RH2022 How to organise directories for different languages

[Olivier Toebosch]

Hello

Up to now we worked with merged chm's, organised in a directory tree with as many branches as languages;

language 1 main project

• subproject A containing htm's in language 1
• subproject B containing htm's in language 1

language 2 main project

• subproject A containing htm's in language 2
• subproject B containing htm's in language 2

and so on

all the content is already translated. but organised in this directory structure

we want to migrate to merged html.

What I noticed is that in RH2022, when you 'call' translations on a project, this is happening in the sources directory

mainproject dir (in the main language)

• subproject A (main language)
• subproject B (main language)
• fr/FR and then
  • subproject A (in french) containing 'to translate' htm's

1. what is strange: there is no separate dir for the main language (nl-BE) in our case. This means that our app will need a different parameter to launch language 1 than language 2 or 3
2. these dirs are only containing 'to translate' htm's (because I clicked on 'translation')

can someone confirm that it is enough to replace those htm's by identically named htm's, but then translated? They are already translated....in the original setup. And the links...are they going to work (contained in the original already translated htm's)?

3. Or do I have to continue to work as in the original situation

I'm aware these are complex matters. I dont' want to start one way to notice afterwards it is to work over again..

best regards

Olivier

[Peter Grainge]

In 2022 you have one project for the main language. The translation process creates separate projects for the other languages.

It's all explained on my site.

________________________________________________________
My site www.grainge.org includes many free Authoring and RoboHelp resources that may be of help.

[Olivier Toebosch]

Hello Peter, just visited your site, it in the 'new features' of RH2020. but my questions are not answered. How to proceed if I translate myself?

You mention this: 

Manual Translation

Initial Translation

In the authoring area, select all the items that are listed, then click the Export icon on the top toolbar to create an XLIFF file. That is then sent to a translation agency or translator who will return a translated version for import into the foreign language project.

no word about translating your self (manual in the first stage I would say :-))

best regards

[Jeff_Coatsworth]

"Manual" in the sense that somebody is doing the translating; as opposed to "Machine" whereby some software does the work. 

[Olivier Toebosch]

In my perspective you can manually translate yourself, ask a translator or use an API (automatic). Many translator tools already cover that last bit too. We are lurking at trados, but not sure it will be purchased. So for the moment is manual 'myself'.

[Jeff_Coatsworth]

I think you need to do some screenshots - are you talking about how the output is organized or the source RH project files (parent & child ones)?
If your output before was separate CHMs (one merged parent project for each language), why wouldn't your output in HTML5 be just the same? Isn't your application calling the help already keyed to point at the appropriate language output?

[Olivier Toebosch]

Hello Jeff, it's the input (source, I mentionned). Without translation within RH,  the output is not a challenge. just point to index.html. Same if I make 3 separated, pararell projects. I would just need to point to dir1/index.htm for language one, dir2/index.html for language 2. That is how we actually work with the chm. based on file names. I merge all the chm's in ond dir and our application uses the filenamesuffix to know which language it is.  help01.chm is dutch, help02.chm is french

So I'm indeed talking about how to organise the project files If :

1. I already have translations and I want to use a translator tool in the futur.
2. I don't use a translation service for now. For the moment I'm translating myself in the topics. (just 3 projects side by side)

Subsidiary question : is there a gui to translate yourself IN RH, or are you obliged to use a translation tool that accepts xliff

The easiest way for me is just to continue working with 3 completely separated projects. Because I don't use a translation service. But I fear it is not the 'ideal' way of working. As I'm busy 'designing' the architecture, I could very well do it as it should be. hence my questions.

best regards

Olivier

My application could call language1/index.htm or index.htm/nl-BE (which won't work i think) or index.htm/fr-FR.

I suspect the last way is 'the official way', and would let me eventually use a translation office or tool in the future.

[Peter Grainge]

Not sure how you work with what robohelp creates as I don't work with translations. I suspect you need an cliff tool. Else you can translate the foreign language project but you'll have to figure out what has changed, thereby losing the advantage of xliff.

________________________________________________________
My site www.grainge.org includes many free Authoring and RoboHelp resources that may be of help.

[Olivier Toebosch]

Hello Peter. as the projects are already translated, I noticed a way to 'link' the principal project to the translated subproject. it is just a tickbox when calling the translation menu. RH checks whether the topics are in sycn. that is good.

I'm still wondering how to organise the output directories in a multilingual merged environment. the mainproject is an 'empty' shell but contains the tocs of the subprojects. Once you start using the translation function, a subdir is made in the source dir. there you have to edit the output for hmtl5. But then... where do you position the output dir....

I suppose there is a relation between toc's f the mainproject (imported from subs) and output dir. But don't know how to have them in sync.  As the toc is already language related, I suppose I'will have to make as many main projects as I have languages and include the right tocs. But then...what output dir for the mainproject, what output dir for the subprojects. I just want one consistent path, identic for every language. and that is already not possible. But OK, our programmers will cater that (main is ducht, french has path fr-FR, english has path en-UK.

By the way is it possible to change this path (can't find the setting) that instead of language-region it will only be language? so fr instead of fr-FR (belgium dutch and belgium french do not exist by the way)

it's complicated....

[Peter Grainge]

The output folders go wherever you want them other than inside the project.

If I have followed correctly, you have one project with folders for the languages. I think you will be able to create a TOC for each language and point to just those topics. That is an entirely different way to the translation process as set up by RoboHelp but in your case it might be easier. However, that's only if you are going to continue translating and you won't have xliff files. 

You could continue in the current way as above but if xliff is required you will have to change things then.

You have to make some decisions about what you want to do at what stage.

I'm not following the last paragraph.

________________________________________________________

My site www.grainge.org includes many free Authoring and RoboHelp resources that may be of help.

[Peter Grainge]

See if Item 10 at https://www.grainge.org/RoboHelp_Gems/RoboHelp_Gems.htm#generating helps.

________________________________________________________

My site www.grainge.org includes many free Authoring and RoboHelp resources that may be of help.

[Olivier Toebosch]

thx we will use that tool. just wondering if javascripts will run if you have no IE server. i mean the javascript for Adobe supplied RoboHelpCSH.js

[Olivier Toebosch · Accepted solution]

my post was multilayered.

I understand how translating works at the source side. (click translations creates a language x folder besides  the original project). You can either paste already translated htm's or use export/import xldiffs to have the translation status updated.

I still don't know how to organise my output directories, to be in synch with the tocs of the translated subprojects (yes it is a merged project) and have it functioning. I understand, as I'll have to make 3 'nearly empty shells/main projects' containing only tocs, these tocs must point to the right paths. which is not the case for the moment.
I also concluded in between that is not a good idea to have the output dirs names translated, as I work with CSH. the path must be a constant name, as it is launched from the mappingtable and the language is defined in our software. 

looked up on the web, static pages (no server) can hold and play js.

regarding output directories and tocs in a merged project, with a multilingual site: still buggered. I think I already made a second post for this matter.

So for me I'll close this post