Table of Contents

How to make new language files

For each language, E2B uses two files:

STRINGS.TXT – holds all $$STRxxxx keyword strings – e.g. $$STRm004=Windows Boot Menu
F1.CFG – F1 help menu

In addition, the MPI ToolKit contains some English and German translation string files (e.g. (MPI):.\csm\e2b\LANG\ENG.txt) which are used by MakePartImage when making .imgPTN files – see here for details on how to change the language in the CSM menu.

If I use your new language files in E2B – please ask me for a free eBook!

Example of how to make new E2B Menu language files

This involves the following stages for each file:

1. Translate file, e.g. using Google Translate (Google messes up the syntax – it may be easier for you to manually translate each file!)
2. ‘Fix’ the translated file messed up by Google Translate!
3. Test the file
4. Add the language to E2B

Preparation

FIXLANG Download

Download WinMerge 2 and install it
Download the FIXLANG.zip file above and unzip it to a new folder on your Desktop called LANG
Obtain the latest (Beta?) version of the E2B download and create a E2B USB drive
Copy the \_ISO\e2b\grub\ENG\Strings.txt file to the new LANG folder and rename it as StringsENG.txt
Copy the \_ISO\e2b\grub\ENG\F1.cfg file to the new LANG folder and rename it as F1ENG.cfg

1. Translate file using Google Translate

This example is for Czech language.

Go to Google Translate and click on ‘translate a document’ – upload the StringsENG.txt file or F1ENG.cfg file and select the language you want to translate it to.

Cut and paste the translated text into Notepad and save it in the Desktop LANG folder as either Strings_NEW.txt or F1_NEW.cfg

You must use these EXACT NAMES…

Strings_NEW.txt
F1_NEW.cfg

Make sure you select UTF-8 when you save the file using Notepad.

Note: You may find it easier to manually translate each file because Google Translate messes up the syntax/formatting a lot!

2. ‘Fix’ the translated file

Double-click on FIXLANG.cmd to ‘fix’ the Strings_new.txt file, or double-click on FIX_F1.cmd to fix the F1_new.cfg file.

Save the new text file as either STRINGS.TXT or F1.CFG in the Desktop LANG folder.

Make sure you select UTF-8 when you save the file using Notepad.

WinMerge

You now need to manually fix the new file.Use WinMerge to compare the original Strings_ENG.txt with STRINGS.TXT and F1ENG.cfg with F1.CFG.

There will be many errors!

You must fix each line so that the format is correct.

3. Test the file

Copy the STRINGS.TXT and F1.CFG to your E2B USB drive into the E2B drive’s \_ISO folder.

You must place .ISO files in all E2B folders on the E2B drive. These can be real ISOs or just a small file called dummy.iso.

Place any small ISO file in each of these folders so that you can test all menus:
\_ISO\ANTIVIRUS, AUTO, BACKUP, DOS, LINUX, MAINMENU, UTILITIES, UTILITIES_MEMTEST, WIN and WINPE folder.

Also add an ISO to each of the folders under the \_ISO\WINDOWS folder so that the Windows menus will appear. Ensure there are two or more ISO files in the XP folder (if only one ISO then it will be automatically selected by E2B and you may not see all the dialogue strings).

If you do not add ISO files to each E2B menu folder, you will not be able to fully test the new language and all menus.

Use \QEMU_MENU_TEST (run as admin).cmd to boot from the E2B drive and test each E2B menu. E2B will warn you if any keywords in the STRINGS.TXT file are missing.

Now carefully check each menu (Antivirus, Utilities, Memory test, help text, F1 help menu, XP install dialogues, Windows 7 and Windows 10 install prompts, etc.).

Be sure to go through the all the steps when selecting Windows Install ISO and check the text and heading and the number of = underline characters, e.g.

XP INSTALL - STEP 1 ===================

and not

XP INSTALL - STEP 1 =========

For more details check my blog post here.

4. Add the language to E2B

Example for a new Klingon language:

1. Create a new \_ISO\e2b\grub\KLINGON folder.

2. Move the \_ISO\STRINGS.TXT and \_ISO\F1.CFG file to the \_ISO\e2b\grub\KLINGON folder.

3. Add the following line to \_ISO\MyE2B.cfg:

if "%LANG%"=="" set LANG=KLINGON

When you have tested the files, send them to me for inclusion into E2B.

Please indicate what keyboard is commonly used with this language (QWERTY USA, QWERTZ, etc.).