Re: Language-generating software (was Re: Replies to my Introduction)

You might be further horrified to learn that I still use Paint Shop Pro.
Version 3.11, to be precise.  I was dragged kicking and screaming from
Windows 3.1x to Windows 95, and didn't move on to Me until the machine
running 95 died (I was running EverQuest on 95, even after it became an
unsupported platform!)  Growing up with DOS version numbers rather smaller
than 6.0, and not using Windows until the early 1990s, had a weird effect on
me.  I also use a DOS-based Russian flashcard program (it's only 75kb!)  I
agree that more features would be nice, but I have a permanent dislike for
anything that might be construed as "user friendly."  My only concession to
the concept is the fact that I use a different keyboard mapping setup for
Russian than what came with Windows; the phonetic version sped up my typing
significantly.  Anyway, see below for my answers.  Just because I'm old and
stogy when it comes to Windows applications (my number one problem with the
entire OS is that it's too rigid in its "user friendliness" -- well, and
it's also massively unstable...), doesn't mean I lack imagination.

Sarah Marie Parker-Allen
lloannna@surfside.net
http://lloannna.blogspot.com
http://www.geocities.com/lloannna.geo

"There are some things that it is better to begin than to refuse, even
though the end may be dark."
-- J.R.R. Tolkien

> -----Original Message-----
> Behalf Of Jeffrey Henning
> I'm appalled that anyone uses LangMaker in this day and age.
> It's an awful
> little Windows 3.1 program that suffers from bit rot.  I just
> downloaded it
> last night for the first time since 1998 and boy is it buggy and ugly.  I
> also think the interface is pretty unintuitive.  It looks like a
> warmed-over
> version of Excel 95.
>
> It's free for a reason...
>
> I think language-generating software should offer:
> * an installer (rather than ZIPped files)
> * ease of use
> * reliability
> * a choice of dictionaries
> * morphological word formation -- change the augmentative root, for
> instance, and see all words derived from it updated
> * translation assistance -- look up a lot of words at once
> * flexible publishing to the Web.
>
> A survey of my own--
>

> 1. Do you regularly use language-gen software?
> [X ] Yes  [ ] No  {place an X in the appropriate box}
>

> 2. If yes, which one?
LangMaker ^___^

>
> 3. What do you like about the language-gen software you've looked at?
Cheap (I'm a poor college student), functional (fragile system), allows me
to copy & paste into Microsoft Office products & Notepad/Word Pad

>
> 4. What do you dislike?
Hard to manipulate my word lists within the program; if I want to change
around the translations for two words (i.e. switch "anna" and "sos" from
meaning "sun" and "word," respectively, to meaning "word" and "sun,"
respectively), I really have to do it in Word.  Overall, LangMaker is useful
to me exclusively as a word generation system, and it is highly functional
for that.  It also gave me some ideas for phonology, in terms of making some
sounds ONLY appear in roots, for example, and never word endings.

>
> 5. What would you all like to see in such software?
More management functions, the ability to generate tables of declensions and
conjugations, the ability to instantly apply conjugation and declension
rules to root words (and apply other rules like that), perhaps the ability
to translate basic constructions (i.e. a command that would allow me to type
in "the dog runs to the store" and see how, based on the various rules for
sentence formation that I've defined, it'll look -- maybe even with all the
variations that are allowed grammatically, the way that some annagram
software will work).  In short, a skeleton translation software; if I gave
it enough material from a natural language like Russian, I'd expect it to
come up with workable translations.  Given that translation software costs
over $1000...


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