Although
the article on Windows Multilanguage Support of was published in the FALL 1999 issue of Koreny
it was actually written several months earlier.At the time of writing I was using Windows
95 and that is the primary viewpoint of the original article. Since that time new
information on the subject has come to my attention.
Windows 98
On the Windows 98 systems that I have seen since writing the article the original CD was
not necessary during installation of Multilanguage Support, as it was with Windows 95. An
added plus is that, the Slovak language and keyboard is available on Windows 98.
Word 2000
The biggest revelation came early in 2000.In February, during a fit of despondency
regarding my old 90 MHz Pentium computer, I dug out a bag of nickels (that had been put
aside for use on the Cermak Road streetcar) and bought a shiny super duper whiz bang
Pentium 600 MHz computer. Ah, what a day!
The new computer came with the latest edition of Microsoft Windows
98 and Office 2000 installed. Among other programs Office 2000 includes Word 2000.
Windows, Multilanguage Support was already installed except for selecting the Czech
language and the Czech keyboard. In a minute or two I was in business. Using Word 2000 in
Czech, seemed to work fine until I needed to print the material. I fed the document to my
HP laser printer, and at first glance everything was looked good. Looking a little more
closely I was surprised to find that many of the letters with diacritical marks
didn’t print at all…there were simply blank spaces were they should have been!!
Horrors! Now what?
I’ll
try to make this short. I am not sure if what I was experiencing was a common problem, but
the answer was on the Microsoft website (http://www.microsoft.com)
although it addressed a different issue. Nevertheless the solution was a printer setting
that I had never used before.
If you run
into this problem here is a solution. In Word 2000 go to File, then Print,
then Print Quality. Set Text Mode to “True Type as
Bitmaps”.That simple change solved the problem (for my HP Laser printer).The
biggest issue is to remember to make the settings on each Czech document.So far, this
setting reverts to the default (Auto) each time Microsoft Word is started.
Neat Add-in
While looking for the answer to the printer problem discussed above I stumbled upon a neat
add-in that is not included with Word 2000, but is available free of charge from
Microsoft. This is the Microsoft Visual Keyboard. It will show you the keyboard
layout and the diacritical keys when you use Czech or Slovak or other language. The Visual
Keyboard is live so, if you wish, you can enter characters by clicking on them. I find
Visual Keyboard very useful. Before this feature I always had to refer to a paper copy of
the keyboard layout and a cheat sheet for the diacriticals. Now I can pop the visual
keyboard up when I want it, and everything is right there on the screen …and
it’s free!! You don’t have to go into your streetcar nickels.
Microsoft Visual Keyboard set for Czech (QWERTY)
You can get the Visual Keyboard on the Internet at the following address: (URL) http://officeupdate.microsoft.com/2000/downloadDetails/viskeyboard.htm
. This web page has good download information and installation instructions.
Remember, this is an add-in for Word 2000 only, and you don’t need to have Windows
2000. Windows 98 will do nicely.
In closing, please be aware that Word 2000 has lots of other Multilanguage
functions, including proofing tools and all kinds of things
that I don’t need. You might need them so if you have Word
2000 take a close look.
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Last Update 2/21/2000