Translation Process

This page covers a few advanced topics related to SilverStripe's translation system.

To find out about how to assist with translating SilverStripe, see the Contributing Translations page.

Set up your own module for localization

Collecting translatable text

As a first step, you can automatically collect all translatable text in your module through the i18nTextCollector task. See i18n for more details.

Import master files

If you don't have an account on transifex.com yet, create a free account now. After creating a new project, you have to upload the en.yml master file as a new "Resource". While you can do this through the web interface, there's a convenient commandline client for this purpose. In order to use it, set up a new .tx/config file in your module folder:

[main]
host = https://www.transifex.com

[my-project.master]
file_filter = lang/<lang>.yml
source_file = lang/en.yml
source_lang = en
type = YML

If you don't have existing translations, your project is ready to go - simply point translators to the URL, have them sign up, and they can create languages and translations as required.

Import existing translations

In case you have existing translations in YML format, there's a "New language" option in the web interface. Alternatively, use the commandline client.

Export existing translations

You can download new translations in YML format through the web interface, but that can get quite tedious for more than a handful of translations. Again, the commandline client provides a more convenient interface here with the tx pull command, downloading all translations as a batch.

Merge back existing translations

If you want to backport translations onto release branches, simply run the tx pull command on multiple branches. This assumes you're adhereing to the following guidelines:

For significantly changed content of an entity, create a new entity key
For added/removed placeholders, create a new entity
Run the i18nTextCollectorTask with the merge=true option to avoid deleting unused entities (which might still be relevant in older release branches)

Converting your language files from 2.4 PHP format

The conversion from PHP format to YML is taken care of by a module called i18n_yml_converter.

Download Translations from Transifex.com

We are managing our translations through a tool called transifex.com. Most modules are handled under the "silverstripe" user, see list of translatable modules.

Translations need to be reviewed before being committed, which is a process that happens roughly once per month. We're merging back translations into all supported release branches as well as the master branch. The following script should be applied to the oldest release branch, and then merged forward into newer branches:

tx pull
# Manually review changes through git diff, then commit
git add lang/*
git commit -m "Updated translations"

Note: You can download your work right from Transifex in order to speed up the process for your desired language.

JavaScript Translations

SilverStripe also supports translating strings in JavaScript (see i18n), but there's a conversion step involved in order to get those translations syncing with Transifex. Our translation files stored in mymodule/javascript/lang/*.js call ss.i18n.addDictionary() to add files.

ss.i18n.addDictionary('de', {"MyNamespace.MyKey": "My Translation"});

But Transifex only accepts structured formats like JSON.

{"MyNamespace.MyKey": "My Translation"}

First of all, you need to create those source files in JSON, and store them in mymodule/javascript/lang/src/*.js. In your .tx/config you can configure this path as a separate master location.

[main]
host = https://www.transifex.com

[silverstripe-mymodule.master]
file_filter = lang/<lang>.yml
source_file = lang/en.yml
source_lang = en
type = YML

[silverstripe-mymodule.master-js]
file_filter = javascript/lang/src/<lang>.js
source_file = javascript/lang/src/en.js
source_lang = en
type = KEYVALUEJSON

Now you can upload the source files via a normal tx push. Once translations come in, you need to convert the source files back into the JS files SilverStripe can actually read. This requires an installation of our buildtools.

tx pull
(cd .. && phing -Dmodule=mymodule translation-generate-javascript-for-module)
git add javascript/lang/*
git commit -m "Updated javascript translations"

i18n: Developer-level documentation of Silverstripe's i18n capabilities
contributing/translation: Information for translators looking to contribute translations of the SilverStripe UI.
translatable: DataObject-interface powering the website-content translations
"Translatable ModelAdmin" module: An extension which allows translations of DataObjects inside ModelAdmin

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