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How
to represent non-Roman alphabets on web pages
Many
of the world's languages require special programs to be installed on the
computer before the writer and reader can use their unique scripts. Even
without these special programs, however, there are ways to use the written
scripts of these languages on Web pages by inserting languages as images.
An investigation by Kecia Yim (a graduate student on the TLEF project
team) has found that using images is the best way to present the different
languages on the Web pages so that online readers can view the language
without having to change character sets in their computers. The following
are four options and the steps for each option:
Option
One:
1.
Go to the search engine, Altavista.
2. Under "Tools" in the menu box, click on "Translate",
which opens up a dialog box for translation.
3.Type the English text you would like to translate.
4. From the menu box listed next to the big dialog box, select the language
you want to translate (e.g., English to Spanish). Then click on the "Translate"
button.
5. The next step is to press the "PrintScreen" button on your
keyboard.
6. Then, from the "Start" button on your computer, open "Program."
7. Under "Program," select "Accessories", then click
on "Paint."
8. Paste the Screen you copied into the box.
9. Using the select button (dotted square shape), crop the sentence. Right
click, and save it as an image file (Bitmap may be the only option here).
10. Convert the Bitmap file to GIF file by changing the extension of the
file to ".gif". If you are using the "Paint" program
in PC Window, you can save the images of the characters directly as GIF.
11. Use the file in Dreamweaver by going through the steps of inserting
images. (Caution: Translation is not as sophisticated as you may desire,
and you might have to juggle with selecting the right words to get native-like
translation. Better yet, locate a native speaker to check the accuracy
of your sample.)
Option Two:
1.
Install Microsoft Word2000 in the computer, download "Global IME"
onto computer.
2. Type the language you want to in Word (you can change the character
by selecting the language). Save it as HTML document. Add it to Dreamweaver.
Web readers should have Global IME installed in their computer to view
the HTML document.
Option
Three:
If
you have a text editor of the language already in your computer, you can
type in the text editor and click on "PrintScreen," and follow
the steps in #1 stated above.
Option
Four:
To
represent accented characters not shown on the English keyboard that use
Roman alphabets, including most European languages, you can use keystroke
combinations based on the ANSII extended character set on the English
keyboard. A full table of these characters along with a few other quick
keyboard solutions can be found at
http://www.netscape.com/eng/intl/accentinput.html
These
options, especially the steps, may sound complicated and tedious, but
these are the best ways so far to solve the problem of using a foreign
language on Web pages. Once you get used to it, it will become much simpler.
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