SCI HEBREW font works but.....

[Alex Lowes]

I have finally fixed the problem with the sci font not working in AGS by asking for help(as told by CJ)at the SCI forum.
well now we have another problem which is now at hand(and will make KQ1 VGA hebrew translation possible).
which is adding a right to left writting form

[Alex Lowes]

anyone who wishes to get the font and "beta test" it for me just e-mail me.

[Pumaman]

Right-to-left writing is still on my to-do list from when it was requested before.

As I'm sure you're aware, I have to prioritise new features depending on how many people are likely to find them useful.

[Vildern]

Alex:
"Please post on the forum on this link giving a possitive opinion for making it possible "

Well, here I post  8) I'm for a Hebrew version for this game. Would be great to play it again, this time in Hebrew!

[Barcik]

Bah, a translation can do no good, especially not to a relatevly poor language such as Hebrew.

And I remember your font Alex, I'm just lazyassing right now.  

[Alex Lowes]

well barcik I don't count hebrew as a poor language at all(plus I made a new font that works' not the one you've got from me  :o).
But yet it's not only for KQ1 this option is for making it possible of making many games in hebrew like educationall games too(yes some pepole like thees things).
Also this option is good for the arab language which is also written from right to left(and others too).
But yet if the tracker says so I have the patients.
Let time do it's best

[Alex Lowes]

Also I would like to pepole to test my font and help improve the font and tell me want's wrong.
Also others may do more fonts.
Anyhow is there a place were I can post my font for downloads?

[Pumaman]

Ok, I've added a preliminary version of this to 2.56 beta 4. However, I'm not entirely sure about how it's supposed to work, so could you give it a go and see if it is displayed correctly.

You'll need to check the new "Write game text backwards" checkbox on the General Settings tab.

[Omer Mor]

please please please with sugar on top and honeynut coating add hebrew / right-to-left support to AGS...  

[Scummbuddy]

please please please with sugar on top and honeynut coating add hebrew / right-to-left support to AGS...  

i could have sworn that was the whole point to chris putting in text to write from right to left

[Alex Lowes]

well it does not work as should
I will try to exlain what should be desplayd instead.
hebrew is firstyl written from right to left so to read it correctly you should be
possible to write from right to left as i did here when I hold ctrl+shift:
in other words the hebrew text sould be written like this message.

I think this option will fix the problem

[Pumaman]

Sorry, I don't understand what you mean - your message looks normal English to me.

[am]

What Alex means is that the message should be aligned to the right.
Also I checked Hebrew using the new beta4 (and Alex's font) - I was able to make it display hebrew message, and the line-break warked fine, only one problem remains - I have to type the message from the last letter to the first (which is not very convenient). Also writting translation files for games will be a problem since a checkbox must be checked ... Is there a possebility to make the choice in the translation file? (also another nice thing will be the ability to change fonts through the translation files)

[Pumaman]

Put:
game.text_align = ALIGN_RIGHT;

in game_start to align the text to the right.

So should the text all be backwards as well as the line breaks? I'm confused now, this sounds different to how we discussed it before.

So the sentence:

Jibble the thingie with the wotsit.

should be displayed how over two lines?

[am]

The prefered way (easyer to write) is:
tistow eht htiw
eigniht eht elbbiJ

although the way it is now is alos OK, only a bit awkward to type eg.
with the wotsit
Jibble the thingie

[Alex Lowes]

am you are allmost right but wrong:
eigniht eht elbbiJ
Jibble the thingie

is the right way cause when you click enter it goes to the second line and you start again the mirror effect:) I think.

[Pumaman]

Ah thanks, I'll get it fixed.

[Rani Hasan]

Thanks a lot for having the left-to-right support in the engine, now I can make an Arabic Localized adventure game and/or help translate current games to the arabic language.

The problem that needs to be fixed in order to have a fully working left-to-right solution is that being able to use both english and arabic/hebrew, and that CAN be done, by using one of the 3 font slots that we have, BUT if you try to use the built in actions such as: GAME->Display Message, then you can't switch to the font of your choice, and so you have to right a script:

SetNormalFont(1); // which is the arabic font in this case
DisplaySpeech(EGO, "{l{H");  
SetNormalFont(0); // switch back to the english font

Simply what I want is to be able to swich between fonts without having to right a script -so that I can use the built in Interaction trees for adding messages and dialogs-, I hope this makes sense.

I would also like to ask about the name of the API function that would set the left-to-right on and off.

Thanks alot,
Rani.

[Al_Ninio]

Hey, nice!
A Hebrew font!
Will you make it available on the web once it's tested and all?

[Pumaman]

The problem that needs to be fixed in order to have a fully working left-to-right solution is that being able to use both english and arabic/hebrew

Perhaps I'm misunderstanding, but why would you want the game to be half English and half Hebrew?

[am]

There are times where mixing is needed, e.g. when using names etc. another option is a multi-language game :-)
However, I don't see this as a problem since I use scripting anyway ...

[Alex Lowes]

let me explain what he means
I will speak as simple as it gets by an example:
in hebrew hello=shalom(with hebrew font's)
but to write shalom in hebrew font's we need to spell it blindly
in other words we have written on the keyboard all the hebrew letters
so hello in hebrew is like this= akuo
which means nothing for you but because AGS translates in to the written font we do see the correct shalom
it would be grate if we had a screen like in the font editor in sci studio poping up and let us write with the sci fonts themselves so we can see what we are writting


now I really did not understand what I have written but I hope somone can explain this better

[Rani Hasan]

There are times where mixing is needed, e.g. when using names etc. another option is a multi-language game :-), However, I don't see this as a problem since I use scripting anyway ...

Well, if that is the case then I think there is no problem

I haven't used the engine so much and so I didn't realize that using the built in interactions would not THAT much important.

Alex, as for what you mentioned, I completely understand you, but that's not what I asked for though having that would be really great ... What i'm planning to do is to write a simple text conversion tool in which you write the words in your local langauge -ie: Arabic, Hebrew - and then it translates them into thier english equvielnt, then you can easily copy and paste the outcome -which is something like 'akuo'- into the ags editor.

Example: you input "Shalom" in the tool -writting in Hebron letters- and it produces "akuo".

Thanks a lot for you comments.

[FiXxXeR]

This is Rani Hasan.

I need help with the following:

1. What's the API function for enabling / disabling right-to-left -ex: setLeftToRight(0)- ?

2. Alex, how did you solve the problem of having the NEW LINES showing not under the text but above it -Line breaks working upside down-?

What happens:
This is the Second line
This is the First line (when line breaks, the second line appears on top)

What should happen:
This is the First line
This is the Second line

P.S: line breaks should be normal, exactly like english, the only differance is the right-to-left oriantation instead of left-to-right. -for Arabic lanaguge at least-

Please help me with those issues.

[Alex Lowes]

well your right
I just saw the problem
well I did not solve it maybe cj will know how?
and about the text translation tool it could be cooler if it were a plug-in.

[LucasFan]

What i'm planning to do is to write a simple text conversion tool in which you write the words in your local langauge -ie: Arabic, Hebrew - and then it translates them into thier english equvielnt, then you can easily copy and paste the outcome -which is something like 'akuo'- into the ags editor.

Heh, wouldn’t it be easier to use an Arabic TTF?  

[Alex Lowes]

well now
If you have read my long ago post asking for hebrew support for AGS.
we conqluded that it won't be done in the near fututre cause there are not more than 128 chars to write with .
So sombody said well no hebrew fonts for now unless someone will make a hebrew sci font
and so after moths of planning it I drew the font

p.s
will it be possible to add the hebrew font to the font pack on the AGS site?

[FiXxXeR]

Heh, wouldn’t it be easier to use an Arabic TTF?  

Ofcourse it would be easier but the problem is the AGS editor doesn't support Arabic letters, and the AGS engine can't import arabic fonts even if they are ttf.

Alex, I'll try to make it as a plugin which can be fully customized to support Arabic and Hebrew.

Oh by the way, I just finished the Arabic font, and it's working smoothly but i still need to fix the line break issue, and I need the API function to switch back to left-to-right.

P.S: I hope it's possiable to add the Arabic font too to the Font Pack Alex mentioned.

Rani

[LucasFan]

…and the AGS engine can't import arabic fonts even if they are ttf.

LOL. And why shouldn’t AGS be able to import them? I’ve read that the Arabic alphabet consists of only 28 characters. The Russian has 33. And AGS supports Cyrillic TTFs very well…  

[Rani Hasan]

LOL. And why shouldn’t AGS be able to import them? I’ve read that the Arabic alphabet consists of only 28 characters. The Russian has 33. And AGS supports Cyrillic TTFs very well…  

First of all, i'm arabic and I do know how to count the alphabet the second thing which makes it impossiable for AGS to import the Arabic font is because Arabic letters come in differant shapes -based in thier location at the word and the letter before and after them- and so even if it has 28 alphabet you should multiplay it with at least 3 times to have all the shapes of the letters ready to be used.

What happens when you import an Arabic TTF is that it only imports the first 128 characters which is NOT USEFUL at all as you still have lots of missing letters -letter shapes-.

The other thing is that, even if you import that arabic TTF the AGS editor doesn't handle arabic font -in the editor text fields- for example, if you switch to the Arabic lanaguge and try to add a Global Message instead of having arabic letters showing in the editor's textfield you'll have rubbish characters.

My easy and simple solution to this was to redraw all the arabic letters over the english ones -for example draw the letter "Alef" in arabic over the letter Q- and then type a "Q" when ever i need the "Alef" letter, and to handle large amounts of text, i'll design a tool in which you write the words in Arabic, and then it converts all the "Alef" letters for example to "Q" and then I would easily copy and paste the out come into the AGS editor and that's it you have an Arabized AGS Engine

I'm done with the Arabic font, i tested it and it's working smooth.

Anyways, Please help me get over the following issuses:

1. What's the API function for enabling / disabling right-to-left -ex: setLeftToRight(0)- ?

2. How can I solve the problem of having the NEW LINES showing not under the text but above it -Line breaks working upside down-?

What happens:
This is the Second line
This is the First line (when line breaks, the second line appears on top)

What should happen:
This is the First line
This is the Second line

P.S: In Arabic and Hebrew line breaks should be normal, exactly like english, the only differance is the right-to-left oriantation instead of left-to-right. -for Arabic lanaguge at least-.

[Pumaman]

What happens when you import an Arabic TTF is that it only imports the first 128 characters which is NOT USEFUL at all as you still have lots of missing letters -letter shapes-.

AGS does import the entire font, but in the editor you can only use 128 characters. You can, however, use 256 characters in a translation file, so one possible way to do it is to write the game in English, then create a Hebrew translation file which can use the entire character set.

1. What's the API function for enabling / disabling right-to-left -ex: setLeftToRight(0)- ?

To disable it:
SetGameOption (OPT_RIGHTTOLEFT, 0);
game.text_align = ALIGN_LEFT;

To enable it:
SetGameOption (OPT_RIGHTTOLEFT, 1);
game.text_align = ALIGN_RIGHT;

2. How can I solve the problem of having the NEW LINES showing not under the text but above it -Line breaks working upside down-?

What happens:
This is the Second line
This is the First line (when line breaks, the second line appears on top)

I'm confused now - that's now I did it before, but Alex said it was wrong. I apologise for the confusion here but I seem to be getting different messages about how left-to-right writing works.

Ok, well I've changed how it works in RC 2, so can you let me know whether this is any better.

[Alex Lowes]

Sorry I have confused you CJ.I myself did not track down the bug
but now in RC2 it works .
thanks.

[Rani Hasan]

Ok, well I've changed how it works in RC 2, so can you let me know whether this is any better.

Right to Left is working 100% now.

Thanks CJ.

Now AGS fully supports Arabic and Hebrew -using special made SCI fonts-.

[Pumaman]

Excellent, thanks for letting me know.

[Al_Ninio]

So where can I find this hebrew font, then?

[Alex Lowes]

hey I did write you a message to just e0mail me
lowesalex@hotmail.com
"am"
the font I sent you has one mising letter so e-mail me again and I will send you the correct font ok
anyone who wishes to get this update please mail me.