Terry's TMG Tips

Creating a Custom Language to Use with Second Site

This page updated 13 Jul 2007

Version note: Applies to TMG 6 & 7, and Second Site 2

As described in my article on Minimalist Style Web Pages, I created a custom Language in TMG to get exactly the look I was after in my bullet style public web pages. This article tells how to create a custom language and use it in Second Site. While it focuses on the bullet style application, the general methods apply to any custom language you might want to create for Second Site.

Setting up the Custom Language in TMG

My article on Languages provides details of how to create a language in TMG. But briefly, I created a new language (File > Language > Customize) and gave it a name, "Site."

Now it's much easier to use one of the custom language names provided for in Second Site - SS1, SS2, or SS3 - but that wasn't available when I created my Language, so in the screen shots you see the language as "Site."

I did not make any translations in the language tables, nor did I make the language active. Rather, I just created custom Sentence Structures in the new language for the few Tag Types I intended to use in the web site.

Adding Sentence Structures for the Custom Language

Once the language is created you modify the Sentence Structures of each Tag Type you will use. In the Master Tag Type List, select the Tag Type and click Edit to open the Tag Type Definition screen, as shown in this screenshot:

Select the Language, then enter the Sentence Structure. Since I don't use Roles for any of these tags except Marriage, I only created Sentence Structures for the Principal Role. I wanted each tag to produce a bold label, and the date and place, but nothing from the Memo field. And I wanted the tags separated by a blank line. Here are the Tag Types and Sentence Structures I created, using standard TMG Sentence variables and codes:

For use of the Marriage Roles, see my article on Using Roles to Manage Multiple Marriages. The custom Webnote tag is used to note conflicting information on lineages, or other brief notes about a person I want to appear on my web pages.

Using the Custom Language in Second Site

Once the Language and Sentence Structures are created, you need to tell Second Site to use them. If you have named your custom language one of the three supported names - SS1, SS2, or SS3 - you just select that language in the drop down list for Sentence Language in the Data > Language section. If you used another name, as I did, you first need to tell Second Site it exists by editing the 2ndsite.ini file, which is more complicated.

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