Translation FAQ

I'd like to help with translating Moodle. What do I do?

Please see Translation for details of how you can help.

I've found an error in a language pack. Who do I contact?

Please contact the language pack maintainer. See the Translation credits for contact details.

The month names and days are displayed in English. How can I translate them?

Names of days and months are pulled out of your operating system. The system is configured for Moodle in langconfig.php where you have the strings locale (for -nix type operating systems) and localewin (for Windows operating systems) that should point to the right locale on your server. Your server operating system should support the language (= locale should be installed) - see also Month-name translation problem for an alternative solution.

I'm starting a new language pack or I'm contributing to one. Can I do the user interface strings first?

No, there is no way to know which strings will be shown for users and which not. But to help you a little bit, there are some unofficial priorities you can take into account.

First:

make sure langconfig is properly set up.
take a look at Translation priority. All files have a rating according to how urgent they need translating.
less urgent are also the contributed plugins, since they are not part of a standard Moodle distribution.

I've found an error in the English language pack. How do I report it?

See the section 'Suggesting improvements to English language strings' in AMOS for details of what to do.

How many words are there in the English language pack?

See the discussion How many words are there in the English language pack?.

Are there translations for the American (and other branches of the) English language?

The "official" language for Moodle is actually the Australian English (hey mate!) , which in 100% the same as UK English.
Someone once said "America and England are two nations divided by a common language".
The English - United States (en_us) language pack mostly contains different spellings (color versus colour, enroll versus enrol etc).
The English - Pirate (en_ar) language pack is used in the 'Talk Like a Pirate' day.
The English for kids (en_kids) language pack seems to be a simplified version of the most common English strings seen by Moodle users, considered easier/suitable for small children.
The English (fixes) (en_fix) is just used to suggest Moodle core language strings improvements and typo fixes.

Documentation