Stefan_Key on 23/10/2019 at 13:42

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Does it mean that the player has only to write in his/her user.cfg enable_subtitles, at least, without the other lines?



We have the same results. ;)

Stefan_Key on 24/10/2019 at 07:24

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Thanks, I will try with Notepad++ then.

Is a copy/paste from other files sufficient for sub files (or other str and such, like books and other readables)? Or should i rewrite them?

Can you set Notepad++ with OEM Codepage 850 by default?

Because I will only use Notepad++ for translating FMs.

You have been very patient to test all of that! :thumb:

Stefan_Key on 28/10/2019 at 09:02

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Because with ParchEd, I have got some mistakes like this : (http://ariane4ever.free.fr/ariane4ever/viewtopic.php?f=43&t=4628)

For instance, there's a book with :



and after saving with ParchEd :



Or like this :


Becomes :



Or



Becomes :



I don't remember what FM it was back then....('twas ages ago...). Don't know if it's still like that with NewDark....

I'm afraid i will get those kind of obliterations with StrConv.

baeuchlein on 29/10/2019 at 00:31

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On the contrary, these are for books. For example, this "decal" thing is used to put a background image into a book. An example of this is the Spider book found in the Keeper's hideout in "Keeper of Infinity II" (the two-mission campaign from Soul Tear). The images are superimposed onto the normal book texture, and the writing in the book is superimposed on that image. Thus, you have three tiers in this case: The lowest one contains the graphics for the book's page, the middle tier contains the background image "printed" onto the book page, and the top tier contains the book text "printed" onto that afterwards.

Another use of something like that can be seen in "Heartcliff Islands". There is a note on the wall there with some texts. What's unusual about this is that there is more than one font used on the same "book" page. Some command is used to switch the font, and I'm pretty sure it's something like the "decal" command above.

I am not certain whether any of these commands are used before NewDark, but maybe I've seen "no_trim" before the NewDark era. I'm not sure.

Most likely, ParchEd deletes all these commands because it was made before NewDark. ParchEd generally deletes everything that's not enclosed in page_X: "Bla bla bla" statements. I've seen several comments I inserted in some texts fall victim to ParchEd.

Other than that, I also find that it sometimes feels "clumsy" when I try to edit .str files with ParchEd, and then have to look into other directories than the ones with the .str files for the matching book art. And upon editing the next text, I have to go back into the books\{LANGUAGE} directory again...:rolleyes:



Confirmed for at least one of the standard fonts for books and parchments. I have created a small .str file containing almost every ASCII code and the corresponding character for testing things like that in "Thief", and indeed, the character for œ's ASCII code is not displayed. It's the same as about all of the accented capital letters in French we just spoke (or wrote) about.

Of course, one can also put new fonts into the game, as, for example, the Russians do, like the ones used in "Keeper of Infinity II". They had one font there which contained cyrillic letters as well as english ones, but not our beloved german "umlauts" (äöüß). So, typing the usual german texts into the .str files there produced something unexpected: Cyrillic letters instead of the "umlauts".

I think the same might be true for Beltzer's special fonts. Isn't Beltzer from Sweden? AFAIK, they have "äöü"/"ÄÖÜ" as well, but no "ß". Would make sense that this letter was missing in their fonts, then. However, one can put different fonts for different languages into a FM, just like one can put an english .str file into it and a german .str file as well. Just check out where the custom font is located, then place the original one in a subdirectory called "english", and one suitable for german texts in another subdirectory called "german". Works with FMSel, NewDarkLoader, and even ancient Darkloader, as long as you place fonts for all available languages in there. Of course, anything that makes Beltzer's fonts special is lost for german texts if you use a standard font from "Thief". Well, take your pick, then.;)



Depends on what you want to do.

I usually copy the .str files from books\english into books\german first, then edit the copies until the english stuff is gone and replaced with a german translation. In the case of .sub files, I have not done too much with them so far. In almost every case, there were no .sub files before, so I had to write them on my own - except for one of the TDP20 contest missions, "Making a Profit". Writing .sub files is comparatively easy for voiceovers heard during the mission(s), but a bit more difficult for movies. In the latter case, for example, you have to place timing information into the files for them to be effective. However, I was able to develop a method by which I could use the sound editor "Audacity" to obtain that timing information quite easily from the audio track of movies.



Not exactly. There is an option somewhere in the Settings menu which allows you to set that codepage as default for any newly created text, but I have not found anything like that for existing files you open with Notepad++ for editing. However, it is possible to put switching to OEM codepage 850 on a key combination on the keyboard. I have put it on the combination of CTRL-SHIFT-8, so whenever I load a .str file, I press CTRL-SHIFT-8 immediately afterwards to switch to OEM 850. It is important, however, to do this before editing anything, otherwise some characters may get changed when you switch to OEM 850 later on.

If Notepad++ is set to english menu texts (you find that in the Settings menu in the Preferences section), you can select Settings, then Shortcut mapper. You get a list of things you can map onto a key combination on the keyboard. Scroll down to entry 171, "OEM 850". Double-click it, and you can set your preferred key combination. However, not all key combinations do work. While CTRL-SHIFT-8 does work for me, CTRL-SHIFT-2 had no effect. I do not know why.

You can, of course, set the menu texts of Notepad++ to French as well, but I was too lazy to check out how the menu entries above are called in French.:angel:



I've been doing that for almost ten years by now, and was very interested in that most of the time. Therefore, testing all that was not so difficult any more. For checking out what happened to french characters, I dug out a mission which used subtitles, installed it, opened the appropriate file for the first movie subtitles with an already installed Notepad++, and quickly typed all of the french accented letters before the first sentence. Then, I started the mission in "Thief 2", and could easily see what the NewDark engine made of these letters. The longest part of this was to pull the appropriate mission out of the depths of my external hard disc.

And of course, typing this long post here took me more time than that.:cool: