement hard.

All 3 of these are relatively simple tasks, and their prime motivation would be to offload all real work to the localization mod.

The real work is setting up the resources:

1. You need to extract all the texts from the mods. For older things like Memento Mori, for example, it'd mean to create a MAPINFO so that the level names can be turned into strings.
2. Create the needed definition lumps - that's mainly MAPINFO but may sometimes necessitate a DECORATE replacement, e.g. for obituaries.
3. For each mod, create a spreadsheet that then can be added to the ones for the main engine so that the translators can do their work.
4. Here's where things will most likely hit a wall: Extend the fonts the mods use! And this can really easily become the lion's share of the work. For the engine-internal work we needed to extend 16 fonts, and with the exception of a handful of characters, there were only two people doing some real work here - me and Undead. So unless you find someone willing to do this work for even more fonts, it will be hard to do a satisfying translation of a mod like BTSX - even now it falls back on the stock Doom font for notification message display.

So, to summarize - point 4 is what has kept me from pursuing this - if we can get past the font problem and find someone willing to create the missing characters I see no reason not to pursue mod localizations.
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Re: Translating GZDoom's text content. Read if you want to h

Post by Gez »

That's seriously out of scope, IMO. Should be left to modders to create localization addons to mods instead of bloating the core GZDoom distribution.

Plus you can't localize BTSX; its gimmick is that every text string in it comes from the title of a Guided By Voices song or album.
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Re: Translating GZDoom's text content. Read if you want to h

Post by Graf Zahl »

While I agree that this is out of scope for GZDoom itself, adding the means to make such mods easier to create is not a bad thing. Allowing MAPINFO defined substitution of strings in binary script files, for example, would make such mods a lot easier to create because it'd make it unnecessary to recompile the scripts and therefore the maps.
I would never make this part of the main distribution but if it came to pass I wouldn't mind hosting such a mod for download.

But like I said, first someone needs to compile the needed data for those mods and also someone to do the font work, which can be quite substantial - to gain full support for an existing font, ca. 150 characters have to be added in case it is case insensitive, and making a full case sensitive font can easily add up to 400 characters, depending on which languages are needed.
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Re: Translating GZDoom's text content. Read if you want to h

Post by Graf Zahl »

I just added generation of hash IDs for resource files. I think the first feature this can be used for is lump injection, which doesn't mean translation but for example providing MAPINFOs for some older mods like Requiem, Memento Mori or Eternal Doom which leave the automap name display untouched and also display the out-of-context intermission texts from the original game.
I'm going to need to do one of these anyway to test the new feature so we'll see how far this can go.
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Re: Translating GZDoom's text content. Read if you want to h

Post by Captain J »

asdasd.png
Ruh Roh! I think i told you about the 한국의 typo. It's not too late for some minor update. No?
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Re: Translating GZDoom's text content. Read if you want to h

Post by Graf Zahl »

I thought I already changed it. Or did I pick the wrong string? Remember, I can't read that.
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Re: Translating GZDoom's text content. Read if you want to h

Post by Captain J »

Captain J wrote:Also it's 한국어. Not 한국의(Basically means Korean's.)!
한국의(hangug-ui), Means Korean's but with no sentence to indicate. 한국어(hangugeo), Means Korean and is the correct one.

And i just redownloaded the GZDoom version 4.2.1, 64 bit one and nah, it's still there.
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