Translating the Kalkules manual is a little bit harder than translating the program, because you will have to edit an html file. It is an advantage if you know at least the basic structure of html files, but if you don't, you can still translate the manual file, but you will have to be more careful about what you are doing.
The Kalkules manual file is located on the following path: [Kalkules folder]\manual\[language code]\manual.html
For instance: If you've installed Kalkules into C:\Program Files, then the English manual file is located at C:\Program Files\Kalkules\manual\en\manual.html
If you want to learn html, check out the W3Schools html tutorial. Html is really easy to learn, and if you learn it, you will be able to create your own simple websites :)
For demonstration purposes, let's say that we are creating a Slovak translation of the manual based on the English version.
To translate the manual file, use a plain text editor such as PS Pad, Notepad ++, or in the worst case Note Pad. Do not use rich text editors such as MS Word, Open Office Writter nor any WYSIWYG website editors, because they will completely mess up the html code and it's very hard to fix it afterwards.
Open manual.html in your plain text editor and translate only the English texts. Do not change nor delete any of the html tags. Html tags are the texts surrounded by < >. For example:
English translation:
<h1 id="content">Kalkules program manual</h1> <hr> <h3>Basic information</h3> <ul> <li>Kalkules homepage: <a href="http://www.kalkules.com/">http://www.kalkules.com/</a> <li>You can download the latest version of Kalkules <a href="http://www.kalkules.com/index.php?page=download">here</a>. <li>If you have any questions or suggestions on how to make the program better, you can use this <a href="http://www.kalkules.com/index.php?page=contact">contact</a>. </ul> <hr>
Slovak translation:
<h1 id="content">Návod k programu Kalkules</h1> <hr> <h3>Základné informácie</h3> <ul> <li>Domovská stránka programu Kalkules: <a href="http://www.kalkules.com/">http://www.kalkules.com/</a> <li>Najnovšiu verziu programu si môžete <a href="http://www.kalkules.com/index.php?page=download">stiahnuť tu</a>. <li>Vaše otázky ohľadne programu, návrhy na vylepšenia a odhalené chyby píšte na tento <a href="http://www.kalkules.com/index.php?page=contact">kontakt</a>. </ul> <hr>
Creating screenshots is easy. You do not need to use any special software. All you need are standard tools available on any Windows computer. The simplest way to create screenshots is:
Remember that all the translated screenshot files must have exactly the same name as the original files. Otherwise they will not be displayed correctly in the manual.
To get better image quality:
To ensure the best quality of the manual, we have to make sure that its html code is valid. All the manual files provided with Kalkules have a valid html code, so when you copied and translated one of these files, you also should get a valid html code. However, there is a possibility that during the translation process, you accidentally modified some html tags. Therefore you should check your manual file for validity errors.
To check your manual file:
If you think you won't be able to check the validity, or you don't know how to fix some errors, don't worry. Just send your translation file anyway and I will do it for you. Just make sure you at least tried, because this saves me a lot of time, so I can focus on improving Kalkules :)
Pack your whole manual folder (for instance manual\sk) into a single zip file and send it via email to [email protected], or use the Kalkules website contact form. Your translation will probably be included in the next released version of Kalkules.
Now every one in your country can enjoy a fully translated Kalkules manual :) Well done and thank you for your contribution.