Does QGIS support multiple languages? I have some shapefile with
Arabic names in its attributes, and they appear as: ????
If I want to see the names in Arabic, do I need to purchase multi-language supporting GIS software or is there any other option?
I am using QGIS 1.8.0.
did you try to use a proper encoding for the shapefile? I suggest you try arabic encoding or utf
Basically, QGIS supports internationalization, but QGIS 1.8.0 Lisboa has some problems with correct encoding of shapefiles. There are some workarounds given here:
How to read Greek fonts (ISO-8859-7) in shapefile attributes within QGIS 1.8.0?
which are a bit Operating-system-dependent.
The matter was fixed in QGIS Master, but currently the bugfixing for the upcoming QGIS 2.0 may lead to a unstable QGIS Master version.
So you might better wait until QGIS 2.0 is published.
EDIT: This only affects shapefiles, other data sources should work correct.
