Translation 2.0

Note: This article is a work in progress. Please use the page comments or an appropriate moodle.org forum for any recommendations/suggestions for improvement.

This evolving page summarises proposals to change the translation process in Moodle 2.0 based on community suggestions in the discussion Translators heads up: proposals to change the Moodle translation process.

Petr's proposal

• Store every lang string in one central database with as much info as possible
• Keep the old rule that no string meaning may change
• en_utf8 lang in main cvs is the master - it already has branches
• Generate/commit lang cvs files directly from main database - do not allow translators to commit any more
• Translators upload standard modified lang files - server sorts out the branches automatically (it learns everything from en packs) i.e. Translators just translate... and, from time to time, click a "Send lang package" button. That packages the whole moodledata/lang/xx_utf8 and sends it to moodle.org where it's analysed and split into n commits (each lang string to its branches)

Benefits:

• 100% backwards compatibility
• Translation process does not need to change at all - file upload instead of commit only
• Branching is transparent - we need to maintain it in en_utf8 pack
• This would allow us to cleanup HEAD/lang/en_utf8/*
• It allows completely new translation UIs and processes

Implementation:

• Moodle module on moodle.org

See also

• Using Moodle Translators heads up: proposals to change the Moodle translation process forum discussion
• Developer chat 22/06/09 about proposed translation process change (only available to developers with CVS write access)