Translating PimpFish

If you would like to see PimpFish translated into your native language, and you have some time to spare, you can help us out! We're always looking to add new languages to our product, so that more people can use PimpFish in the language that they're most comfortable with. And the best part - if you provide us with a new, good-quality translation, we'll give you a free license! All you need is a resource editor and some good typing skills!

This page will demonstrate doing a translation, and just to be totally PC and culturally-neutral, we'll use Klingon as the example language.

Preparing for a Translation

The first step in doing a translation is to take the English language files and make copies of them. Go to your PimpFish install directory, by default this is C:\Program Files\PimpFish. In that directory is another directory called lang. In the lang directory, you'll see several files. Make a copy of PFRes_eng.dll. PFRes_eng.dll holds English resources for the entire product. Rename the copy by changing "eng" to an abbreviation of the target language; using a standard naming scheme like the ISO three-letter language code is preferred.

For the purposes of our Klingon example, we'll use the abbreviation "kli". So, to summarize, make a copy of PFRes_eng.dll and call it PFRes_kli.dll. From now on, all work will be done on the new Klingon copy.

Using a Resource Editing Tool

Next, you will need a program that can edit the resources in Windows PE binaries. If you have Microsoft Visual C++, you can use its resource editor as long as you are running an NT-based version of Windows (NT 4, 2000, XP, and so on). Otherwise, we recommend the free program XN Resource Editor.

Once you have your editor, open the resource DLL for editing.

• Visual C++ 6: Click File, then click Open. Select PFRes_kli.dll, then at the bottom of the dialog, change the Open As option to Resources. Click OK and Visual C++ will open the DLL in editing mode.
• Visual C++ 7: Click File, point to Open..., and click File. Select PFRes_kli.dll, then click the down arrow next to the Open button and you'll see a menu. Select Open With... on the menu. In the ensuing dialog, select Resource Editor and click Open.
• XN Resource Editor: Click File, then click Open. Select PFRes_kli.dll and click Open to open the DLL in the editor.

Translating Resources

In PFRes_kli.dll, here are the resource types and numeric IDs of the resources that you need to change:

• Bitmaps: Change #108 (a Windows Media Player screen shot)
• Dialogs: Edit the text in all dialogs that contain text (in either the caption or controls)
• HTML: Change #104 (help page shown if the downloader can't connect to the PimpFish help center), #217 (credits for the About box, please keep our names in there ;) and feel free to credit yourself for the translation), and #292 (web page shown in the download statistics window).
• Menu: Edit the text in all of the commands. Any items with text in <angle brackets> are place holders and do not need to be translated. Since all menus are popups, the top-level item in each menu is not used, and does not need to be translated.
• String: Change all except #100 and #204, which are the name of the program. Some strings will need some additional explanation:
  • 42: The name of the target language (in this case, "Klingon"). This string is shown in the dialog that lists which languages are available.
  • 43: A message (in Klingon) that tells the user his new language choice will be used the next time he runs PimpFish.
  • 116: Text for the tooltip for that button (in English, these two are the same, but they do not have to be)
  • 167: The point size to use for the font that's used in skinned dialogs. This can usually be left at 8, but should be 9 for east Asian languages, or another size if your language has a larger default GUI font size.
  • 175: Controls the font used for skinned buttons that have text labels. This string has the format "face_name;point_size;bold_flag". Remove the trailing ";bold" if you don't want a bold font.
  • 184: Controls the font used for the caption text in skinned dialogs. This has the same format at #175.
  • 218: Default face name for the font used in GUI elements. Change this only if your language has a default font that is not Tahoma.
  • 219: Face name for the font used for text labels in the main downloader window. If you change #218, you should set this string to the same name.
  • 285: Face name and point size for the font used to show SLAPfile messages. This should be a fixed-width font. This string has the format "face_name;point_size".
  • 1000-1039: Tooltips used in the color picker control.

Trying Out Your Translation

When you're ready to try out the new language, run Internet Explorer. In the PimpFish toolbar, click Control, then Options. On the Appearance tab, click Change Language. Select your new language from the list, and click OK to all the dialogs. Close and rerun Internet Explorer, and bask in the warm glow of a new translation!

Send It To Us!

Once you've completed your translation, use the Contact Support form to let us know about your awesome work!