Two Languages at the same time

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mvreade
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Joined: 2007-12-02 13:30:55

Two Languages at the same time

Post by mvreade »

I am in the process of writing in two languages (Portuguese and English) and switch between them frequently, sometimes in the middle of a sentence.

Is there any way that I can set up Nisus Writer Pro to check for both languages?

Thank you,
Michael
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martin
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Re: Two Languages at the same time

Post by martin »

Hello Michael: when you say "check for both languages" I assume that you mean spellchecking? If so, then yes, Nisus Writer can automatically switch between spelling dictionaries as you write in multiple languages.

The key to understanding this feature is Nisus Writer's language system. To state it briefly: you should mark each bit of text in your document using the appropriate language and let Nisus Writer do the rest automatically. For example, if you use the menu Format > Language > Portuguese, then Nisus Writer can automatically change the spelling dictionary, keyboard layout, etc. You choose the desired automation in your Language preferences.

I hope that helps! Please let us know if you have any questions.
David Sharp
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Re: Two Languages at the same time

Post by David Sharp »

Hi Michael,

I do this a lot, between English and French. Of course, as Martin says, you need to mark each chunk of text as being in the desired language. The most basic way to do that is to select your text, and use the "language" palette to define which language it's in. If you're switching languages a lot, that can be a hassle, but I'm not aware of any automatic way to detect what language a given piece of text is in. (Even if such a system could be used within Nisus, the depressing fashion for importing English words wholesale into other languages would probably make it unreliable).

I've found it useful to use style sheets, both character- and paragraph-based, to mark groups of words, or paragraphs, as being in a given language. This allows you to also specify, if necessary, a different font or style for each language.

My personal system is to have character styles called "Quote in English", "Quote in French", etc. for each language I'm likely to use, plus similarly named paragraph styles such as "Quote_eng", etc.
The character styles not only define the required language for each chunk of text, they also specify italic. The paragraph styles specific both italic and indented.

The advantage of using style sheets for your different languages is that you can easily change the formatting of your text on a per-language basis. And of course if you don't want certain words, phrases or paragraphs to have language-specific formatting, you can just use the "language" palette.
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xiamenese
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Re: Two Languages at the same time

Post by xiamenese »

martin wrote: 2020-07-13 12:54:54 Hello Michael: when you say "check for both languages" I assume that you mean spellchecking? If so, then yes, Nisus Writer can automatically switch between spelling dictionaries as you write in multiple languages.

The key to understanding this feature is Nisus Writer's language system. To state it briefly: you should mark each bit of text in your document using the appropriate language and let Nisus Writer do the rest automatically. For example, if you use the menu Format > Language > Portuguese, then Nisus Writer can automatically change the spelling dictionary, keyboard layout, etc. You choose the desired automation in your Language preferences.

I hope that helps! Please let us know if you have any questions.
And don't forget Preferences > Menu Keys > Language where you can set a shortcut to switch between English and whatever other language. For me that is mostly Chinese and I have a Character style for that—to set my preferred font and size rather than Apple's default—which is invoked by the shortcut; for French, I merely invoke the language, using my standard styles.

:)

Mark
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