[BlueSky]

Can someone who knows Japanese help me out here?

The following is supposed to say "Change Drive Letter" or maybe "Change Letter".

ドライブ文字を-変更

It's being used in a GUI button. Problem is, no way I can fit it on one line. Can you break this up into 2 or 3 lines (however many words there are) ?

And is this read from right to left or vice versa?

[analogika]

Left to Right, with a logical break after either the sixth or seventh character.

[BlueSky]

Originally Posted by analogika

Left to Right, with a logical break after either the sixth or seventh character.

ドライブ文字
を-変更

So this would be acceptable?

[Scifience]

Originally Posted by BlueSky

ドライブ文字
を-変更

So this would be acceptable?

Putting the を on the first line would be better IMHO.

[wataru]

The を should definitely be on the first line.

But what in the world is a "drive letter?" And why is there a hyphen before 変更?

[JoshuaZ]

My office coworks say its fine.

[lurkalot]

Originally Posted by wataru

The を should definitely be on the first line.

But what in the world is a "drive letter?" And why is there a hyphen before 変更?

I concur. を on the first line. No need for the hyphen.

The "drive letter" ドライブ文字 is the designation of a disk drive in a windows system. Something like this is what Bluesky has in mind, would be my guess.

P.S. Edit to add: How to change drive letter assignments in Windows XP. A Japanese translation of the article is available by changing the language on the top right of the screen.

[BlueSky]

Hyphen? Hell, I thought it was a letter.

lurkalot, you're right...it's a backup program and it has to do with drives, letters and stuff.

There was no way I could get を on the first line, so it'll have to do. Sent the project in already.

I'm much obliged to all who replied, thank you!

[wataru]

Nope, that was a hyphen. It certainly wasn't a Japanese character. Maybe it's supposed to represent a letter? Is it really supposed to read "Change drive letter to -" where the hyphen represents the letter to be changed to? If that's the case, it should read
ドライブ文字を
-に変更
Without the に before 変更 it would be ungrammatical.

If that's not the case, you should remove the hyphen. And having the を on the second line makes it look very odd. I understand you have constraints and whatnot to deal with, but
ドライブ文字
を-変更
looks like a Crappy Localization™ no matter how you slice it. I highly recommend making the changes I mentioned in this and the earlier post.

[BlueSky]

Originally Posted by wataru

Nope, that was a hyphen. It certainly wasn't a Japanese character. Maybe it's supposed to represent a letter? Is it really supposed to read "Change drive letter to -" where the hyphen represents the letter to be changed to? If that's the case, it should read
ドライブ文字を
-に変更

Yes, it's supposed to be "Change Drive Letter To-". I'm going to make an alternate button with the characters as you suggested and give your reasoning on the subject, can't hurt. It's a US company and I don't know where they got their translation.

Thanks much wataru!

[wataru]

You're very welcome. Thanks for listening to my advice; I find often people don't care and settle for "good enough" translations. The end product always looks like crap in the target language, and users are immediately turned off.

Then again, this must be a Windows app you're working on, so maybe the bar isn't set that high

[BlueSky]

Yep, Windows. I sent the alternate version and the art director was very appreciative. Thanks again.