Select Installation Language

The Select Installation Language appears when you create a new language on the Languages page, or when you are changing the language identifier of an existing language. It allows you to select the desired language ID.

Background

Language identifiers in Windows use a primary and a secondary language ID. The primary language ID determines the base language (for example, French); the secondary ID sets the local variant (for example, Canadian). The two IDs are combined into a single number that uniquely identifies the actual language. This language ID is usually rendered in hexadecimal because that shows the primary and secondary language ID parts more clearly. (Confusingly, the primary language follows the secondary language in this rendering, but that just happens to be the established practice.)

Dialog fields and options

This dialog box contains the following fields and options.

Attribute	Description
Language	Select the desired base language from the drop-down list. The language names should be self-explanatory. There are two pseudo-language names among them: Neutral - Designates a language-neutral resource language, which is used for resources that must not be localized, or that are shared among all languages. You will rarely, if ever, use this as a product language. Invariant - Designates a language-independent resource language, which is used mainly for sorting text strings in a manner that does not depend on any language conventions. Again, you will rarely use this as a product language.
Sublanguage	Select the desired sublanguage from the drop-down list. Many languages have specific regional variations that are listed here. For others, the following pseudo-sublanguages appear: Default - Indicates the default sublanguage for the given base language as defined by the user's regional settings. Neutral - Indicates a sublanguage-neutral resource language, which is used for all of the base language's variants. System default - Indicates the system's default sublanguage for the given base language. This might differ from Default if the user's regional settings are different from the language version of the underlying Windows installation.
Warning	For some languages, a warning may appear in the dialog box. This warning indicates that no support is installed for the selected language. For example, this warning might appear if you are selecting Japanese on a US English Windows version and did not install support for East Asian languages. If the language support is missing, then text typed in that language might appear garbled (because the correct fonts are not present) or may be converted incorrectly (because the required code pages are not available). We recommend that you do not try to edit text in a language that is not supported on your system. If necessary, add the required language support to your Windows system through the Regional and Language Options control panel applet. (This is a Windows application; it's not part of InstallMate.)

Attribute

Description

Language

Select the desired base language from the drop-down list. The language names should be self-explanatory. There are two pseudo-language names among them:

Neutral - Designates a language-neutral resource language, which is used for resources that must not be localized, or that are shared among all languages. You will rarely, if ever, use this as a product language.
Invariant - Designates a language-independent resource language, which is used mainly for sorting text strings in a manner that does not depend on any language conventions. Again, you will rarely use this as a product language.

Sublanguage

Select the desired sublanguage from the drop-down list. Many languages have specific regional variations that are listed here. For others, the following pseudo-sublanguages appear:

Default - Indicates the default sublanguage for the given base language as defined by the user's regional settings.
Neutral - Indicates a sublanguage-neutral resource language, which is used for all of the base language's variants.
System default - Indicates the system's default sublanguage for the given base language. This might differ from Default if the user's regional settings are different from the language version of the underlying Windows installation.

Warning

For some languages, a warning may appear in the dialog box. This warning indicates that no support is installed for the selected language. For example, this warning might appear if you are selecting Japanese on a US English Windows version and did not install support for East Asian languages.

If the language support is missing, then text typed in that language might appear garbled (because the correct fonts are not present) or may be converted incorrectly (because the required code pages are not available). We recommend that you do not try to edit text in a language that is not supported on your system. If necessary, add the required language support to your Windows system through the Regional and Language Options control panel applet. (This is a Windows application; it's not part of InstallMate.)