Language Translation Tables.

If you wish to go direct to the Table of Languages in alphabetical order below, please click here.

GENERAL NOTES

[Note:  DBT Codes are shown in these topics in red purely for clarity]

The "Document ... Translation Table" menu of the Duxbury Braille Translator (DBT) provides the basic way to choose the base language and "jurisdiction" that is to be applied to the translation process. For example, one may select English as a base language, with "American" as the jurisdiction. That would mean not only that English is presumed to be the basic language of the document, but also that the braille codes established by the Braille Authority of North America (BANA), along with any specifically American usage conventions, are to be applied throughout -- even as to the treatment of other "secondary" languages that may occur as included passages within the document.

All of these tables are works in progress, in part because the various national authorities often refine or extend the corresponding braille code rules, and in part because improvements are often undertaken in order to conform to the rules more closely. Consequently, in any given version of DBT, the various tables typically vary in certain respects, such as whether secondary (embedded) languages are allowed and if so which ones, which characters may appear in the file, and whether math or other technical notation may be entered.

In general, the emphasis in this document is upon print to braille translation, because that is the most commonly used direction and usually the first one implemented. The notes under "Special Requirements and Limitations" generally note when true braille-to-print translation is not available or more limited in scope than the print-to-braille translation.

The list of allowed secondary languages documents those languages that are explicitly supported in the sense that a [lng~...] code can be given to switch into that language. (The initial language of a file is assumed to be the base language of the selected table, so no [lng~...] codes are needed at all for files that are entirely in the base language.) The general rule is that a plain [lng] code, i.e. one without a parameter designating a specific language, or a [lng~...] code for an unsupported language, implies reversion to the base language. In many cases, it is possible to enter passages in secondary languages without switching (although it is usually a good idea to switch to grade 1 if not already in grade 1), at least as long as the character set is supported. The necessity to switch, or not, is partly governed by the rules defined by the applicable braille authorities. For example, in an English document being transcribed according to American usage, it is normally not necessary and in fact inappropriate to switch to another language just for the duration of a word or short phrase presented as an "Anglicized" expression, e.g. "I had a tête-a-tête with my brother ...".

The supported translation codes are listed; those that have no further explanation can be presumed to function as documented in the "Codes Quick Reference" document under the Help menu.

Just as the assumed initial language is the base language for that table, the assumed initial "grade" (level of contraction) is the highest grade supported in that table, e.g. grade 2 in the English/American table. That grade applies not only to the base language but also to any secondary languages, to the extent that contractions in such languages are allowed by the braille authorities for the base language and jurisdiction represented by the table. As an example, at this writing (October 2000), the English/American custom is to transcribe French in grade 1. So, when using the English/American tables, text marked as French is always done in grade 1 even though grade 2 mode remains in effect. By contrast, the English/British custom is to use a kind of grade 2 (a subset of "full" French abrégé) in French passages. So, when using the English/British tables, text marked as French is done in that special grade 2 unless grade 1 mode is in effect.

The "characters supported" sections list the characters only in broad groups, as detailed lists would be impracticably long and subject to frequent change. If detailed information is needed for a particular character or group, a good way to obtain the information would be to copy-and-paste any relevant portions of the "Character List" document (under Help) into a short trial document, and then, having selected the table of interest, translate the document to braille. (In some instances, it might be necessary to select a math or computer-notation context, or a particular secondary language, to set up the translation situation of interest.) Essentially the same advice applies when importing from word-processor files and the like: If you are concerned about unusual characters that may appear in a document, try a short document containing those characters. The braille output for a character that is not supported is typically the same as an asterisk (*), e.g. dots 35, 35 in English, sometimes followed by another arbitrary braille character or short sequence.

The term "ASCII printable" means all the non-control characters in the American Standard Code for Information Interchange, or in other words all those in the range D+20 through D+7e in the Character List. These include all Roman-alphabet letters in both cases, ordinary punctuation marks typically used in English, the dollar sign, and a few other symbols with primarily technical uses. Most of the translation tables support the basic ASCII characters. However, as with the other named character groups, some ASCII symbols may not be supported in a given table or a particular context thereof -- in fact, there may not be any defined braille equivalent given in the associated braille code.

A "Select Contractions" section is given only for those tables that provide that option.

The "References, History and Credits" sections give basic information as to the origins of the tables and major relevant documents. However, in general, there are many other influences, too numerous to list, that have played some role in ongoing development. Duxbury Systems is indebted to all of these in its efforts to keep the tables up to current braille standards.

Table of Languages included in DBT DBT 11.1 SR3
Region Table Designator Language
Africa afr Afrikaans
Africa afr-x00 Afrikaans (pre-Unified)
Europe sqi Albanian (Experimental)
Africa amh Amharic
Asia, Africa ara Arabic
Asia, Africa ara-x02 Arabic (pre-2002 rules)
Asia hye Armenian, Eastern (Experimental)
Asia asm Assamese
Asia awa Awadhi
Asia aze Azerbaijani (Experimental)
Europe bel Belarusian
Asia ben Bengali (Bangla)
Asia bho Bhojpuri
Europe bos Bosnian (Experimental)
Europe bul Bulgarian/Uncontracted
Asia mya Burmese
Europe cat Catalan (Experimental)
Asia ceb Cebuano (Experimental)
Asia cmn Chinese/Mandarin
Asia yue Chinese/Yue (Cantonese)
Asia ctg Chittagonian
Europe hrv Croatian
Europe cym Cymraeg (Welsh)
Europe ces Czech (Experimental)
Europe dan Danish
Asia prs Dari
Europe nld Dutch
Asia dzo Dzongkha
Europe qqp-ebu EBU Pharmaceutical
America eng-xna English/American
America eng-xnat English/American Textbook
America eng-xnate English/American Textbook (Distinct Emphases)
Pacific eng-aus00 English/Australian (pre-Unified)
Europe eng-xuk00 English/British (pre-2005 rules)
Europe eng-xuk English/British
Africa eng-zaf00 English/South African (pre-Unified)
America, Europe, Asia, Africa, Pacific eng-xueb English/Unified
Europe eng-xukmoon English/Moon
America, Europe, Asia, Africa, Pacific epo Esperanto
Europe est Estonian (Experimental)
Africa ewe Ewe (Experimental)
Asia fas Farsi (Persian)/Uncontracted
Asia fil Filipino (Experimental)
Europe fin Finnish/Uncontracted
Europe fra-fra00 French (pre-Unified)
America fra-xqu French/Quebec (pre-Unified)
America, Europe fra-xuf French/Unified
Asia kat Georgian
Europe deu German (Experimental)
America grc-a Greek (Classical/American)
Europe ell Greek (Modern)/Uncontracted
Asia guj Gujarati
Asia bgc Haryanvi
Africa hau Hausa
Europe gle Irish Gaelic
Asia heb-isr Hebrew/Israeli Uncontracted
America heb-usa Hebrew/American Uncontracted
Asia hil Hiligaynon (Experimental)
Asia hin Hindi
Europe hun Hungarian (Experimental)
Europe ise Icelandic
Africa ibo Igbo
Asia ilo Iloko (Experimental)
Asia ind Indonesian
America, Europe, Asia, Africa, Pacific qip IPA Braille
Europe ita Italian/Uncontracted
Asia jpn Japanese (Kana)
Asia kan Kannada
Asia kaz Kazakh/Uncontracted
Asia khm Khmer (Cambodian)
Asia kir Kirghiz (Experimental)
Asia kor Korean
Asia kur Kurdish (Experimental)
Asia kru Kurukh
Asia lao Lao (Experimental)
Europe lat Latin/Uncontracted
Europe lav Latvian/Uncontracted
Europe lit Lithuanian/Uncontracted
Europe ltz Luxembourgish (Experimental)
Europe mkd Macedonian (Experimental)
Asia mag Magahi
Asia mai Maithili
Asia msa Malay
Asia mal Malayalam
Europe mlt Maltese
Asia mar Marathi
Asia mni Meitei (Manipuri)
Asia mon Mongolian (Experimental)
Africa nde Ndebele
Asia nep Nepali
Africa qng Nguni (Xhosa or Zulu)
Europe nor Norwegian
Asia ori Oriya
Asia pan Panjabi
Europe pol Polish
America, Europe por Portuguese/Uncontracted
Asia pus Pushto
Europe ron Romanian/Uncontracted
Europe, Asia rus Russian/Uncontracted
Asia sck Sadri
Asia san Sanskrit
Asia sat Santali
Europe srp Serbian (Experimental)
Asia snd Sindhi
Asia sin Sinhala
Europe slk Slovak (Experimental)
Europe slv Slovenian (Experimental)
Africa som Somali
Africa sot Sotho (Southern and Northern (Pedi))
America, Europe spa Spanish/Original
America, Europe spa-xre Spanish/Reducida
Africa swa Swahili
Africa ssw Swati
Europe swe Swedish/Uncontracted
Asia syl Sylheti
Asia tgl Tagalog (Experimental)
Asia tgk Tajik (Experimental)
Asia tam Tamil
Asia tel Telugu
Asia tha Thai
Africa tig Tigrinya
Asia bod Tibetan
Africa tso Tsonga
Africa tsn Tswana
Europe, Asia tur Turkish/Uncontracted
Asia tuk Turkmen (Experimental)
Europe ukr Ukrainian/Uncontracted
Asia urd-ind Urdu/Indian
Asia urd-pak Urdu/Pakistani
Asia uzb Uzbek (Experimental)
Africa ven Venda
Asia vie Vietnamese/Uncontracted
Africa xho Xhosa
Africa yor Yoruba
Africa zul Zulu