//MESSAGE_NAME=THE_ONLY_MESSAGE "//COLOR WHITE BLACK LOW_INTENSITY NON_BLINK //ERASE 0 0 24 79 //SCREEN 10 0 0 " This is the //COLOR RED WHITE HIGH_INTENSITY NON_BLINK GERMAN//COLOR WHITE BLACK LOW_INTENSITY NON_BLINK language example.\n As soon as you press a key, you will see the ASP's OMBUDSMAN statement displayed in GERMAN. Forget about the fact that it's the OMBUDSMAN statement, and concentrate on the fact that //COLOR GREEN BLACK HIGH_INTENSITY NON_BLINK you see something in GERMAN.//COLOR WHITE BLACK LOW_INTENSITY NON_BLINK \n What is so special about this???\n Notice that the program you are executing, namely //COLOR BROWN BLACK HIGH_INTENSITY NON_BLINK LANGUAGE.EXE //COLOR WHITE BLACK LOW_INTENSITY NON_BLINK , always remains the same, and all you do is provide it with different versions of a file named //COLOR CYAN BLACK LOW_INTENSITY NON_BLINK LANGUAGE.MSG //COLOR WHITE BLACK LOW_INTENSITY NON_BLINK to produce output in different foreign languages.\n "When the //COLOR BROWN BLACK HIGH_INTENSITY NON_BLINK LANGUAGE.EXE //COLOR WHITE BLACK LOW_INTENSITY NON_BLINK module executes, it simply opens the file " //COLOR CYAN BLACK LOW_INTENSITY NON_BLINK LANGUAGE.MSG //COLOR WHITE BLACK LOW_INTENSITY NON_BLINK , and displays the one and only message in that file. You are looking at the first screen full of that 1 message. There are 3 more screens of text to complete the message. To run this test again, and see the same EXE now produce the //COLOR RED WHITE HIGH_INTENSITY BLINK ENGLISH//COLOR WHITE BLACK LOW_INTENSITY NON_BLINK equivalent of all this, simply copy LANG_ENG.MSG to LANGUAGE.MSG, and execute //COLOR BROWN BLACK HIGH_INTENSITY NON_BLINK LANGUAGE.EXE //COLOR WHITE BLACK LOW_INTENSITY NON_BLINK again.\n //COLOR RED BLACK HIGH_INTENSITY BLINK The source code for LANGUAGE.C is provided so you can see how simple it is. The base text files that produced LANG_ENG.MSG & LANG_GER.MSG are also provided.//NOISE 1000 100 \n\n\n //COLOR CYAN BLACK HIGH_INTENSITY NON_BLINK ÚÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ¿ ÚÄÄÄÄÄÁÄÄÄ¿ ³ (R) Äij ³o ³ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ ³ ÚÄÄÄÄÄÁÐÄÄ¿ ³ Association of ³ ³ ³ÄÙ Shareware ÀÄÄij o ³ Professionals ÄÄÄÄÄij º ³ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ ÀÄÄÄÄÐÄÄÄÄÙ MITGLIED\n Wilhelm Gradwohl ist ein Mitglied der Association of Shareware Professionals (ASP) . Die ASP m”chte sicherstellen, daá das Shareware-Prinzip auch fr Sie funktioniert. Sollten Sie ein Shareware-bezogenes Probleme mit einem ASP-Mitglied nicht direkt mit dem ASP-Mitglied l”sen k”nnen, so wenden Sie sich bitte an die ASP. Der Schiedsmann der ASP kann Ihnen bei der L”sung von Streitigkeiten oder Problemen mit einem ASP-Mitglied behilflich sein, jedoch keine technische Beratung fr Programme bieten. Bitte schreiben Sie an:\n ASP Ombudsman, P.O. Box 5786, Bellevue, WA 98006, USA.\n oder schreiben Sie ber CompuServe an den ASP Ombudsman 70007,3536.\n\n //COLOR WHITE BLACK LOW_INTENSITY NON_BLINK What this demonstrates is that with the MSGCOMP system, a single executable can produce messages (either to the screen, printer, or file) in various foreign languages just by associating the executable with the correct version of a .MSG file.\n The following steps were taken to produce this demo :\n 1. LANGUAGE.C was written, compiled and linked to produce LANGUAGE.EXE . 2. Two source text files named LANG_GER.TXT and LANG_ENG.TXT were created with a text editor (or word processor), and each was MSGCOMPiled to produce LANG_GER.MSG and LANG_ENG.MSG respectively. 3. I arbitrarily picked the German version .MSG file, and made a duplicate named LANGUAGE.MSG using a copy command.\n That's it! Now when LANGUAGE.EXE executes, it first produces the GERMAN demo. If you copy LANG_ENG.MSG to LANGUAGE.MSG and execute it again, You will see the ENGLISH language ASP message.\n If you are a software developer, just think of how much more of a market you can reach if your product can communicate in a language other than English. The beauty of the MSGCOMP system is that it requires no changes to your source code to support additional languages, after it is properly set up to support English.\n We feel so confident that MSGCOMP will catch on, that we have invested a large sum of money in language translation software, and human translators. We intend to offer registered users of the MSGCOMP system access to these facilities by offering a translation service. All you have to do is to provide us with the English language messages that your product produces, and we will return to you the foreign language equivalents. Note that we never see your source code! Please execute MSGCOMP with the /H and /FOREIGN switches for more details.\n Please execute MSGCOMP with the /H and /OVERVIEW options to get a thorough overview of the process. In fact, please execute MSGCOMP with all its help options to produce the users guide, and lots of other important information.\n Even if you aren't interested in foreign language possibilities, consider that with the MSGCOMP system, your product may be able to use various .MSG files for different English speaking markets. Just think about it!\n All the effects you see on the screen when you execute any of our products, are as a result of using the MSGCOMP and SCRNCOMP systems.\n Bill Gradwohl Author\n\n