Language support in Reaper

[alez]

Hi All,

I've recently installed Reaper to give it a try and so far I'm very impressed. I know a few people in Spain who would really love to use this software if it was in Spanish, and I was wondering if maybe I could actually do the translation.

Do you think this is feasible in terms of the way the software has been conceived? Thanks for any comments.

Alex

[Pashkuli]

Yes, I can be a volunteer to translate it into Bulgarian.
The menus as a start would be great!

[zorn]

Recently, one of my buddies (doesn't speak english at all) tried to move to Reaper. It turned out the problem was not the menus (even him could learn quite fast the english word for a command), but the documentation.

So, imo, a true multi-language support is really a huge task (menus inside Reaper + translations of user's manual + keeping these translations up-to-date)

just my 2 cents

[Mr. Data]

IIRC this is on the agenda, but who knows when it is gonna happen.



-Data

[Pashkuli]

Hm, the docimentation, help and manual are really big effort for translation... Lets go first for the menus.

For example Guitar Pro 5 has language database files *.dpl (guitar pro language). Simple text base files like:

DLG_001 = "OK"
DLG_002 = "Cancel"
DLG_003 = "Yes"
DLG_004 = "No"
DLG_005 = "Help"
DLG_006 = "Erase"

and so on, where you can just replace the words for your language and alphabet. Seems so simple!
Maybe Reaper could have support for someting that simple.

[Mr. Data]

I think it isn't that easy though.

If you for instance look at the preferences "Audio -> Buffering" you find:

"Notes: Anticipative FX processing can have considerable advantages on all systems. Synchronous multiprocessing is usually only effective for less than 4 CPUs and isn't ideal for maximum low latency performance. If in doubt, enable both."

If you translate this to German, you have to consider, whether you want to stay in German strictly or use Anglicisms. It begins right with the word "anticipative". If you translate it as "antizipativ", most of the Germans wouldn't understand what's meant by that, not necessarily 'cos they're dumb but more because this word isn't that often used in daily speaking unless one uses it as part of a professional terminology. But is "vorgreifend" the right word in this context? Or can I use the word "gepuffert", which would translated back to English be "pre-buffered"?

Next question is: How to translate FX? Should I write "FX" too or should I write "Effekt"? Although longer, I'd prefer the latter one, because this is part of the German language opposed to "FX" which is pronounced nearly the same as "effects" in English so it's no problem to use it there.

There are other questions as well. Should the translation be more technical or more popular descriptive? Here I'd rather follow the latter way as well, as the original tends to be this way also.

There's another point that has to be considered: In many cases you'd have to shift elements of dialogs to make the text fit. Especially translations to German and French are predestined to result in longer texts than the original English text would be. In many software you see cut text (or even sometimes letters are just seen partly) if you have switched to your own language; I wouldn't like to see this in Reaper.

F.i. a German translation of the above example could look like this:

"Anmerkungen: Vorgreifende Effektbearbeitung kann erhebliche Vorteile auf allen Systemen haben. Synchroner Multiprozessorbetrieb ist normalerweise nur für weniger als 4 Prozessoren effektiv, jedoch nicht optimal für beste Leistung bei minimaler Latenz. Wenn im Zweifel, beide anwählen!"

But I don't doubt, there will be better ones.

I even wouldn't like to see every other word abbreviated, as BTW in the German translation of NVidia software - this is horrible!

An NVidia translation would probably look like this:

"Anmerk.: Vorgreifende Effektbearb. kann erh. Vorteile a. all. Syst. hab. Synchr. CPU-betr. i. normalerw. n. f. weniger als 4 CPUs eff., jed. n. opt. f. beste Leist. b. minim. Latenz. Wenn im Zweifel, beide anw."

HORRIBLE!!

But I get your point AdXok (at least I think so). Only thing is that I don't know how the issue with elements that have to be moved to make texts fit could be accomplished this way. I think there has to be done extensive manipulations of resources as well (i. e. moving checkboxes, radio-buttons and so forth).



-Data

[alez]

adXok, that's the kind of sintax I'm hoping for.

Mr. Data, I'm aware that the perfect translation is not easy to do, in fact the perfect translation does not exist. However, I'm pretty sure that many Germans will welcome being able to read "antizipativ", "vorgreifend" or "gepuffert" instead of having to try and figure out what the hell "anticipative" means (together with the whole text in English). The translated version, even if it's not 100% accurate or even if it's not too accurate at all, will help them. For those who won't gain much from it, there's always the English version. That said, I volunteer to translate to Spanish because I think I can do a decent job. The other thing as well is, at a later stage (anytime) my translation can be replaced by a better one that another guy could eventually come with. In the meantime, my one would hopefully be a lot better that none to many people.

> F.i. a German translation of the above example could look like this:
> [...]
> But I don't doubt, there will be better ones.

No doubt there will also be better DAW than Reaper. To me it's not about coming with a perfect solution, more with a solution that is better than the current one (i.e. no language support whatsoever).

As to moving controls around to fit the text, a software done in this way should be flexible to accomodate any text to an extent, same as it can accomodate different full screen resolutions. Some testing should help with this.

Anyone knows if this can be done? Should I try and contact the Reaper developer guys?

Cheers,

Alex

[boka]

Originally Posted by alez

Hi All,

I've recently installed Reaper to give it a try and so far I'm very impressed. I know a few people in Spain who would really love to use this software if it was in Spanish, and I was wondering if maybe I could actually do the translation.

Do you think this is feasible in terms of the way the software has been conceived? Thanks for any comments.

Alex

This has been requested lot of times! I wrote in the other topics that I would help make the hungarian translation but i am not sure that it's worth. Each and every audio production software uses english language primarily. ( Ok Logic knows German as well if i remember well) If we non-english speaker have been using lots of audio apps then I say It would be really hard to change. Let me say an example : I've always used english version of Windows Xp both on my audio pc and my net pc. At college it was really hard for the first time to get used to the hungarian one. After a while I got used to it but...here in hungary we do not have all the expression used in audio production translated to hungarian. We could have its not difficult to mirror translate them but they just sound silly. No one would understand them immediately because everyone uses the english ones in speech in hungarian sentences. This is my opinion.


/boka

[madias]

hm, i´m german native speaker and i worked with audio software since the early 90ies: cubase 2 (atari st) only in english (with only basic knowledge of it). i was shocked and totally confused moving years later to cubase vst with a german interface, confronted with terms like "gleichstromversatz entfernen" (it took me more than a day to get the answer: "remove dc offset").
in my opinion the best way is a manual in the native language and let reaper as it is - in english.

[The-Zeronaut]

Originally Posted by madias

hm, i´m german native speaker and i worked with audio software since the early 90ies: cubase 2 (atari st) only in english (with only basic knowledge of it). i was shocked and totally confused moving years later to cubase vst with a german interface, confronted with terms like "gleichstromversatz entfernen" (it took me more than a day to get the answer: "remove dc offset").
in my opinion the best way is a manual in the native language and let reaper as it is - in english.

+1 i think this is a great idea

[Mr. Data]

Originally Posted by alez

adXok, that's the kind of sintax I'm hoping for.

Mr. Data, I'm aware that the perfect translation is not easy to do, in fact the perfect translation does not exist. However, I'm pretty sure that many Germans will welcome being able to read "antizipativ", "vorgreifend" or "gepuffert" instead of having to try and figure out what the hell "anticipative" means (together with the whole text in English). The translated version, even if it's not 100% accurate or even if it's not too accurate at all, will help them. For those who won't gain much from it, there's always the English version. That said, I volunteer to translate to Spanish because I think I can do a decent job. The other thing as well is, at a later stage (anytime) my translation can be replaced by a better one that another guy could eventually come with. In the meantime, my one would hopefully be a lot better that none to many people.

> F.i. a German translation of the above example could look like this:
> [...]
> But I don't doubt, there will be better ones.

No doubt there will also be better DAW than Reaper. To me it's not about coming with a perfect solution, more with a solution that is better than the current one (i.e. no language support whatsoever).

As to moving controls around to fit the text, a software done in this way should be flexible to accomodate any text to an extent, same as it can accomodate different full screen resolutions. Some testing should help with this.

Anyone knows if this can be done? Should I try and contact the Reaper developer guys?

Cheers,

Alex

Hi Alez,

I get your point, I think. My point just was, that it seems to be not that easy and that when it is done, it shouldn't be done half-assed.

There are tools to accomplish movement of text and elements. but this can't be done without the permission of the devs. I don't know, whether it can be done just with an external language file, because if you have to move elements of dialogs, you have to do it in the resources containing the data of all elements of the dialog (Maybe even the size of the dialog-window could have to be changed in some cases). This could be done automatically, but that would mean, that there has to be some code in reaper.exe (or an additional .dll) that accomplishes that.

Originally Posted by madias

hm, i´m german native speaker and i worked with audio software since the early 90ies: cubase 2 (atari st) only in english (with only basic knowledge of it). i was shocked and totally confused moving years later to cubase vst with a german interface, confronted with terms like "gleichstromversatz entfernen" (it took me more than a day to get the answer: "remove dc offset").
in my opinion the best way is a manual in the native language and let reaper as it is - in english.

Yes Madias,

terms like "gleichstromversatz entfernen" are the ones I definitely don't want to see. This is terrible! But the question is not to leave Reaper as it is or alter it, but more to have the opportunity to have it in your own language additionally if you want it.

To have a German manual is yet another point, because Nicholas is doing great work with the English manual and he has real problems to cope with all those new features, that V3 will have. Reaper enhances so fast, that it is difficult to stay up-to-date even with the English version.



-Data

[alez]

Originally Posted by madias

in my opinion the best way is a manual in the native language and let reaper as it is - in english.

I'm cool with your opinion and I actually choose to do the same (not just for software, also when I read a novel or watch a movie). That said, I'd rather let each end user decide what he/she thinks suits him/her best instead of going "English, take it or leave it", which, being OK with me, may be not ideal for others. I wasn't thinking anything like the installer auto-detecting your region and choosing for you if you see what I mean

[alez]

Originally Posted by Mr. Data

This could be done automatically, but that would mean, that there has to be some code in reaper.exe (or an additional .dll) that accomplishes that.

...Which pretty much is my initial question: has Reaper been done with this in mind at all? If so, I'd like to volunteer. Otherwise, probably not worth it...

[Mr. Data]

As I wrote in my first post in this thread:

Originally Posted by Mr. Data

IIRC this is on the agenda, but who knows when it is gonna happen.



-Data

But I don't know when and how this will be done. But generally I'd presume it is possible. And I'd like to see versions in Spanish, French, German, Dutch and so forth. And if I can, I'd contribute as well.



-Data

[alez]

I suppose we'll need to stay tuned and see when there's a possibility for these contributions

Cheers guys.

[boka]

Originally Posted by madias

...in my opinion the best way is a manual in the native language and let reaper as it is - in english.

I second that!

[Pashkuli]

I could be also volunteer for translate the manus on so in bulgarian.
Not the manual which would be a big effort.

None of the developers has responded so far and I think this could be related to some kind of copyrights or something... maybe.