The Entourage Help Blog

This is an area of Entourage that clearly didn't get as much attention as it should have.

Here is a (short) list of things that I really really would like to see improved in Entourage:

• limited number of languages supported


• you can select only one custom dictionary


• you need a zillion clicks to switch between dictionaries


• you can't set the default language associated with a specific account


• you cannot have more than one language in an e-mail

Let me expand on each point and try to offer workarounds.

1) limited number of languages supported

In Word, you can actually cheat a bit for this type of problem. You can create a custom dictionary (from Word for instance) for the language you want, and populate it manually with the words found in dictionaries of various projects (I would suggest taking a look at the Excalibur dictionary files). In Entourage, you have a limited selected set of languages to chose from and that's it. As of today, I haven't found any workaround. If your language is not in the preset list, you are simply out of luck (please someone, tell me I'm wrong and give me a workaround).

I really hate this issue. I also believe it sends an unintended very negative message to MS customers that use other languages. It's something between "we don't really care about you because you don't make the bulk of our customer base" or "why don't you speak English anyway?". Of course, that's not what MS meant, but I've heard these types of comments many many times in the past.

This is where the power of Open Source really shows. Look at Openoffice.org on MacOS X: So many languages and dictionaries supported! Even more than the localization provided by Apple themselves for the System. When you read that Win:Office 2007 is now being localized for regional languages like "Alsacien", this really gets upsetting.

This should be plain and simple: Because the MacBU will never have the necessary resources to localize and maintain every languages, Office Mac should embrasse Open Source initiatives and let the community do it's part of the game. The same applies to the user interface actually: Open the resources for localizers. We need a UI that's not locked and some sort of SDK for the spelling dictionaries!

They wouldn't be the first ones… Look at how many software rely on external independent localizers to translate their apps! They don't even have to go through the tedious process of reviewing the localizations: let third party volunteers provide the localized resources and let the users install them themselves. MS could just open these resources and let people play with it at their own risks.

2) you can select only one custom dictionary

Millions of people like me write e-mails in multiple languages. Even though Word supports multiple custom dictionaries and automatically associates them with the language you are writing in, Entourage takes a different approach: it requires that you select only one dictionary. This means that if you select a custom dictionary, lets say, in English, and decide to write in French, the spell checker will get confused and accept all the English words you have in your custom dictionaries. That could be more or less OK, but don't even try adding words when you write in French: Entourage will simply add your custom French words to your selected English custom dictionary!!!! A nightmare in perspective that will propagate to the other applications using the same custom dictionary (like Word).

The workaround for this one?? Create a custom dictionary with no language associated. Let Entourage add all the words there. You'll end up with a dictionary that has words from more than one language, but it still is better than nothing :-\

It is a pretty awful solution. The approach used in Word is tremendously better: the language can be attached to the words and change as often as required. But, at this point there isn't much more we can do. It's up to MS to correct that in future versions of Entourage :-(

3) you need a zillion clicks to switch between dictionaries

This one really gets on my nerves. The guy who thought this one up probably never writes in more than one language. I'm exaggerating a bit when I say a zillion clicks, but still.

I often write e-mails in French and English. I'm faaaarrrrr from being the only one using more than one language and I find the user experience for setting up the spell checker accordingly horrible. Every time I need to write an e-mail in a different language, I need to go to Tools>Spelling Language and select my language there.

Workaround?? In Tiger, you can define a custom shortcut for these specific commands in Entourage. A bit tedious, but it works (System Preferences > Keyboard and Mouse > Keyboard Shortcuts and then create a specific shortcut for Entourage). The problem is that I always forget the shortcut I assigned… I end up setting the spell checker on English and I simply don't spell-check through Entourage when I write in French (I disregard all the red lines under virtually all my words). I asked around and it looks like the numerous people in the same situation around me do the same.

4) you can't set the default language associated with a specific account

Some applications let you do that. I've used several Newsreaders for instance that let you create multiple personalities for the same account where you can set the associated language. No workaround for this one, but I really would like something like that.

What I would also like, would be a pull-down menu to select the language on the message window itself. Better yet! the possibility to set the language to use for each contact!!! We'd need a language field for the contacts and after that, every time you reply to one of your contacts, or when you create a new message for them, automatically Entourage would switch the spell-checker to the appropriate language. Most people would be quite satisfied with the "one account - one language" idea, event if it's more like a workaround or a hack than a real solution.

One of the workarounds I found for most of these issues is to use SpellCatcherX. The application supports multiple languages (great for people whose language is supported) and does a pretty good job. You can set shortcuts to switch between languages (and since I use this software with many other applications, I do remember these shortcuts :->), you have shortcuts to copy all your text in SCX and spell-check it there, you have glossaries, shorthand expansions… Ist's a pretty good application IMVHO. You can also use Excalibur of course, but i find the experience a lot more tedious (and when it becomes too tedious, I tend to simply not use Spell-checking at all - which is not good considering I am an awful typist: I make typos evrywher).

5) you cannot have more than one language in an e-mail

Word lets you select paragraphs and affect them the language of your choice. Unfortunately, in Entourage, the Spell-Checker affects the language to the entire e-mail. There is a pretty awful workaround: select the first language, and concentrate on correcting the corresponding paragraphs, then select the next language and spell-ceck the corresponding paragraphs, etc. Pretty bad indeed :-(

There is definitively room for improvement there. I would strongly encourage anyone who feels like me on any of these issues to send a feedback to MS to let them know.

We are all waiting for Office 2008: I would love MS (or Apple for that matter) to realize that a localized grammar checker is actually interesting to provide in a program that now supports most of the human communication exchanges.

We're not even asking for so much actually… I realize that a grammar-checker is pretty complicated and at this point, all we would like to get is one of the basic computing tool from the 80's: a plain and simple spell-checker (that's actually usable)… Bummer! :-\

FYI, the French grammar checker in Mac:Word is certainly one of the main sources of troubles, crashes and lost work. Interestingly enough, its developed for MS by a French company settled in Toulouse!!! Give us a proper spell-checker and we'll focus on grammar in another post after that :->

(Collaborative effort by Benjamin Amsaleg, Corentin Cras-Méneur and Bernard Rey)