How to add multi-lingual (multi language) support
in Joomla 1.5
If you are facing the task to build a
multi-language enabled
Joomla website like me then I think my experience on building a
multi-language website with Joomla CMS might be beneficial to
you.
In order to build a multi-language website in Joomla you will have
to use
Joom!Fish multilanguage Joomla support plugin.
The plugin is a bit buggy, but in overall it will allow you to
build a multi language website and consequently add the page
different languate translations.
To install the plugin on your 1.5 Joomla based install;
1.
Download the
JoomFish plugin
Install it the usual joomla way joomla plugins are installed,
via;
Extensions -> Install/Uninstall
2. Enable the Joom!Fish plugin
To do so navigate to;
Extensions -> Module Manager
Enable the module by ticking under the
Enabled column on the
line where you read
Language Selection
3. Install Language packs for all languages which should be
supported by JoomFish
Now as the
JoomFish Language selection module is enabled,
one needs to install the necessery
Joomla Language Packs for
all the languages which the Joomla based website is planned to
support.
In my case I neede a three lingual website, which will support only
the Languages:
- Bulgarian
- Russian
- and
- English
Thus I went on
Joomla! Extensions Directory -
extensions.joomla.org and downloaded the the three language
packs I needed (English, Russian and Bulgarian).
Again the Installation of the language packs is trivial and is done
through the Joomla's:
Extensions -> Install/Uninstall
After installation to find out all the languages your Joomla
installation will support you can navigate inside Joomla admin
to:
Extensions -> Install/Uninstall ->
Languages
Screenshot of my installed list of Joomla Language Packs
(Multi-Language setup)
Another way to check the list of enabled installed languages
supported in your Joomla is via the menu:
Site -> Control Panel -> Language
Manager
Something important here is to a default language is set in the
Language Manager
4. Create translations from default installed language to the rest
of the installed ones
Go to the JoomFish component through the menus:
Components -> Joom!Fish -> Control
Panel
If all your language packs are correctly installed and enabled so
far you should notice them listed while clicking on Content
Languages
If all the Joomla Languages which your website is supposed to
support are not there, this means something is generally wrong with
installed lanaguage packs and you need to go back few steps and
check what might be wrong, hopefully that's not the case ;)
To immediately start translating your Joomla website to another
from one language to another one, use the control menus:
Components -> Joom!Fish ->
Translation
Here is screenshot on how this menu would look like:
Notice in the above screenshot the Languages: and Content Elements
dropdown menus, this ones are actually the two menus used for all
language translations.
One needs to select under Languages: menu the Language to
which will be translated to, while in Content Elements: has
to be choseen the exact site elements which are about to be
translated.
The Content Elements: necessery to be translated in most of
the cases would be just Menus and Contents
Translating that will have your website user frontend be completely
translated info the foreign language choosen in the
Languages: dialog.
After finalizing the translations of all Articles available in
Menus and Contents make sure the translation is Published, by
selecting the Published tick, below I show you an example language
translation edit of an article, on the left side you see the
Published tick which need to be enabled, for translation to appear
officially in Joomla.
After completing all the translations of elements offered by the
translation window, save the translation by pressing the Apply
button Further on you can check the website in a new tab, if
everything is okay with translations, on the down left corner of
the website footer you should notice the flags of enabled languages
to appear.
Clicking on each of the languages should show you the website in
the language choosen (if you have previously done the translation
to the respective menus).
5. Solving a minor bug in JoomlaFish which prevents translated
language text to display on webpages
During translation of my website from Bulgarian to English, I have
noticed a bug of JoomFish, even though I did the translation of all
my Menus and website Content elements and saved the translations,
refreshing the website in a new tab and choosing the desired
translation was constantly displaying the error message:
"There are no translations available"
I was not able to find a good explanation on the Internet on why
exactly and how this bug occurs, but by some experiments I come up
with a workaround.
If you get the "There are no translations available" after
properly configuring Joom!Fish Multilang support, in order to solve
the error you will have to select temporary a different default
website language from the one currently specified by your
website.
(E.g.) go to jooma admin panel location:
Site -> Control Panel -> Language
Manager
and trigger the default language configured to some of the other
available ones. After reverting back in a couple of seconds this
setting to your desired default language the annoying: "There are
no translations available" message will disappear and your
translated content will appear on the website.
6. Changing the location of language flags (language links) in
Joomla's JoomFish
I have seen plenty of people online looking for a solution on how
they can change the default image flags location, which by default
is placed a place which is not that intuitive and visible by the
user.
Maybe I did not searched enough but from my quick research it
appears there is no information available on how the placement of
language flags switching menu can be changed.
Even though I couldn't find a solution to change the langage flags
in JoomFish , after a bunch of experiments I find a way to do it!
:)
The placement of Language selector buttons can be easily adjusted
through following the Joomla Admin menu:
Extensions -> Module Mamager -> Language
Selection
After opening the Language Selection , you will notice the
Position: dropdown menu setting. The setting has a bunch of options
and allows you to choose the best preferred placement of the
language selector flag buttons, just take few minutes to experiment
which setting fits you best and choose the one most suitable to you
and you're done! ;)
Honestly I never imagined that building a multi-lingual website
with Joomla will be such a piece of cake.
The only drawback with JoomFish, is the way language translation is
implemented as it is not enough user friendly, anyways having the
option to build multi language website for free using open source
CMS solution is great. Ain't it? :)