Imagine currently exists in 6 language mutations
- English, Slovak, Standard Portuguese, Brazilian Portuguese,
Polish and Hungarian. Each language edition of Imagine
has its own user interface language (it is the language
in which menus, dialog boxes and Help is written) and
also its command language (it is the programming language
used by Logo programmers). The user interface language
is fixed and depends on the exe file, which is running. The
command language, on the other hand, can be changed.
However one project can use only one command language.
Why might I need changing the command language in
Imagine?
How can Imagine learn (install) a new command language?
Each language mutation of Imagine prefers its
own command language. It means that if you start
Imagine with an empty project (and you take no special
actions like ones described below) then its command
language is set to the same language as its user
interface language. Each non-English language mutation
of Imagine includes also the knowledge of English
command language. Any language mutation of Imagine
can "learn" a different command language
if a command language definition file is supplied
to it. A command language definition file is a file
with LDX extension, which is contained in LDX.ZIP,
which can be downloaded from ldx.zip.
Teaching Imagine a new command language is easy,
just the corresponding LDX file has to be copied
to the same folder where Imagine.exe is located.
LDX.ZIP also contains a helper file eraser.exe,
which is needed by Imagine to support command language
switching. Most language mutations of Imagine contain
this file, but we added it here because the English
language mutation does not contain it.
My Imagine.INI has commands written in a specific
command language and they would not be understood when
switching to another language. What to do?
Imagine.ini is a special file located in the
Imagine folder (the folder where Imagine.exe is
located, too). It contains Logo instructions, which
should be carried out each time when Imagine starts
and also each time when an existing project is being
opened or a new empty project is created. Imagine.ini
allows the advanced user to write commands, which
modify the standard default behaviour of Imagine.
Commands in Imagine.ini can be written in "language
independent" way, but this way of writing commands
is quite complicated and usually only expert users
of Imagine do it. Some language mutations of Imagine
(including the English mutation) use language specific
commands in Imagine.ini directly when installed
from the CD. Other languages install a language-independent
Imagine.ini, but advanced users may add some language-specific
commands into it. If Imagine.ini contains language-specific
commands then it will cause problems when switching
to another command language because then these commands
will not be understood and errors in Imagine.ini
will be reported. The solution is to rename imagine.ini
to another name, which includes the name of the
language (see exact instructions in point 3 of the
step-by-step guide) and then using a special imgaine.ini,
which can be downloaded from imagine.ini.
This Imagine.ini will examine the current command
language of Imagine and will call the language-specific
imagine.ini file if present. This way your Imagine
can contain several ini files specifically for each
command language.
So, after all preparations, how to change the command
language?
- If you have an IMP file prepared in a specific
command language then Imagine tries to switch
to that command language when loading the IMP
file. If the command language of the IMP file
matches one of the installed command languages
then Imagine automatically switches to it and
loads the IMP file correctly.
- If you want to switch to another command
language manually to start a new project in
a different command language then you can choose
the desired language from the Options menu.
How can I permanently override the default command
language?
By default each time Imagine starts with command
language, which is equal to the user interface language.
If this default is not convenient for you (e. g.
you want to work for a longer time with Hungarian
Imagine but creating English projects) then you
can override the default. To do it you must locate
the icon, which you use to start Imagine. It may
be on the desktop, on the Quick Launch bar or in
the Start menu. Alternatively you can make a copy
of that icon leaving the original one untouched
and modifying only the new one. Right-click the
icon and select Properties in the popup menu. In
the dialog's Target line add a command-line switch
/v:xxxxxxxxx where xxxxxxxxx denotes your desired
language as listed in the following table:
Language
|
Command line
switch to add
|
Brazilian Portuguese
|
/v:portugues_brasil
|
English
|
/v:english
|
Hungarian
|
/v:hungarian
|
Polish
|
/v:polish
|
Slovak
|
/v:slovak
|
Standard Portuguese
|
/v:portuguese
|
Do not forget to add one space before the /v
switch and do not put any space inside the added
text (there is no space around the colon character).
What about texts in programs, which use special characters?
If you run a program written in a different language,
there is always a risk that your computer will not
contain the correct fonts i.e. that it will not
be able to show special characters of that language.
This paragraph tries to introduce information about
these issues and may help you to understand better
what can happen. Texts written in textboxes and
saved with the project usually preserve their characters
correctly if the computer, which runs the project,
has installed the correct fonts. Usually all European
versions of Windows install all fonts for all other
European languages. Texts written in the program's
code may show incorrect fonts when run on a computer,
which Windows defines a different default character
encoding. Even if the program shows incorrect characters,
it can run correctly, just it may display unreadable
texts. At this moment this behaviour cannot be changed.
In Windows XP there is a way to change the character
encoding for all non-Unicode programs (Imagine as
a non-Unicode program). So if you need to see correctly
the characters of Imagine programs written in a
foreign language then you can use this switch of
Windows XP. For Windows 98 you may know that
some European languages share the same character
encoding (code-page), so sharing programs between
these languages should not introduce font problems
in Windows 98. Polish, Hungarian and Slovak language
share one code-page while Portuguese (both standard
and Brazilian) use another code-page. The characters
for English alphabet are always present in any national
language mutation of Windows. Therefore the safest
way to write programs, which should be shared by
international users, is to use English command language
and also English texts shown by the program on the
screen.
So what to do exactly and step by step?
If you want to add the ability to switch the
command language to any of the currently existing
command languages do this:
- Find the folder where is Imagine.exe (Imagina.exe
in Standard Portuguese edition) located (C:\program
files\Imagine or C:\program files\Imagine Logo).
We refer to this folder as Imagine folder in
later points.
- If you are an advanced user and you know
that your Imagine.ini file is language-independent
then you can skip steps 3 and 4. If you are
not sure then do steps 3. and 4. (Comment: you
can be sure if your language mutation of Imagine
is not English and you did not modify by hand
Imagine.ini.)
- Rename Imagine.ini to a different name depending
on the command language in which that file was
written (it is usually the default language
for your language mutation of Imagine) according
to this table:
Language
|
Imagine.ini
should be renamed to
|
Brazilian Portuguese
|
portugues_brasilImagine.ini
|
English
|
englishImagine.ini
|
Hungarian
|
hungarianImagine.ini
|
Polish
|
polishImagine.ini
|
Slovak
|
slovakImagine.ini
|
Standard Portuguese
|
portugueseImagine.ini
|
- Download file Imagine.ini from imagine.ini and
copy it to the Imagine folder.
- Download all ldx.zip from ldx.zip unzip
it and copy all files into Imagine folder
- Now you can use all the command languages.
You can switch them either by loading an IMP
file written in one of those command languages
or using The Options item of the main menu.
- If you want to use a command language, which
is different from you default one, automatically
after starting Imagine, then you can modify
the Windows command, which starts Imagine. The
section "How can I permanently override
the default command language?" explains
how to do it.
|