French (France) style guide¶
Use this page for French written for readers in France. Its grammar and wording sections also support the Canadian French guide, which specifies regional terminology and typography. Follow the shared registers, mechanics and localization review; the local conventions below take precedence where they differ.
Address and agreement¶
Use vous for respectful direct address in help and instructions. Give a step with an imperative: Ouvrez le fichier. A compact command label can use an infinitive: Ouvrir le fichier. A heading can name the task: Exporter une police. A campaign may use a different relationship when its brief calls for it; keep that choice consistent.
The pronoun vous does not specify gender. Use agreement appropriate to the referent, or a formulation that avoids unnecessary gender marking: Votre connexion est active. For a specific person, preserve their pronouns and form of address. On can be natural when its referent is clear; it must not hide who has to act.
Keep number, role, ownership and obligation when making wording inclusive. La personne devra gérer les commandes retains a future duty; gestion des commandes only names an activity. A collective such as le lectorat does not necessarily replace one reader. The shared inclusion guidance covers the broader principles.
Terms and concise wording¶
Use application, informations and synchronisation in ordinary explanatory prose. A short form such as appli may fit an established compact label; an actual interface label takes precedence when quoted. Choose the approved term for the product and locale rather than treating a supplier’s old terminology list as house policy.
Prefer a direct verb when it preserves the claim: recommander can replace faire une recommandation. Other replacements need context. Demander is not always as strong as exiger, and beaucoup does not necessarily convey an excess. Retain intensity, conditions and technical distinctions that matter.
Use se connecter à and se déconnecter de for the corresponding account actions. Choose a preposition with its verb and intended relationship: enregistrer dans un dossier, cliquer sur un bouton, informations sur une fonction. Propre à can express a characteristic belonging to something; do not classify every use of spécifique à as a grammatical error.
Keep product names, legal entity names, version identifiers and exact labels as approved. French spelling rules apply to the surrounding prose, not to a literal identifier. Follow product names and the glossary for product-specific choices.
Articles, adjectives and compounds¶
Choose the article for the intended reference. Sélectionnez un fichier permits a choice; sélectionnez le fichier points to an identified file. Replacing every indefinite article with a definite one changes that distinction. A possessive can distinguish whose file or administrator is meant; remove it only when the reference remains clear.
Adjectives agree with the nouns they qualify: une police variable, des polices variables. Their position depends on the adjective and its meaning. Un nouveau fichier and un fichier vide are both natural; there is no blanket rule placing every adjective after the noun. Avoid long modifier chains by naming the relationship in a phrase.
Check an established compound’s spelling and plural rather than applying one rule to every pair of nouns. Des raccourcis clavier and des polices variables have different structures. A long compound can often become a phrase without losing its technical meaning. Do not capitalize a compound merely because it contains several words.
Use normal French case in new headings and labels: Options d’exportation. Keep accents on capitals: Édition, À propos. Preserve the exact case of an existing interface label or identifier when quoting it.
Conditions, tense and mood¶
Keep cause, purpose, consequence and timing distinct. Sauf que can introduce an exception or objection; sauf si introduces a condition. Replacing one with the other requires a complete-sentence meaning check. A sentence beginning with selon does not require two explicit alternatives.
Use the mood required by the construction. Il est possible que vous puissiez ouvrir ce fichier preserves possibility. An infinitive can make an instruction direct: Cliquez ici pour ouvrir le fichier. The subjunctive is not an error to remove throughout a translation.
Describe a completed event with the appropriate past tense: Le fichier a été enregistré. Preserve an earlier event or future condition when it matters; a present-tense preference does not override chronology. Keep the subject of an introductory phrase clear: Une fois le fichier enregistré, vous pouvez fermer la fenêtre.
Modifiers must survive restructuring. Nous prévoyons que notre production va plus que doubler cette année retains “more than double”. Doubler, au minimum would include exactly double and therefore change the boundary. Likewise, a possible permission must not become a promise of access.
Messages and variables¶
Distinguish a command, progress, result and failure. These are wording examples, not product status guarantees.
| Meaning | French wording |
|---|---|
| Command | Enregistrer le fichier |
| In progress | Enregistrement en cours. |
| Completed | Le fichier a été enregistré. |
| Failed attempt | Le fichier n’a pas pu être enregistré. |
| Present limitation | Le fichier ne peut pas être enregistré. |
A general progress message can say Traitement en cours. Merci de patienter. It does not establish that the task is almost finished. Translate an idiom’s useful meaning without inventing completion, installation or an available next action. Use the shared interface feedback for message structure.
French agreement may depend on a variable’s gender and number. Le fichier {name} est prêt works only when the value names a single file; it is not a template for every object type. Give translators the value’s meaning and possible forms. Follow messages and variables for complete messages, plural branches, parser syntax and substituted-output checks.
Punctuation and spacing in France¶
Use « … » in ordinary French quotations, with nonbreaking spaces inside the guillemets. Use “…” for a nested quotation. Preserve straight quotation marks in literal code and required input. Developer prose follows French punctuation too; its subject does not make every sentence code.
For this locale, use a nonbreaking space before a colon and inside guillemets, and a narrow nonbreaking space before ;, ! and ? when the output supports it. Use a regular nonbreaking space as the fallback for that narrow space. The examples below contain the actual characters:
| Use | Example |
|---|---|
| Colon | Destination : dossier local |
| Question | Enregistrer les modifications ? |
| Quotation | Le nom « Essai » est déjà utilisé. |
U+00A0 is the regular nonbreaking space; U+202F is the narrow nonbreaking space. Check both in the rendered font and copied text. Do not replace ordinary spaces inside code, filenames or user data to enforce prose typography. Online documentation can use nonbreaking spaces.
Do not normally add a comma before the final et or ou in a simple French list. Retain a comma that marks a clause or prevents ambiguity. A semicolon can separate related clauses or complex list items. For complete-sentence list items, use sentence case and a final period; keep fragment lists grammatically parallel.
Use … for an ellipsis. Preserve one in an exact label, but do not add one to manufacture a sense of progress. Use – (U+2013) for an appropriate range or dash and − (U+2212) for mathematical minus: 5 − 2 = 3. Literal input may require ASCII -. See technical notation.
Abbreviations, numbers and units¶
Use established abbreviations instead of shortening words to meet a letter-count formula. Examples include art., chap., etc., M. and Mme. Unit symbols such as h, min and mm have no abbreviation period or plural ending. A final abbreviation period also closes the sentence.
Write ordinals as 1er, 1re, 2e, 3e, with superscript letters where the format supports them. Preserve the conventional case of acronyms and names rather than uppercasing every short form. Write an ordinary expansion in lowercase: publication assistée par ordinateur (PAO). Give a useful expansion when the audience needs it, without imposing a French-plus-English expansion on every occurrence.
Follow house mechanics for numerals in quantities: 3 fichiers, 12,5 mm. Use a decimal comma in French prose and a nonbreaking space between a value and its unit or percent sign: 25 %. Group longer numbers with spaces rather than English commas. In a date, 13 septembre 2026 is clear; preserve the syntax of timestamps and other machine-readable values.
Distinguish Mo from Mio, bits from bytes and M from m in technical units. Do not abbreviate million as Mio. Let the application format dynamic values and verify any conversion; changing a unit label alone changes the fact. See names and formats.
Keyboard wording and speech¶
Use names readers can match to their keyboard or platform: Entrée, Échap, Maj, barre d’espace, flèche gauche. These are useful descriptive forms, not a universal layout map. Keep Ctrl where the key or documented combination uses it; do not replace it with another modifier or expand every key label.
Use interface actions to distinguish selecting, clicking and dragging. Check actual shortcuts, access-key collisions and keyboard layouts through the shared localization review. A resource syntax from one application does not define all French keyboard interactions.
Use established French pronunciation for ordinary technical terms and the approved pronunciation of product names. For Canadian narration, follow the Canadian guidance. Spell an unfamiliar acronym when useful. If listeners must reproduce a URL or identifier, include every necessary separator in order. The shared audiovisual guidance covers captions, timing and visual information.