Creating MSI packages in other languages

This tutorial will guide you step by step into the creation of a MSI packages in languages other than that of the project. It is addressed to those who have previous experience in using the Advanced Installer application to create MSI packages, but only in English.

1. Create the project
2. Add other languages to the build
3. Build the MSI packages
4. Expand package localization
5. Create translation dictionary
6. Translate dictionary

Create the project

Follow the Professional Installation tutorial to create the Advanced Installer project. Select English as the project language.

Add other languages to the build

It is recommended that you do not add other languages until you have completed all the steps for creating your package (adding files, registry entries, etc.).

Let's specify the languages in which we want to have MSIs created.

Switch to the "Translations" page by selecting it in the left-side panel.

Select the "Languages" tab.

In the tree, select the languages you want to generate MSI packages in. Let's say Chinese Simplified and German.

Build the MSI packages

Now that you have specified the languages you want MSIs in, let's build them.

Click on the [ Build ] toolbar button and a "Build Project" dialog will appear showing you the build evolution.

To find the created MSI packages, look on your hard drive in the folder where the project MSI is being created. The localized MSIs will be built in subfolders, named by their language identifiers. In our case, a folder "zh" will contain the Chinese build and a folder "de" the German one. Run the Chinese MSI by double clicking on it to see how it looks like:

Nice and foreign!

Expand package localization

By default, Advanced Installer will attempt to translate only package elements that are specified for translation. This includes all UI strings and certain Windows Installer Properties. However, sometimes you want to translate other elements as well.

Still in the Languages tab of the Media page, click on the [ Select... ] in the "Translations" group. This is the Localization Options Dialog. Let's select "Features" and click [ OK ].

If we build again, Advanced Installer will try to translate the "Features" localizable strings (the main feature's Title and Description, but it won't have translations for them so it will default to English.

Create translation dictionary

Now, Advanced Installer did its best to translate everything into the languages we wanted but in certain cases - like the product name - it just didn't have the corresponding German or Chinese string. So we have to help it with a Translation Dictionary.

Still in the Languages tab of the Translations page, click on the [ Create... ], also in the Translations group. The wizard will create a dictionary file containing all the strings without translation in one of the build languages.

The created dictionary will be added automatically to the translations list. Switch to the "Translations" page by selecting it in the left-side panel and notice the dictionaries added to your project.

Translate dictionary

The dictionary file is a regular XML file saved in the UTF-8 encoding. You can edit with any Unicode aware editor that can save in UTF-8. Notepad on Windows XP is such an editor, although a fully featured validating XML editor would be preferred.

So open the dictionary file in Notepad, translate the entries you want translated and comment out (or delete) the rest.

You will notice that the dictionary also contains the strings in one or more "start" languages. Those are placed there only to help you in your translation. Do not edit them, as they are being ignored at build.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="yes"?>
<DICTIONARY type="multilanguage">
  <ENTRY id="Feature.Title.MainFeature">
    <STRING lang="en" value="MainFeature"/>
    <STRING lang="zh" value="Main Chinese Feature"/>
    <STRING lang="de" value="Main German Feature"/>
  </ENTRY>
  <ENTRY id="Property.ProductName">
    <STRING lang="en" value="Long Story"/>
    <STRING lang="zh" value="Long Chinese Story"/>
    <STRING lang="de" value="Long German Story"/>
  </ENTRY>
</DICTIONARY>

Build and run the Chinese MSI again. Note how the strings were now taken from the supplied dictionary.

The End

This concludes our tutorial. To learn more, please read the New Language tutorial.