Drupal7 multilingual

Multilingual sites in Drupal 7: New features, new possibilities Grigory Naumovets Kiev, Ukraine

Outline
Support of multilingual content in Drupal: an overview
New multilingual features in D7 core
New multilingual features in D7 versions of contributed modules (i18n etc.)
Summary of most important improvements in multilingual functionality
Problems and prospects

It’s a followup presentation to:
Multilingual sites in Drupal : Problems, solutions, workarounds, and “goodness on the way”
(DrupalCamp Kyiv 2009)
www.slideshare.net/Tinnka/multilanguage-drupal
gn.org.ua/drupal/presentations/DrupalCamp_2009-2010
2009 ----> 2011:
Has anything essential changed with the release of Drupal 7?
Is “multilingual goodness” already approaching, or still on the way?

What is ”i18n” and ”L10n”?
i nternationalizatio n  i18n
18 letters omitted 10 letters omitted L ocalizatio n  L10n These abbreviations are used in the names of Drupal modules, such as “i18n” or “L10n_client”

If Drupal nodes were designed as multilingual from the very beginning …
node/1
(multilingual)
Title (lang1) Title (lang2) Body (lang1) Body (lang2) Some field (lang1) Some field (lang2) Another field (language-neutral) Some file attached (lang1) Some file attached (lang2) Another file attached (language-neutral) comments

However, Drupal nodes are unilingual . i18n is an external feature.
node/1 (unilingual) lang1
Some file attached Another file attached node/2 (unilingual) lang2 Some file attached Another file attached Drupal i18n system: I hereby declare node/1 and node/2 to be translations of each other comments comments Title Body Some field Another field Title Body Some field Another field

Multilanguage: inside or outside?
Two possible approaches to i18n:
Multilingual features inside an object
Unilingual object, multilanguage features are applied from outside as a system of connections to other objects
“ Object” can be a node, a block, a taxonomy term, a menu, a menu item, and so on.

Inside vs outside
Drupal uses both approaches (depending on the object type), so improvements of multilang support proceed in two ways:
Making objects “more multilingual”
Improving the system of i18n-related connections between unilingual objects
Each approach has its advantages and difficulties
Until recently, approach to nodes was only “from outside”
Some problems caused by this approach will be demonstrated below

No field-level language attributes: Why it can be a problem? Example 1
node/1 lang1
Image field node/2 lang2 Image field translation synchronization Title Body Title Body

No field-level language attributes: Why it can be a problem? Example 2
You need to synchronize nodereferences
(i18nsync)
node/3 (en) event info node/4 (ru) event info node/1 (en) location info node/2 (ru) location info translation translation nodereference nodereference

Problem with multilingual views based on nodereference
ru/events/by-location/ Распределение со бытий по месту проведения:
Киев (6)
Кишинёв (4)
ru/events/by-location/37 Список событий в Кишинёве
en/events/by-location/ Events grouped by locations :
Kiev (6)
Chişinău (4)
en/events/by-location/36 List of events in Chişinău “ Chişinău ” (node/36) and “ Кишинёв ” (node/37) are different nodes, so when you switch language EN -> RU while viewing the “ List of events in Chişinău ” you will see an empty list instead of “ Список событий в Кишинёве ” . en  ru en  ru

Inside vs outside
However, the “outside” approach can have some advantages, too
It can be simpler to do or maintain
It can utilize such node-level things as access permissions for nodes having certain attributes (e.g. when you have different people working with nodes in different languages), and so on
It’s highly desirable to have both possibilities, and choose between them depending on the specific situation.

Now, let us look at the D7 core
Modules included in D7 core (same as for D6):
Content Translation
Locale
( disabled by default )

Site configuration settings: “ Regional and Language ” section
Available after enabling the “ Locale ” module

Regional settings
New in D7:
Now you can set “Default country” (to be used by contributed modules)
More intelligent time zone handling (with PHP 5.2+ DateTime objects )

Date and time settings
More control over date and time format

Configuration of Languages: Detection and selection
New in D7:
Finer control over language detection and selection
We can set order of priorities

Interface translation
New in D7:
Improved user interface
Support for context

Contexts are intended for per-meaning translatability Context: “May” as Long month name ( not “may be”) Context is a new feature; guidelines still need to be developed. So far, used inconsistently. Not supported by Javascript menu items and strings.

Localization auto-update
Localization update module by Jose Reyero ( L10n_update )
Works similarly to Drupal core update module
Downloads translation updates from localize.drupal.org (or from custom depository)
Available both for D7 and D6 (v. 7.x-1.0-beta2 and 6.x-1.0-beta1 of 2011-May-31 )

“ Cheat sheets” for localizers (“ шпаргалки ”)
Drupal 7 localization cheat sheet Drupal 6 localization cheat sheet by Gábor Hojtsy hojtsy.hu/files/Drupal7TranslationCheatSheetv2.pdf hojtsy.hu/files/Drupal6TranslationCheatSheetv2.pdf

Now about content translation Enable multilingual support in content type properties: Looking for this in “Publishing options” is not really obvious

Now we can control ‘ node.language ’ attribute for nodes of this content type
By default, a new node is Language neutral
New in D7: For language-neutral nodes, database field node.language = ‘und’ ‘ und’ means ‘undetermined’ in compliance with ISO 639

Node translation (same as in D6)
“ Translate ” tab is seen when:
This content type has multilingual support “ Enabled, with translation ”
This node is NOT language neutral
User is permitted to translate content

“ Translation set” (same as in D6)
‘ tnid ’ – translation set id
is shared by all nodes in a translation set
is equal to ‘nid’ of the base node
node/1 Base node node.nid=1 node.language=‘ en ’ node.tnid= 1 node/2 Translated node node.nid=2 node.language=‘ uk ’ node.tnid= 1 node/3 Translated node node.nid=3 node.language=‘ ru ’ node.tnid= 1

And now something really new… We need to use some contributed modules However, D7 has NO built-in interface for translatable fields  D7 core has built-in support for field languages!!! (via its new Field API) 

Entity_translation module
Can be used to translate fields
New item in “Regional and language settings” – “Entity translation”

Entity translation
Field settings: “Users may translate this field”
New option for multilingual support in content type properties

Single node with multilingual body and other fields: wow, it [almost] works!
Node title is a different kind of field and cannot be translated this way!!!
example.com/uk/node/1 example.com/node/1

‘ Title’ module: replace node title with a regular field

Single node with multilingual body and other fields: now the title can be translated, too!
Node title is now replaced with a regular field using ‘Title’ module
example.com/uk/node/1 example.com/node/1

Entity_translation + Title: is this already the “multilingual field goodness”?
These modules are very recent, still at the ‘dev’ stage (v. 7.x-1.x-dev )
As of June 2, 2011,
130 sites currently report using ‘Entity_translation’
59 sites currently report using ‘Title’
Still quite a lot of todo’s
We need to test its interactions with views. taxonomy, paths, and so on.

Now about the i18n.module
Q: Can I build a multilingual site using only the core D7 functionality?
A: A very simple site – yes, but for more complex things you’ll need the i18n.module. i18n helps you handle multilingual blocks, menus, views, synchronization of items between nodes, and so on.

Enabling multilingual variables in i18n/D6: add their names ( site_name , site_footer , theme_settings , etc.) to the settings.php file $conf['i18n_variables'] = array( // Site name, slogan, mission, etc.. 'site_name', 'site_slogan', 'site_mission', 'site_footer', 'anonymous', // Different front page for each language 'site_frontpage', // Primary and secondary links 'menu_primary_links_source', 'menu_secondary_links_source', // Contact form information 'contact_form_information', // For theme variables, read more below 'theme_settings', 'theme_garland_settings', );

i18n/D7 does not work this way anymore Now multilingual variables are controlled via “Multilingial settings – Variables” menu (Depends on the new variable.module )

Multilingual variables A very convenient link to switch languages (especially if there is no language switcher in the admin theme)

New in D7 and important: Translation set API
(i18n_translation.module)
Now we can create translation sets not only for nodes, but for other things, too:
taxonomy terms
menu items
paths
Not implemented yet for blocks

Taxonomy terms Connect different terms as translations of each other: This option was available in D6, too – but it did not really work. Now (I hope) it should!

New: Path translation (i18n_path.module)
Intended for translation of generic paths that don't have other way of being translated.
From any of these pages, the language switcher will point to the other path for each language.
Note: path translations must be defined without aliases.

Menu translation
Thanks to Translation set API, now we can translate menu items pointing to specific nodes, e.g.: (en) -> node/1 (uk) -> node/2

Blocks
Translation sets not working for Blocks yet(?)
Improved UI and visibility options
Block can be translated via string translation

Other improvements in i18n
More options and improved UI for content selection and filtering by language
More items can be synchronized between translation set nodes (because more items are available as Fields)
Translation redirect (i18n_redirect.module): redirect to translated path when available (SEO optimization)
Contact form translation (i18n_contact.module) – recently added

Berlin Internationalization sprint (May 11-15, 2011)
i18nsprint.drupalevents.de
reyero.net/en/drupal/berlin_internationalization_sprint : “ How i18n got some fresh blood and a sexy facelift ”
i18n 7.x-1.0-beta6 (May 24, 2011) includes improvements from Berlin i18n sprint. New features:
Consistent translation tabs for objects
Contact form translation

Summary of most important changes in D7 and i18n/D7
D7:
Translation of fields within a node (no built-in UI yet, available via recently contributed modules)
i18n/D7:
Translation sets (connecting taxonomy terms, menu items, paths, etc.)
Plus lots of less important improvements in UI, content selection and filtering, etc.

References
Drupal 7's new multilingual systems compilation by Gábor Hojtsy hojtsy.hu/multilingual-drupal7
Drupal 7 Multilingual: What is new in i18n by Suzanne Kennedy evolvingweb.ca/story/drupal-7-multilingual-whats-new-i18n
Multilanguage for Drupal 7: Internationalization module (i18n beta1) by Jose Reyero reyero.net/en/drupal/drupal7_i18n_beta1_overview
Content Translation (field translation) in Drupal 7: First steps by Randy Fay (read discussions in the comments, too!) randyfay.com/node/88

Questions?
Contacts:
http://camp11.drupal.ua/users/GN
[email_address]
http://gn.org.ua/feedback

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Drupal7 multilingual

by Grigory Naumovets on Jun 03, 2011

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Drupal7 multilingual — Presentation Transcript