Here’s how I implemented a translation management system for a static website, using GNU gettext. For the impatient, I’ve distilled it to 11 instructions at the end. Goal This system allows block-by-block translation (string-by-string), which is better than page-by-page because: Changes to non-translated parts will be applied to all translations automatically (formatting, tags, images, maybe Read more »
(Last month’s article: Using LaTeX to make PDF documents with Japanese characters) I’ve found a better TeX tool for making Japanese PDFs: XeTeX. Below are first the technical advantages, and then an analysis of community and sustainability. XeTeX is a version of Tex that has been modified to use Unicode (UTF-8) encoding internally. It is Read more »
Even if you know nothing about LaTeX, you can make your first Japanese PDF document by taking a copy of this example file JIS.tex, going to a shell command line and typing "pdflatex JIS.tex". That should produce this output: JIS.pdf. If that doesn’t work for you, then you need to install some LaTeX software or Read more »
Emacs 21 had a generic function called iso-accents-mode for writing âççéntèd çhàrâçtërs, but that was removed in Emacs 22. It took me a while, but I found the replacement was to use set-input-method, and then select whichever language you want to be able to type the accented characters of. The default keybinding for set-input-method is Read more »
After a bit of tweaking, I’m now happily using the the It’s All Text! plugin to let me to edit webpage text boxes with Emacs. It also works with other text editors. [UPDATE: Actually, my browser is Iceweasel, not Firefox. See the Mozilla software rebranding article on Wikipedia, and the IceCat project] To configure it, Read more »
Despite having an aversion to configuring and maintaining security and crypto software, I accepted that I had to update my system in response to the recent big Debian security problem. If I can do it, you can do it. Below are my notes, but keep in mind that my security rank is somewhere between ignorant Read more »