Command/setuplanguage

Summary

The command \setuplanguage adjusts the settings for a language.

Settings

\setuplanguage[...][...=...,...]
[...]	language default
default	language
state	start stop
date	see \currentdate
time	see \currenttime
patterns	file
lefthyphenmin	number
righthyphenmin	number
lefthyphenchar	number
righthyphenchar	number
setups	name
spacing	broad packed
font	auto name
bidi	left right l2r r2l
text	text
limittext	text
hyphen	text
compoundhyphen	text
leftcompoundhyphen	text
rightcompoundhyphen	text
leftquote	command
rightquote	command
leftquotation	command
rightquotation	command
leftspeech	command
rightspeech	command
leftsentence	command
middlespeech	command
rightsentence	command
midsentence	command
leftsubsentence	command
rightsubsentence	command
factor	yes no

Option Explanation

language an already defined language to be set up

patterns

The hyphenation patterns to use.
file	If you enter `XX` as value, ConTeXt loads `lang-XX.lua` from either the local folder or the `tex/context/patterns/mkiv` directory

lefthyphenmin

Minimal number of characters for prefixes. Default: e.g. 2 for English, 3 for German; beware the latter is different from LaTeX (2) and prevents many possible hyphenations!

righthyphenmin

Minimal number of characters for sufffixes. Default: e.g. 3 for English, 3 for German; beware the latter is different from LaTeX (2) and prevents many possible hyphenations!

hyphen

hyphen character

leftquote

left single quotation mark (for \quote)

rightquote

right single quotation mark (for \quote)

leftquotation

left double quotation mark (for \quotation)

rightquotation

right double quotation mark (for \quotation)

Description

Examples

Example 1

\installlanguage
   [en]
   [spacing=broad,
    leftsentence=---,
    rightsentence=---,
    leftsubsentence=---,
    rightsubsentence=---,
    leftquote=\upperleftsinglesixquote,
    rightquote=\upperrightsingleninequote,
    leftquotation=\upperleftdoublesixquote,
    rightquotation=\upperrightdoubleninequote,
    date={month,\ ,day,{,\ },year},
    default=en,
    state=stop]

Suggestion for German with guillemets

\setbreakpoints[compound] % break at / and -
\setuplanguage[de][
  goodies={lang-de.llg}, % prevent wrong ligatures
  lefthyphenmin=2,
  righthyphenmin=2,
  leftquotation=»,
  rightquotation=«,
  leftquote=›,
  rightquote=‹,
]

German texts might benefit from setting a minimum word length for hyphenation (hyphenmin isn’t listed as an option for \setuplanguage).

Notes

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