Changing the Language on Office X

[Richard McPherson]

My other half uses a French version of Office X. I, however, speak
French as well as I speak Martian. Is it possible to change the
language?

Thanks.

 

[Jim Gordon]

Hi

This is from Word's help when I searched on the word "language", but I'm not
sure if this is what you meant:

Check the spelling of all or part of a document in another language
1. If you haven't already done so, install the dictionary for the language
you want to check.
How?
2. Select the text that's written in another language.
3. On the Tools menu, click Language.
4. In the Mark selected text as box, click the language you want to check,
and then click OK.
5. When you finish marking the text, check the spelling in the document.
How?
When the spelling checker encounters the marked text, it uses the
specified language dictionary to check the text. Then, the spelling checker
returns to the default language dictionary to check the rest of the
document.

There are language settings in MacOS that can be changed. There are
versions of Office available in different languages.

-Jim Gordon
Mac MVP

All responses should be made to this newsgroup within the same thread.
Thanks.

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http://www.mvps.org/

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<http://www.rondebruin.nl/Google.htm>

 

[Richard McPherson]

Jim

Many thanks - this will certainly help although I'm really looking for
a way to turn the whole program into English - menus etc. If not, I'll
just have to bite the bullet and get the English version.

Best wishes,

Richard

 

[Jim Gordon]

Hi

If you decide to add another version of Office on the same computer there
are some considerations to think about that I don't know the answers to.

In general, MacOS will use the most recently installed version to open
documents when they are double-clicked. So if other half saves a Word
document from Fr version, when it's double-clicked it will open in English
version if that version of Office was installed after the French version
was. The way around this is to open the application (French Word in this
example) then use File > Open from within the application.

What I don't know (and will try to find out for you) is whether there are
other potential conflicts within Office that could cause problems. I've no
idea whether the preference files will cause troubles for you. So please
wait for further information so you don't wind up with a big mess.

-Jim Gordon
Mac MVP

All responses should be made to this newsgroup within the same thread.
Thanks.

About Microsoft MVPs:
http://www.mvps.org/

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----------

 

[Richard McPherson]

Jim - thanks loads. It's a pity there just isn't a "Click Here to Turn
Everything Into English" button.... Might be easier just to learn
French me thinks!

Thanks again - awaiting your next posting. )

Rich

 

[Jim Gordon]

Hi

One of the other MVPs is about to give it a whirl to see what happens. What
language did you set MacOS to?

-Jim Gordon
Mac MVP

All responses should be made to this newsgroup within the same thread.
Thanks.

About Microsoft MVPs:
http://www.mvps.org/

Search for help with the free Google search Excel add-in:
<http://www.rondebruin.nl/Google.htm>

 

[Gene van Troyer]

What I don't know (and will try to find out for you) is whether there are
other potential conflicts within Office that could cause problems. I've no
idea whether the preference files will cause troubles for you. So please
wait for further information so you don't wind up with a big mess.

I have Japanese Office X and English Office X (different licenses) installed
on the same Mac in the same account. Both work without any problems except
for one:

They share whatever same preference file that controls the main Menu Bar, so
my Views Menu > Tool Bars lists Some English and some Japanese for the tool
bars.

There is no mix-up in the Microsoft User Data Folder because the Japanese
version adds Japanese to its MUD file and folder names. I just have two MUD
folders.

Unfortunately, you can't change the language of the application's menus
unless you apply a patch (I know it can be done for Chinese) but them your
wife will have a problem.

If you use two separate accounts, you could place English in yours and
French in hers, and they'd be separate and wouldn't share preference files.

Gene van Troyer

 

[Gene van Troyer]

One of the other MVPs is about to give it a whirl to see what happens. What
language did you set MacOS to?

Changing the language of OSX doesn't affect the language of MS Office
because it Carbon, not Cocoa, and doesn't have language localization built
into it.

Gene van Troyer

 

[Corentin Cras-Méneur]

My other half uses a French version of Office X. I, however, speak
French as well as I speak Martian. Is it possible to change the
language?

You simply can't... You need to install the US version instead of the
French one.
You should uninstall Office in French before you install the UIS version
since some of the preferences would remain in French otherwise.

One good thing to know: The US version takes the same serial number than
the French version...


Corentin

 

[Corentin Cras-Méneur]

What I don't know (and will try to find out for you) is whether there are
other potential conflicts within Office that could cause problems. I've no
idea whether the preference files will cause troubles for you. So please
wait for further information so you don't wind up with a big mess.

Some of the preferences appear in French in the US version if you keep
the same prefs, but they work just fine.


Corentin

 

[Corentin Cras-Méneur]

Jim - thanks loads. It's a pity there just isn't a "Click Here to Turn
Everything Into English" button.... Might be easier just to learn
French me thinks!

The problem is that the application has been built as an evolution of
Office 2001. You'd need to rebuild the entire user interface for MacOS X
and package the applciation. You could then have multiple localizations
in the application. That's what you have in many MacOS X apps.
Unfortunately..... we don't have that for Office X.....

Corentin

 

[Corentin Cras-Méneur]

Hi

One of the other MVPs is about to give it a whirl to see what happens. What
language did you set MacOS to?

As Gene mentioned, it does not make the slightest difference. Here is
how it works:

Packaged application (including the Finder) have their user interface
described in .lproj files. You have one .lproj per language in the
application.

If you run the system in French, then MacOSX tells all the applcaitions
to use the French.lproj when you launch them (and the English.lproj if
there is no French.lproj).

Changing the language for the system does not affect the application
itself of its files or preferneces. It is just a matter of which
localization of the user interface it uses.

Unfortuntely, Office does not use .lproj...


Corentin

 

[Richard McPherson]

Thanks for all your help, both of you!

Richard

 

[Corentin Cras-Méneur]

Thanks for all your help, both of you!

You're very welcome (and lets hope future versions will be packaged :-\
).
Corentin