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LOCATION: Basic Setup » ANGEL 7.3

Foreign Languages in ANGEL 7.3

These instructions explain how to post non-English content in Penn State's Course Management System ANGEL 7.3.

This Page

  1. HTML Editor Tools
    1. Special Character Palette
    2. Superscript/Subscript
    3. Insert Equation
    4. Student Access to the HTML Editor
  2. Debugging: If Students see ??? Instead of Character
  3. Non-Western Languages
    1. Non-English Keyboards in Firefox, Mozilla, or Internet Explorer 7
    2. Editing Numeric Codes in the HTML Editor

HTML Editor Tools

About the ANGEL HTML Editor

There are several tools available in the ANGEL HTML Editor for entering foreign language and math including the special character, insert equation, and superscript/subscript tools.

To access the HTML Editor click the HTML Editor link between designated text area fields within ANGEL. The HTML editor can be accessed in discussion boards, the syllabus tool, the calendar tool, thr quiz tool, the page tool and elsewhere.

Note: For best results, use the ANGEL HTML Editor tool with either Internet Explorer 7 or Firefox 3.

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Special Character Palette

The HTML Editor allows ANGEL users to insert common foreign language letters and symbols by clicking the Insert Latin (Æ) button.

  1. Click the HTML Editor link beneat a designated text area field.
  2. To insert a special character, click the arrow next to the Insert Equation (Σ) button and select Special Character.
    screen capture of Special Character menu option
  3. The Select Special Character palette opens. Click on the character you wish to insert and it will be inserted into your document.
    Special Character Palette with accented letters, currency signs, special punctuation

See the HTML Editor: Special Characters help topic for more details.

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Superscript/Subscript

Note: This tool may not be available in all HTML Editor menus. See the HTML Editor: Superscript and Subscript help topic for more details.

  1. In the HTML Editor, click the down arrow next to the Underline button to access the Font Style Menu with the subscript and superscript options.
    Superscript and Subscript menu options
  2. To remove superscript or subscript formatting from a range of text, highlight it, then select the Superscript or Subscript option again

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Insert Equation

  1. To insert a math equation, click the Insert Equation (Σ) button.
    Insert Equation Button (Capital Sigma)
    Note: You may also see a delay then a request to approve a Java applet. Click the appropriate option to approve the applet. If the page remains blank, contact ANGEL Support for help in finding the correct version of Java.
  2. The Insert Equation window will open showing a number of equation templates. See the HTML Editor: Create Math Equations help topic for more details on creating the equations.
    Equation Editor Template Options

 

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Student Access to the HTML Editor

Students have access to the HTML Editor in several locations:

The HTML Editor is not available to students taking a fill-in the-blank quiz, but accent codes can be used instead.

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Debugging: If Students See ??? Instead of Foreign Character

If students or instructors see "???" instead of an accented character , they may need to switch encoding to Western/ISO-8859-1/Latin-1 or to Unicode (UTF-8). To switch encodings.

Firefox/Safari/Internet Explorer 5-6

  1. In the browser, go to the View menu go to Character Encoding (Firefox), Encoding (Internet Explorer) or Text Encoding (Safari).
  2. Select the option for Western (ISO-8859-1) [Firefox] Western European [Internet Explorer] or Western (ISO Latin 1) [Safari].

Internet Explorer 7

  1. Click the Tools (gear wheel) icon beneath the search box, then select Toolbars then Classic Menu.
  2. A new set of menu options should appear including a View menu should appear beneath the URL text box.
  3. Under the View menu, select Encoding » Western European.

See detailed instructions with screen captures.

HTML Entity Codes

Instructors can also HTML entity codes such as ñ for ñ to minimize viewing incompatibilities.

Note: These codes can be used everywhere EXCEPT fill-in-the blank quizzes. If incompatabilites arise, make sure both the instructor and student are viewing ANGEL in Western European/ISO-8859-1/Latin 1 encoding.

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Non-Western Languages

These techniques should be used with Asian, Cyrillic, Middle Eastern, or Classical languages.

Non-English Keyboards in Firefox, Mozilla, or Internet Explorer 7

If an instructor or student needs to input content in another script, such as Cyrillic, East Asian characters, Arabic, or Hebrew, then use the following steps.

  1. Open ANGEL in the Firefox or Internet Explorer 7 browser (this technique will not work with other browsers or Internet Explorer 5/6 or Safari).
    Note: Students can view the content with Internet Explorer, Opera, Safari, Firefox, or Netscape/Mozilla.
  2. Switch your input keyboard from English to appropriate script. See the By Language page for details for your language.
  3. Begin to type in the language within ANGEL; the appropriate characters will appear in ANGEL. This method works for both an ANGEL discussion forum and chat room.

Note: This works both inside and outside the HTML Editor.

Editing Numeric Codes in the HTML Editor

If you have entered the characters in the HTML Editor mode, you will see that the browser converted the typed text to the Unicode numeric escape characters (e.g., Д for Cyrillic Д). See the By Language page for details for your language's numeric codes.

To edit the numeric codes

  1. Make sure the numeric codes are in a field which links to the HTML Editor.
  2. Open the HTML Editor. The codes will be displayed as the appropriate letters.
  3. Type with the non-English keyboard, then select Accept Changes. The edited text will be displayed as numeric characters.
  4. Copy and paste the numeric characters to other fields as needed.

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This Web page maintained by Teaching and Learning with Technology, a unit of Information Technology Services. For questions or comments on this Web page, please contact Elizabeth J. Pyatt (ejp10@psu.edu).
Unicode character names and hexadecimal entity codes are taken from the public Unicode Character Charts.
Last Modified: Thursday, 17-Sep-2009 10:41:27 EDT