I recieved the following printed card today, from somebody in Prague I have'nt seen since 1992. What does it say ? Is there a web-translator, which I can use when I recieve letters or meet notes in Czech, a language which I want unsuccesfully to learn for the last 12 years ?! "Je tomu dvacet pet let, co jsme si pred Bohem a pred lidmi slibili lasku, uctu a vernost. Dekujeme za vsechno co jsme prozili a take za to, ze jsme vas poznali." (By the way: how could I print here those letters which in Czech have tipical small signs above them ?) Thanks a lot.
Here is my (primitive) attempt at translation: It's twenty five years since we promised love, repect and faith to God and people (?). We thank for everything we've spent and also for becoming familiar with you. Special Czech letters are writing using the keys 1, 2, ..., 0 (below F1-F12 keys, not on numercal keybord) and few others. Concrete setting depends on operating system you are using, try to find something about localization...
Here's a little modification: "It's been twenty five years since we promised love, respect and faith to each other in front of God and people. We give thanks for everything we have lived through, as well as for getting to know you." I think there are some online dictionaries but I don't know of any web translators for the Czech language. To be able to type Czech characters, you first need to add the Czech language to your keyboard by going to (for PC) Start - Settings - Control Panel - Keyboard - Language - Add... - Czech. You can then switch between English and Czech keyboards by pressing Left Alt+Shift or Ctrl+Shift. Once you're on the Czech keyboard, most Czech characters with diacritical marks are in the top row of keys (with numbers), like finn said. The top row defaults to those characters. To type numbers, you need to hold the Shift key.
You can find an image of czech keyboard layout at http://gif.ceskyweb.cz/klavesy.htm There may be some differencies, for example there are only 2 keys between "0" and "Backspace" on my keyboard, but generally it is correct. If you want to write a letter with diac. mark that is not on any key (such as ď, ň etc.), you have to use the "accents key" - on that page (and usually on most keyboards) it lies below F10. Using that key before a character you get the "čárka", Shift+the key gives you "háček" (don't know the english terms . Btw. how is a 25-years wedding anniversary called - silver wedding?
