i18n: preface
This is a series of essays about internationalising a software application using a translation management suite. It assumes you have some working knowledge of web development and Typescript, but not a huge amount - I've tried to make this book useful for non technical folks too - but hopefully the planning section has you covered.
Motivation
This is the first series of articles I've shared, and I'd like to get some feedback and improve. I've also greatly enjoyed my most recent project at Semble, and wanted to share how it went.
When I say most recent project, I mean the following:
We need to ready our web application & related services to deploy in another language.
If you face the prospect of a task like this and don't have time to read all this, then here is the TLDR:
- Find & list your phrases first, don't worry about switching on the system.
- Think about ownership early - text is voice.
- Pay attention when interpolating - some things may not change when you expect.
- Once (you think) it's all tagged, tidy up your dictionary (and make a copy for testing)
Good luck! If you have more time, read on.
Chapters
In the first chapter I cover how we approached this problem from a theoretical perspective at Semble.
Next, we look at what it is like in practice to complete this work, from a developers perspective.
In the third chapter we look at this system as it stands in production, and reflect on bugs, enhancements and supporting code.
In Doing it again I share my opinions on what I'd do differently if I undertook this work again. In the last chapter, I share even more opinions on the future of doing work like this, and how one might avoid a large translation refactor by starting out with a dictionary.
next: in theory