Language Guidelines for 3rd Party Extensions - Revision history

Ludwig at 17:56, 7 March 2012

2012-03-07T17:56:09Z

2010-09-01T17:00:26Z

‎Include an English language file

2010-05-09T02:05:35Z

2009-10-17T07:35:24Z

add development and extensions categories

2009-03-06T14:03:28Z

2009-01-10T17:15:59Z

Added to some relevant categories and tweaked syntax highlighting.

2008-08-31T16:50:59Z

‎Include an English language file

2008-08-31T16:47:35Z

‎Use UTF8

2008-08-31T01:06:39Z

2008-08-31T01:03:29Z

@@ Line 102: / Line 102: @@
 [[Category:Extensions]]
 [[Category:JED]]
 </noinclude>

@@ Line 57: / Line 57: @@
 </source>
-Another reason to provide an English language file is to help translators using the Translation Manager Component to create the file in other languages.
+Another reason to provide an English language file is to help translators using the [http://joomlacode.org/gf/project/trans_mngr/frs/ Translation Manager Component] to create the file in other languages.
 The Translation Manager Component proposes the basic en-GB set as a reference when creating/editing these files.

@@ Line 1: / Line 1: @@
 The purpose of this document is to give some guidelines for developers for their 3rd party Joomla! 1.5 extension, so that users can easier adapt extensions for use in their local language. '''These guidelines are not rules''' which would limit their freedom in development and distribution. But extensions based on these guidelines will be more flexible and easier to translate, which might have a positive influence on their use and popularity.
@@ Line 100: / Line 101: @@
 [[Category:Development]]
 [[Category:Extensions]]
 </noinclude>

@@ Line 97: / Line 97: @@
 * [[Location of template language definition files]]
 * [[Formatted fields in language translation strings]]
-<noinclude>[[Category:Languages]]</noinclude>
+<noinclude>[[Category:Languages]]

@@ Line 76: / Line 76: @@
 == Group logical entities in translation file ==
 Large translation files are difficult to read. Try to group logical entities together, and use # comment lines (start with "#") to describe the logical entity. A good example is the Joomla core translation file '''/language/en-GB/en-GB.ini'''. Date format, Months, Days of the Week, Time Zones, Mailer Codes are all grouped together and those logical entities start with a comment line.
 == Translation File Version Control ==

@@ Line 4: / Line 4: @@
 A module (e.g. mod_somemodule) with the following hard coded Dutch language text in the XML installation (and configuration) file,
 needs to be fully analyzed and rewritten for any other language.
-<source lang="ini">
+<source lang="xml">
 <param name="dateformat" type="text" default="%A %d %B %Y, %H:%M"
   label="Datum / Tijd formaat" description="Gebruik de PHP strftime datum en tijd opmaak." />
@@ Line 13: / Line 13: @@
 == Use language labels instead ==
 The same mod_somemodule.xml installer file but now with language labels is much easier to translate!
-<source lang="ini">
+<source lang="xml">
 <param name="dateformat" type="text" default="%A %d %B %Y, %H:%M"
   label="DATUMTIJDFORMAAT" description="DATUMTIJDFORMAATBESCHR" />
@@ Line 30: / Line 30: @@
 == Use English language labels ==
 The previous example with language labels and an external language file is easier to translate. However Non-Dutch users will have much difficulties in translating the language file. Please use English language labels instead!
-<source lang="ini">
+<source lang="xml">
 <param name="dateformat" type="text" default="%A %d %B %Y, %H:%M"
   label="DATETIMEFORMAT" description="DATETIMEFORMATDESCR" />
@@ Line 95: / Line 95: @@
 * [[Location of template language definition files]]
 * [[Formatted fields in language translation strings]]

@@ Line 55: / Line 55: @@
 POSTTEXTDESCR = Any text that should be placed after the date.
 </source>
 == PHP strftime ==

@@ Line 60: / Line 60: @@
 == Use UTF8 ==
-All .ini language files need to be saved as UTF-8 for the proper display of characters which are not in the ASCII range [a..z] and [A..Z].
+All .ini language files need to be saved as UTF-8 no BOM for the proper display of characters which are not in the ASCII range [a..z] and [A..Z].
 es-ES.mod_somemodule.ini

@@ Line 1: / Line 1: @@
-The purpose of this document is to give some guidelines to developers for their 3rd party Joomla! 1.5 extension, so that users can easier adapt extensions for use in their local language.
+The purpose of this document is to give some guidelines for developers for their 3rd party Joomla! 1.5 extension, so that users can easier adapt extensions for use in their local language. '''These guidelines are not rules''' which would limit their freedom in development and distribution. But extensions based on these guidelines will be more flexible and easier to translate, which might have a positive influence on their use and popularity.
-−
-Note that this document contains '''only guidelines'''. These guidelines are '''not rules''' which limit your freedom in development and distribution. Extensions based on these guidelines will be more flexible and easier to translate to other languages, which will have a positive influence on their use and popularity.
-−
-Extensions with hard coded text in a specific language have limited use within the community, because translating such an extension is difficult, and if possible, takes a lot of time.
 == Do NOT use hard coded language text ==

@@ Line 75: / Line 75: @@
 despuÃ©s is UTF-8 and will be displayed as después.
-== Group translations ==
+== Group logical entities in translation file ==
 Large translation files are difficult to read. Try to group logical entities together, and use # comment lines (start with "#") to describe the logical entity. A good example is the Joomla core translation file '''/language/en-GB/en-GB.ini'''. Date format, Months, Days of the Week, Time Zones, Mailer Codes are all grouped together and those logical entities start with a comment line.
-== Version Control ==
+== Translation File Version Control ==
 Keep in mind that your extensions might be used in a broad range of different languages. A new release of a new version of your extension might have changes in your default language file. If your extension has a large language files, then individual users might have difficulties to find the changes. Please make their lives easier and find a way to make translation easier. Some 3rd party extension developers put changed language labels on top, or bottom, of the language files which makes the changes easier to spot. Some added # comments (e.g. with version information) are also very welcome.