How do I write in another language?

FAQ for Nisus Writer Express

Moderator: faq-editor

Post Reply
dave
Official Nisus Person
Posts: 135
Joined: 2002-07-11 17:19:40
Location: Solana Beach, CA
Contact:

How do I write in another language?

Post by dave »

How Languages Work:
An important thing to understand is that Nisus Writer treats language like any other text formatting (eg: font). In other words, you can have multiple languages applied in a single document. Changing the language for one bit of text will not affect the language for the rest of your document. To change the language of some selected text, see the section How to Change the Applied Language just below.

Consider that you might have a paragraph of German text, but a few words within that paragraph marked as English. Nisus Writer can customize its behavior to help you edit such text. For example, it can check spelling using both German and English spelling dictionaries accordingly. Or when you click to select some text marked in another language, Nisus Writer can change the keyboard automatically. You can learn more by reading our FAQ on language sensitive options.


What Languages Are Supported?
Nisus Writer supports any mix of Unicode text in your documents. That means you can write in nearly any language ever created. That includes the scripts Latin, Greek, Cyrillic, Armenian, Hebrew, Arabic, Syriac, Devanagari, Thai, Han (Japanese, Chinese, Korean ideographs), Hiragana, Katakana, and more.

If you are working in Nisus Writer and do not see your desired language available, you need to edit the list of your favorite languages.


How to Change the Applied Language:
To change the language of your text:

1. Select the text (or style definition) whose language you'd like to change.
2. Use any one of the language tools described below (A-D) to select the new language.
Note: if you do not see your desired language, you will need to modify your favorite languages.

A: Change the language using the menu Format > Language:
menu.png
menu.png (49.37 KiB) Viewed 15922 times
B: Change the language using the Language palette, available by default, or via the menu Window > Palettes:
palette2.png
palette2.png (30.43 KiB) Viewed 15922 times
C: Change the language using the toolbar item:
toolbar.png
toolbar.png (31.72 KiB) Viewed 15922 times
D: Change the language using the tag at the bottom-right of every document window:
tag.png
tag.png (15.02 KiB) Viewed 15922 times
Tip: Keyboard Shortcuts:
If you often need to switch between languages, you may want to take the time to assign custom keyboard shortcuts to languages you frequently use. Just visit Nisus Writer's "Menu Key" preferences, where you may assign any shortcut to any menu.

Tip: Use Styles
Because languages are a kind of formatting, you can apply languages to your styles (eg: the "Normal" paragraph style) just as you would other kinds of formatting.


Change the Language of New Documents:
When you create a new document, Nisus Writer uses the language found in your "Nisus New File" template. To change that language, please visit Nisus Writer's "New File" preference pane:
newfile.png
newfile.png (95.58 KiB) Viewed 15922 times
An Unwanted Language Still Appears:
Even after you've applied the desired language to your text, you may find that an unwanted language sometimes reappears. There are a few ways that an unwanted language can be introduced into your document.


Keyboard Layouts:
The keyboard layout (aka input method), only controls which letters are produced when you type. It is distinct from the language and will not trigger all of Nisus Writer's editing features.
flagmenu.png
flagmenu.png (15.93 KiB) Viewed 15922 times
Instead, you will want to let Nisus Writer change the keyboard layout automatically as you change the language. You can configure that behavior in your Nisus Writer language preferences. If you want to know more, please read this FAQ on the difference between language and keyboard layout.
Post Reply