Macedonian (North Macedonia) style guide¶
Use this page with the house guide and localization review. Examples use standard Macedonian in Cyrillic. Verify actual product terms, labels and behavior before adopting them. Source acknowledgments are in credits.
Voice and context¶
Write clear Macedonian for the reader's task. Technical instructions need precise terminology and conditions; an introduction can be conversational. Familiar words and short sentences help when they preserve the meaning. Avoid forced slang and unexplained English borrowings.
Use the formal plural in instructions: Отворете ја датотеката. A command label can use the singular imperative: Отвори. General interface text uses lowercase вие, вам and ваш within a sentence. Personally addressed correspondence can follow its agreed capitalization convention.
Keep terms consistent for the same object and context. Апликација, програма and компјутер need product context; an English preference for “app” over “application” is not a Macedonian terminology rule. Starting an application, switching on a device and playing media are different actions. Do not substitute one verb for another merely to sound less formal.
Likewise, providing information, giving instructions and helping do not always mean the same thing. Треба can express a requirement; distinguish a recommendation from an obligation before translating “should.” Најди is a possible command for finding something, not a fixed form for every occurrence of “find.” Choose the grammatical form required by the surface.
Use active, passive, impersonal or fragmentary wording according to purpose. Report a completed save with Датотеката е зачувана. This gives a useful result without naming an actor. A fragment is suitable for some labels, but not for every condition or warning. Starting with a conjunction is an option, not a requirement.
Translate an idiom's intended meaning when it matters. For a simple task, one possible adaptation is Ова е едноставно. Do not add a joke or benefit, exaggerate ease, or replace a meaningful qualification to make the copy friendlier. “We” should refer to an identifiable actor, not an invented person behind every system action.
Preserve actions and conditions¶
Compare the action, object, actor, timing, condition and scope after rewriting. Fluent wording can still change the task.
- A password message must preserve case sensitivity without demanding mixed case: Лозинката не е точна. Обидете се повторно. Кај лозинките се разликуваат малите и големите букви.
- A failed attempt with a product key does not establish that the key is invalid: Клучот на производот не можеше да се употреби. Проверете го и обидете се повторно. Use the product's approved term for its key.
- If the verified Откажи button returns to editing, keep the later save explicit: Изберете Откажи, завршете го уредувањето и зачувајте ја работата. Cancel itself need not save anything.
- Keep the location in a drawing instruction: Користете го глушецот за да нацртате кругови на страницата. Removing a redundant possessive must not also remove the page.
- Preserve the distinction between an attempted search and a successful find. Difficulty locating a page does not prove the page has been deleted.
A picture password protects the specified computer. Preserve the reader's choice of picture and gestures. Watching a demonstration and performing the gestures are separate actions: Погледнете го повторувањето и повторете ги гестовите прикажани на сликата. Retain any specified number or order of gestures. A distinctive password is not a guarantee of secrecy.
Keep permission to provide personalized content as permission. Preserve which name and location belong to the computer, which picture belongs to the account, and which information comes from the domain. Do not turn those separate categories into one vague personal-data claim.
In a setup message, retain what must restart. An installer needing a restart is not the same as updates restarting or the whole computer necessarily restarting. Preserve a supported promise to resume from the previous point without extending it to work the product cannot recover.
A restart warning must name the affected computer and retain other people using it, possible loss and unsaved work. Movement to a library and folder remains movement to both, after the stated prerequisite about invalid or missing properties. И and или express different relationships.
Retain the purpose of bootable media and the failure to locate the downloaded files needed to create it. Removing an alarming interjection must not remove the failure itself. Keep “when you rename the file” as a timing or conditional relationship; “by renaming the file” can instead make renaming the means of achieving a result.
Do not replace suggestions with words unless the suggestions are known to be words. Preserve сите предлози when the source means all suggestions. Similar phrases can share a translation only when their objects and conditions actually match.
Articles, agreement and reference¶
Macedonian expresses definiteness with endings: датотека and датотеката, сервер and серверот. Use the form required by the reference, rather than automatically adding or removing an article for every English “a” or “the.” A definite article does not preserve every meaning of “this” or “your.”
Adjectives agree with their nouns: нов документ, нова датотека, ново поле. Definiteness can be marked on the adjective: новиот документ, новата датотека, новото поле, новите датотеки. A standalone Ново label does not resolve the gender of an unknown noun elsewhere.
Keep object pronouns aligned with the noun: Отворете го документот. Отворете ја датотеката. Отворете ги датотеките. Read the complete string, including substitutions. Removing every short pronoun for concision can damage the grammar.
Omit a possessive when the owner remains clear. Retain it when ownership distinguishes objects: Отворете го вашиот документ. Do not reject that form merely because it contains a possessive. Replacing a person's document with “the document” can erase a needed distinction. Similarly, a closed account is not necessarily the reader's account unless the context identifies it.
Use descriptors to keep protected names intact: во програмата FontLab. Do not attach an article or invented ending to a protected name merely because ordinary borrowed nouns can take articles. Approved localized feature names follow their own grammar and exact labels.
Preserve required prepositions: Распоред на страницата and Окно за навигација express different relationships. Macedonian's analytic structure does not justify dropping a preposition to imitate English noun order. Nor is every English noun best translated with a noun.
Translate the function of an English infinitive with natural Macedonian wording, including a да construction where appropriate. Preserve adverbs that change the task. For careful reading, use Внимателно прочитајте ги упатствата. For prompt action, use Брзо притиснете го копчето. Do not confuse acting quickly with holding a key for a short time.
Check each noun's plural rather than applying one suffix to every word. Лице is singular and лица plural; the latter is not a singular translation of “person.” Страница becomes страници. Regular, counted and other plural forms need the actual noun and context.
Do not infer a person's gender from a username. The source pattern that adds a masculine “user” before every name does not remove gender assumptions. Rephrase the message or obtain the needed grammatical context while preserving the person, ownership, number and action. A plural rewrite is unsuitable when exactly one person is intended.
Numbers and complete messages¶
Use numerals for technical values where readers need to compare or enter them. Spelled-out small numbers can suit prose, but a rule to spell out every value from one through ten is unsuitable for all interfaces.
One and two depend on the noun: еден документ, една датотека, едно поле; два документа, две датотеки, две полиња. A plural category does not determine these word forms or the rest of the sentence.
| Standalone count | Macedonian example |
|---|---|
| One | 1 датотека |
| Two or five | 2 датотеки; 5 датотеки |
| Zero | 0 датотеки |
| Eleven or twelve | 11 датотеки; 12 датотеки |
| Twenty-one or twenty-two | 21 датотека; 22 датотеки |
For one saved file, use Зачувана е една датотека. For two, use Зачувани се две датотеки. Check the whole message for every supported number.
Macedonian cardinal selection has one and other categories. Integer endings in 1 exclude 11; fractional digits also affect selection. Test 0, 1, 2, 5, 11, 12, 21 and 22, as well as supported decimals and visible trailing zeros. Do not import another Slavic language's few category or assume that every value other than 1 takes the same variant.
Keep personal-number forms distinct from ordinary counts and approximations. Use established forms such as двајца, петмина and шестмина in their proper context, with definite петтемина where required. They are not general counters for files. Verify newer spelling references instead of copying the source's entire suffix catalog.
Ordinals can use words, a numeral with an ending, or a numeral followed by a period, according to context. Keep forms such as трет, трета, трето and петти, петта, петто distinct. Do not combine a numeral's ordinal period with an added hyphenated ending. Distinguish repetition двапати from a definite expression such as двата пати; word boundaries carry grammatical meaning.
Choose wording for the actual state:
| Purpose | Macedonian example |
|---|---|
| Command | Зачувај ја датотеката |
| Instruction | Зачувајте ја датотеката. |
| Activity title | Зачувување на датотеката |
| In progress | Датотеката се зачувува. |
| Completed | Датотеката е зачувана. |
| Attempt failed | Зачувувањето на датотеката не успеа. |
| Currently unavailable | Датотеката не може да се зачува. |
A past problem creating an account can be reported as Се појави проблем при создавањето на сметката. Do not silently change it to an ongoing condition. English present or past tense does not dictate the Macedonian sentence mechanically, but the event's timing must survive.
For insufficient memory, use Нема доволно меморија за да се изврши оваа наредба. Generic простор can suggest storage and loses the specified resource. An error need not stop the entire application or require restarting it. State the known condition and give only a supported recovery action.
Preserve placeholders and format syntax exactly. If %s contains a filename, use Не може да се отвори датотеката %s. %c denotes a character, not necessarily a letter. Keep positional and precision forms such as %1!d! and %1!-.200s! intact. A template containing a person's name needs agreement appropriate to that person; do not assume every %1 is masculine.
Cyrillic, punctuation and notation¶
Preserve Macedonian ѓ, ќ, ѕ, ј, љ, њ, џ and Ѓ, Ќ, Ѕ, Ј, Љ, Њ, Џ. Macedonian ѕ is not Latin s, and Cyrillic ј is not Latin j. A visually similar letter from another script is not a substitute.
Retain the grave-marked forms сѐ, нѐ and ѝ where the meaning requires them. In Сѐ е подготвено, the accented letter must remain Cyrillic. Do not copy a Latin accented e or a font's misleading PDF text extraction into the published word. Verify both the displayed mark and copied characters.
Use sentence case for headings and labels. Proper names retain their capitals; ordinary четврток, март and македонски јазик are lowercase within a sentence. A comma does not prevent a following proper name from needing its capital.
Follow established compound spelling: метаподатоци, веб-страница, веб-прелистувач. Do not join, separate or hyphenate every English compound by one formula. Keep exact technical identifiers and existing control labels intact.
Use „{filename}“ for ordinary quotations. Straight quotes remain where code requires them. Put punctuation according to whether it belongs to the quotation or surrounding sentence; “always outside” is too broad. Use house emphasis for interface labels rather than adding quotation marks to every reference.
A colon can introduce a list after a complete introduction. Do not insert one mechanically between a verb and its objects. Keep punctuation in list items consistent with their sentence structure. Separate a preceding condition with a comma: Ако сакате да продолжите, зачувајте ја датотеката.
Use … consistently outside literal strings: Отвори… is not three full stops. Preserve the actual label when quoting a control; an ellipsis does not prove that every control opens a dialog. Sentence punctuation and abbreviation punctuation should not create doubled periods.
Hyphens, prose dashes and minus signs serve different purposes. Keep a required compound hyphen and use −5 for a mathematical negative value. This page follows the supplied spacing convention for a range such as 30 – 35. Prefer a colon or separate sentence to a prose dash when the relationship remains clear.
Ordinary numeric prose uses a decimal comma: 5,25. Locale-formatted percentages include a separating space, as in 15,2 %. Preserve literal machine-readable syntax, which may use a decimal point. Keep numeric values and units together; international symbols retain their specified spelling and case, as in 5,25 cm. Do not silently replace an international symbol with a Cyrillic lookalike. A spelled-out unit name is a different form.
Use established abbreviations such as стр., год., итн., и др. and и сл. without inventing a truncation rule. Use a nonbreaking space where words must stay together, as in и др. Do not remove a required space on the assumption that all help formats reject nonbreaking spaces.
Keep approved abbreviations and acronyms in their required form. A rule based solely on whether an English acronym contains W, Q, X or Y does not determine how every product token should be written. A familiar borrowed word can follow ordinary Macedonian grammar; code and protected names remain literal. DNS means Domain Name System.
Keyboard, accessibility and review¶
Preserve actual key labels and consistent localized descriptions such as стрелка за лево, стрелка за долу and копче за празно место. Alt+Esc is a held combination; Alt, F is a sequence of separate presses. Identify the numeric keypad when the operation depends on it.
Distinguish access keys, key tips and command shortcuts. Resource markers and supported characters depend on the application and platform. Test Macedonian layouts, discoverability, conflicts and focus movement. Do not adopt an old blanket ban on Cyrillic characters or assume that a shortcut tool has completed the review. A way to leave a control group must be verified.
Small capitals are distinct from lowercase. The source's Смалени големи букви describes that typographic distinction; use the approved FontLab term and actual shortcut. An old table of Windows key assignments does not establish current FontLab behavior.
Use descriptive links and labels, meaningful headings and instructions that work with the intended input methods. Do not remove a required gesture while generalizing an instruction. Test screen-reader output, focus and text expansion with the real interface; the existence of accessibility features alone proves none of these.
Localize fictional example names when appropriate, but preserve real people, places, quotations and data. Review culturally sensitive examples in context without inventing political or product requirements. Protected product names, version tokens and approved translations keep their exact form. Верзија 4.2 is an example, not a rule that every version contains a period.
For narration, check each name, acronym and number rather than copying a phonetic catalog. Preserve written product names. Read a literal URL or special character clearly enough to recover it; do not automatically omit its protocol, path or dots. Try the task and align speech with captions and demonstrated actions.
Use community terminology and previous translations as evidence to review, not automatic authority over product facts. The Mozilla Macedonian guide supports standard language, contextual consistency and meaning-based translation; its contributor tools and onboarding do not define a FontLab workflow. Have a proficient Macedonian reviewer check full substitutions, number forms, articles, ownership and agreement before release.