tables and translation

[International DTP]

Hi Verner,

Tables are indeed one of the tricky parts in translated FrameMaker files.

Some things you can do to avoid laborious manual copy fitting:
- adapt your table column widths in the source file to the expected target
languages (as you suggested), although it may not always look nice for
English.
- try to minimize number of columns and avoid long texts in tables
(languages like German or Spanish may grow up to 170% of space compared to
English, and use long words)
- always use table formats and paragraph formats for your tables, this will
ease global updates after translation
- make sure the translator sets the proper language when converting back to
MIF
- in your language templates add hyphenation settings to the table paragraph
formats, making it possible to break long words (like in German, Dutch etc).
This will only work as expected when also the language setting is correct.
- instruct translators to take into account the available space .....

HTH,

Vriendelijke groet,
Wim Hooghwinkel
Adobe Certified Expert (ACE) in FrameMaker
                                                                        
International DTP
DTP and Documentation Consultancy
 
tel. +31652036811
info at idtp.eu 
www.idtp.eu
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